I just hit level three as a fighter and kind of new to 5e. I am a half orc fighter, who was planning on going 17 champion/3 barbarian for crit fishing. But have been reading about rune knight and thinking...just pure rune knight might be better. By only having 3 levels in barbarian, I would only be able to rage 3 times per long rest. Now during that time, I would have resistance to most melee attacks. Also, I would gain advantage on attacks, but give advantage on attacks against me per reckless attacks. I would have crits on 18-20, which would give me an extra weapon damage die roll as a half orc. With advantage and crits on 18-20, I am guessing my crit rate would be around 27-28%. But none of that seems to be as good as all that the rune knight brings to the table! Add to that, I would be able to wear heavy armor as a pure fighter.
Am I missing anything? Has anybody played both a fighter/barbarian and a rune knight, who can give me the run down on both? Seems to me that rune knight is insanely good.
Im playing a Rune knight in Mad Mage campaign and I have to say the subclass is incredibly fun! Soooo many options and so much utility and power! You feel like a spellcaster yet you dont cast spells.
With that said though I have found a few hiccups with the subclass:
- You absolutely need ranged weaponry. This is mostly just to hit from anywhere, plus its nice to not be hit while still providing "cover" for allies. Also Giants might will work on ranged weapons.
-from my experience the cloud, hill, and storm runes are the absolute best (ymmv however).
-highly suggest avoiding dual wielding blades for just how often you probably will be using your bonus action with your rune (this depends on the difficulty of the fight and again ymmv)
Outside of these things I absolutely LOVE this subclass. I probably will be playing in one soon again and using a revolver over my current greatsword.
Here's something to consider-- you come online much later as a fighter barbarian. Rune Knight gets all their features right on schedule without sacrificing anything. Now keep in mind, those features of raging are a lot more limiting at a lvl 3 dip, they'd be far more situational and you'd end up relying more on your rageless gameplay, and you'd have a lot less AC or be limited to half plate at best most of the time.
Sounds a little like you’ve already made up your mind. Go with the one that will be more fun, not the one that you picked because the math said you’ll do more damage on average. The more memorable characters are the ones that had a personality, not the ones that were mathematically superior.
Sounds a little like you’ve already made up your mind. Go with the one that will be more fun, not the one that you picked because the math said you’ll do more damage on average. The more memorable characters are the ones that had a personality, not the ones that were mathematically superior.
Or create one with both. I always attempt min/'max, but unless I can create a personality for my pc's they won't see the light of day.
Sounds a little like you’ve already made up your mind. Go with the one that will be more fun, not the one that you picked because the math said you’ll do more damage on average. The more memorable characters are the ones that had a personality, not the ones that were mathematically superior.
I went with the champion fighter, to later multiclass into barbarian. I already had the character concept and backstory written, but Rune Knight was trying to flirt with me from across the room! lol
I am planning on going fighter 6, then barb 3, then the rest all fighter. Currently our campaign is only going to 12, but DM has talked about finding something else to take us on after we finish Rime of the Frostmaiden. Not sure if he will have to homebrew something or maybe can find some module/campaign settings from non-WOTC sources. Seems like there is a demand for 12-20 level campaigns, just not what it is going to be for the lower levels.
I wouldn't ever recommend building a character around what might happen at very high levels. Play the game to enjoy the game now, not for perceived power spikes that might happen a long way down the line.
More than that, play the character to be the RP character you want them to be. Multiclassing is best done for RP reasons, not to power up your character.
Remember that your character's "power level" is purely in your head. My players have min-maxed themselves as much as possible (I told them to go for it) and they are 4 x level 4 characters who take on CR7 creatures and I double all the boss monsters hit points because otherwise the players just tear them apart in 1-2 turns. So essentially, they are still taking out the boss after about 5 turns of combat, which is what they would be doing anyway if they weren't all cheesy min-maxers. I often just dose the monster with an extra 50-100 hit points in the first or second turn of combat if I feel that I've not provided a tough enough challenge (I assume other DM's do this with homebrew, which is really hard to balance given the myriad factors of feats, magic items, and random dice rolls - the game being exciting matters more than sticking to what you wrote down three Tuesdays ago). So even though it feels like you are more powerful... there's no such thing as power.
I wouldn't ever recommend building a character around what might happen at very high levels. Play the game to enjoy the game now, not for perceived power spikes that might happen a long way down the line.
More than that, play the character to be the RP character you want them to be. Multiclassing is best done for RP reasons, not to power up your character.
Remember that your character's "power level" is purely in your head. My players have min-maxed themselves as much as possible (I told them to go for it) and they are 4 x level 4 characters who take on CR7 creatures and I double all the boss monsters hit points because otherwise the players just tear them apart in 1-2 turns. So essentially, they are still taking out the boss after about 5 turns of combat, which is what they would be doing anyway if they weren't all cheesy min-maxers. I often just dose the monster with an extra 50-100 hit points in the first or second turn of combat if I feel that I've not provided a tough enough challenge (I assume other DM's do this with homebrew, which is really hard to balance given the myriad factors of feats, magic items, and random dice rolls - the game being exciting matters more than sticking to what you wrote down three Tuesdays ago). So even though it feels like you are more powerful... there's no such thing as power.
While I agree with this, in theory. It's a basic fact of the game that most people who play it, wish to have an effective player. In terms of Gameplay, the half orc champion is likely to be good at only one thing, combat. This is not a bard, warlock, sorcerer or paladin with a really high charisma, who can be the "face" of the party. You probably don't have a high intelligence score and certainly not proficiency, so your investigation and such is lacking. A fighter's role is pretty much combat. So they have to be good at that or they have nothing. The champion subclass has the least going for it, imo. It's really there to be a 3 level dip as a multi-class, from what I can tell. I am going half orc champion, to see if I can make it an effective class. So far, the problem I see the most is...the champion has almost no ability to control the combat. It has one thing that's nice, expanded crit range. But you have no control over that and no way to expand your damage beyond basic attacks ala most other classes and fighter styles.
I wouldn't ever recommend building a character around what might happen at very high levels. Play the game to enjoy the game now, not for perceived power spikes that might happen a long way down the line.
More than that, play the character to be the RP character you want them to be. Multiclassing is best done for RP reasons, not to power up your character.
Remember that your character's "power level" is purely in your head. My players have min-maxed themselves as much as possible (I told them to go for it) and they are 4 x level 4 characters who take on CR7 creatures and I double all the boss monsters hit points because otherwise the players just tear them apart in 1-2 turns. So essentially, they are still taking out the boss after about 5 turns of combat, which is what they would be doing anyway if they weren't all cheesy min-maxers. I often just dose the monster with an extra 50-100 hit points in the first or second turn of combat if I feel that I've not provided a tough enough challenge (I assume other DM's do this with homebrew, which is really hard to balance given the myriad factors of feats, magic items, and random dice rolls - the game being exciting matters more than sticking to what you wrote down three Tuesdays ago). So even though it feels like you are more powerful... there's no such thing as power.
While I agree with this, in theory. It's a basic fact of the game that most people who play it, wish to have an effective player. In terms of Gameplay, the half orc champion is likely to be good at only one thing, combat. This is not a bard, warlock, sorcerer or paladin with a really high charisma, who can be the "face" of the party. You probably don't have a high intelligence score and certainly not proficiency, so your investigation and such is lacking. A fighter's role is pretty much combat. So they have to be good at that or they have nothing. The champion subclass has the least going for it, imo. It's really there to be a 3 level dip as a multi-class, from what I can tell. I am going half orc champion, to see if I can make it an effective class. So far, the problem I see the most is...the champion has almost no ability to control the combat. It has one thing that's nice, expanded crit range. But you have no control over that and no way to expand your damage beyond basic attacks ala most other classes and fighter styles.
In Practice Champions are actually able to be good at a lot of things. Your Face complaint? More Easily covered than you think... Or getting that wisdom a bit higher. Or Being a more intelligent fighter. These are much more easily done because of the number of ASI's... Some interesting little tidbit abilities like Remarkable Athlete which provides half your proficiency bonus to something like 1/3 to 1/2 the skills in the game at level 6. As well as a whole slew of other factors. Even their second Fighting Style let's them diversify their combat focus more than other types of Fighter. That Champion Fighter only has a couple of stats to worry about and a whole lot of room to increase others as they wish. Or take Feats if they wish. Particularly since there are 7 of them. And it's easy to pick a race combination that doesn't require more than 4 ASI's to max those two stats out. Meaning you can pick up that extra wis or extra Charisma or Extra intelligence if you want to. Their basic nature actually allow them to be the most customizable thanks to the various tools provided in the game.
I wouldn't ever recommend building a character around what might happen at very high levels. Play the game to enjoy the game now, not for perceived power spikes that might happen a long way down the line.
More than that, play the character to be the RP character you want them to be. Multiclassing is best done for RP reasons, not to power up your character.
Remember that your character's "power level" is purely in your head. My players have min-maxed themselves as much as possible (I told them to go for it) and they are 4 x level 4 characters who take on CR7 creatures and I double all the boss monsters hit points because otherwise the players just tear them apart in 1-2 turns. So essentially, they are still taking out the boss after about 5 turns of combat, which is what they would be doing anyway if they weren't all cheesy min-maxers. I often just dose the monster with an extra 50-100 hit points in the first or second turn of combat if I feel that I've not provided a tough enough challenge (I assume other DM's do this with homebrew, which is really hard to balance given the myriad factors of feats, magic items, and random dice rolls - the game being exciting matters more than sticking to what you wrote down three Tuesdays ago). So even though it feels like you are more powerful... there's no such thing as power.
While I agree with this, in theory. It's a basic fact of the game that most people who play it, wish to have an effective player. In terms of Gameplay, the half orc champion is likely to be good at only one thing, combat. This is not a bard, warlock, sorcerer or paladin with a really high charisma, who can be the "face" of the party. You probably don't have a high intelligence score and certainly not proficiency, so your investigation and such is lacking. A fighter's role is pretty much combat. So they have to be good at that or they have nothing. The champion subclass has the least going for it, imo. It's really there to be a 3 level dip as a multi-class, from what I can tell. I am going half orc champion, to see if I can make it an effective class. So far, the problem I see the most is...the champion has almost no ability to control the combat. It has one thing that's nice, expanded crit range. But you have no control over that and no way to expand your damage beyond basic attacks ala most other classes and fighter styles.
In Practice Champions are actually able to be good at a lot of things. Your Face complaint? More Easily covered than you think... Or getting that wisdom a bit higher. Or Being a more intelligent fighter. These are much more easily done because of the number of ASI's... Some interesting little tidbit abilities like Remarkable Athlete which provides half your proficiency bonus to something like 1/3 to 1/2 the skills in the game at level 6. As well as a whole slew of other factors. Even their second Fighting Style let's them diversify their combat focus more than other types of Fighter. That Champion Fighter only has a couple of stats to worry about and a whole lot of room to increase others as they wish. Or take Feats if they wish. Particularly since there are 7 of them. And it's easy to pick a race combination that doesn't require more than 4 ASI's to max those two stats out. Meaning you can pick up that extra wis or extra Charisma or Extra intelligence if you want to. Their basic nature actually allow them to be the most customizable thanks to the various tools provided in the game.
This is the odd thing about Champion though....they are encouraged to go STR with the increased chance of crits (bigger die on a crit = better) but the fighting styles for a long time did not encourage STR builds much (GWF is about 1.2 point of damage added and Defense tends to be the default option). Now we have some interesting contenders (Unarmed, Blind, Throwing) that work a lot better with STR builds. The only downside is you get the extra style at level 10 which is late enough that its unlikely to impact your game much as most games end by 10th level.
Overall its better for champion but I do think Rune Knight gives you more bang for your buck in the meat of the play time (5th through 10th).
I wouldn't ever recommend building a character around what might happen at very high levels. Play the game to enjoy the game now, not for perceived power spikes that might happen a long way down the line.
More than that, play the character to be the RP character you want them to be. Multiclassing is best done for RP reasons, not to power up your character.
Remember that your character's "power level" is purely in your head. My players have min-maxed themselves as much as possible (I told them to go for it) and they are 4 x level 4 characters who take on CR7 creatures and I double all the boss monsters hit points because otherwise the players just tear them apart in 1-2 turns. So essentially, they are still taking out the boss after about 5 turns of combat, which is what they would be doing anyway if they weren't all cheesy min-maxers. I often just dose the monster with an extra 50-100 hit points in the first or second turn of combat if I feel that I've not provided a tough enough challenge (I assume other DM's do this with homebrew, which is really hard to balance given the myriad factors of feats, magic items, and random dice rolls - the game being exciting matters more than sticking to what you wrote down three Tuesdays ago). So even though it feels like you are more powerful... there's no such thing as power.
While I agree with this, in theory. It's a basic fact of the game that most people who play it, wish to have an effective player. In terms of Gameplay, the half orc champion is likely to be good at only one thing, combat. This is not a bard, warlock, sorcerer or paladin with a really high charisma, who can be the "face" of the party. You probably don't have a high intelligence score and certainly not proficiency, so your investigation and such is lacking. A fighter's role is pretty much combat. So they have to be good at that or they have nothing. The champion subclass has the least going for it, imo. It's really there to be a 3 level dip as a multi-class, from what I can tell. I am going half orc champion, to see if I can make it an effective class. So far, the problem I see the most is...the champion has almost no ability to control the combat. It has one thing that's nice, expanded crit range. But you have no control over that and no way to expand your damage beyond basic attacks ala most other classes and fighter styles.
In Practice Champions are actually able to be good at a lot of things. Your Face complaint? More Easily covered than you think... Or getting that wisdom a bit higher. Or Being a more intelligent fighter. These are much more easily done because of the number of ASI's... Some interesting little tidbit abilities like Remarkable Athlete which provides half your proficiency bonus to something like 1/3 to 1/2 the skills in the game at level 6. As well as a whole slew of other factors. Even their second Fighting Style let's them diversify their combat focus more than other types of Fighter. That Champion Fighter only has a couple of stats to worry about and a whole lot of room to increase others as they wish. Or take Feats if they wish. Particularly since there are 7 of them. And it's easy to pick a race combination that doesn't require more than 4 ASI's to max those two stats out. Meaning you can pick up that extra wis or extra Charisma or Extra intelligence if you want to. Their basic nature actually allow them to be the most customizable thanks to the various tools provided in the game.
This is the odd thing about Champion though....they are encouraged to go STR with the increased chance of crits (bigger die on a crit = better) but the fighting styles for a long time did not encourage STR builds much (GWF is about 1.2 point of damage added and Defense tends to be the default option). Now we have some interesting contenders (Unarmed, Blind, Throwing) that work a lot better with STR builds. The only downside is you get the extra style at level 10 which is late enough that its unlikely to impact your game much as most games end by 10th level.
Overall its better for champion but I do think Rune Knight gives you more bang for your buck in the meat of the play time (5th through 10th).
Both of my Champions were very different. One was built as an outright tank. So yes Defense was it's first fighting STyle. My second one was built mostly for dealing damage and off-tanking if desperate because we had better tanks so I had TWF and eventually archery.
for the longest time it wasn't that the Fighting Styles didn't encourage using strength. But more that for a long time the Fighting Styles were ambivalent about your stat choices with the exception of the Archery fighting style but that was more forced by the nature of Ranged weapons than the fighting styles. This was by design because they were meant to be open to a wide variety of builds as choices. But they actually made some of the best strength based dual wielders in the game (with the appropriate feat of course).
But with the Champion. It's not exactly about what Champion gives you. It does give you some very potent but basic perks. Perks that are found almost nowhere else in fact. The Champion primarily revolves around what you give yourself instead and that's pretty much at all levels. The Champion more than any other class and Subclass primarily is about what you make of it. And not what it pushes you into.
Even the Battle Master which is another fairly neutral subclass kind of pushes you in one direction and it pushed you a lot more into certain styles than the Champion ever did. I'd have to go back and look but I remember about half of the seemingly more interesting Maneuvers initially somehow revolving around tanking with a lot more options being added in only in the last couple of books. The Fighting Styles are a nice addition for all fighters and in some ways the champion in particular for being able to get two. But the champion is still fairly neutral in their regard. The abilities and styles kind of opened up with the new maneuvers though does a lot more for the Battle Master and opens up some interesting combinations that they just didn't have before though you are kind of locking yourself into certain styles still by your combination of choices.
I honestly feel the opposite about Battlemaster as I think it had a bunch of different options that appealed to a variety of builds. Menacing attack you could use as a TWF to hit 3 targets at level 5 and make them all frightened which plays much differently than someone who took Precision attack and GWM to really kill that one thing in the room.
I do feel like that for Samurai though...its mostly geared towards the power attack builds (GWM or Sharpshooter) with sharpshooter being the prevailing approach due to Elven Accuracy and the "super advantage" it creates.
I actually think Battlemaster is more versatile now out of combat with the add of Ambush and other skill based uses of the die. It really helps you mold a character to exactly how you want them to play.
Champion to me was the "simple" fighter that had a chance (albeit a small one) of producing something exciting every attack with the critical and you had a lot of free reign in the RP as you stated.
I honestly feel the opposite about Battlemaster as I think it had a bunch of different options that appealed to a variety of builds. Menacing attack you could use as a TWF to hit 3 targets at level 5 and make them all frightened which plays much differently than someone who took Precision attack and GWM to really kill that one thing in the room.
I do feel like that for Samurai though...its mostly geared towards the power attack builds (GWM or Sharpshooter) with sharpshooter being the prevailing approach due to Elven Accuracy and the "super advantage" it creates.
I actually think Battlemaster is more versatile now out of combat with the add of Ambush and other skill based uses of the die. It really helps you mold a character to exactly how you want them to play.
Champion to me was the "simple" fighter that had a chance (albeit a small one) of producing something exciting every attack with the critical and you had a lot of free reign in the RP as you stated.
Menacing attack only hits one target. But even if you spent 3 of your superiority die to do it 3 times. Menacing attack leans heavily into tanking because it's a good tool for denying space to the enemy. Which pairs up with things like Parry, Goading, Pushing, trip, evasive footwork, maneuvering and even some extent Riposte for making a strong tank with some control options that Fighters actually kind of need to help with their Tanking either to affect enemy movements or to make themselves more threatening.
Precision attack is going to be more of a striker dps move but that's really the second category of moves you got in the core book for the most part along with Feinting attack, Sweeping Attack, lunging attack, and even distracting Strike.
Now that's not to say there isn't some variation within these depending on what you pick. But they really just lean in two directions.
Then when you get the newer ones you get things like Ambush, Brace, Commanding Presence, and Tactical Assessment which 3 of the 4 just these actually rely fully on skills for the first time. This opens up a whole new type of fighter. The Skill Based Fighter. Something the Champion could do before by being so simple is now open to the Battle Master to focus on various different skills and get improvements on them through their Maneuvers for the first time. This is the first real shift for the Battle Master and it's something the Champion was easily doing all along and even low key encouraged to do all along but people didn't really notice or didn't really consider because all they considered was "what do you my features enable me to do" and not "What does my Character enable me to do" which the second is what the Champion truly excelled at but the Battle Master is finally catching up.
If you notice when it comes to Fighters. Most of the Fighters that came in future installments do something like give you new proficiencies with the exception of the Echo Knight (and the rune Knight if your one that thinks Smith's tools don't really count for some reason). Most of them are Proficiencies in one or more skills and usually is a choice of what skill you want. The Psi-Warrior is technically also an exception but it actually does help your proficiencies by having Intelligence be important so it actually gives you more skills by the Design of being somewhat more MAD in a stat that actually improves several skills which lends towards a more skill based warrior as well because of it.
You can use menacing with any weapon attack so even an archer can use it so its hardly just for tanking.
You can trip attack from a distance too so you can prone the guy in front of your friend if you know he is going next.
Things like Riposte on a monk means you can off turn stun a guy and end their turn.
Commander's strike is great if you have a paladin key'd up to smite some fools.
Battle master is pretty versatile....not quite as versatile as Eldritch Knight but fairly close. It pairs well with literally any marital build and since it keys off your DEX or STR your DC will always be fairly high.
It has debuffs (Trip attack, Menacing, Disarm), Damage (Precision, Riposte), Movement (Evasive Footwork, maneuvering attack, pushing attack), Buff (Distracting, Commander's Strike),
And most of these can be with melee or ranged. Yes you can push attack with an arrow and knock it away from your friend.
I wouldn't ever recommend building a character around what might happen at very high levels. Play the game to enjoy the game now, not for perceived power spikes that might happen a long way down the line.
More than that, play the character to be the RP character you want them to be. Multiclassing is best done for RP reasons, not to power up your character.
Remember that your character's "power level" is purely in your head. My players have min-maxed themselves as much as possible (I told them to go for it) and they are 4 x level 4 characters who take on CR7 creatures and I double all the boss monsters hit points because otherwise the players just tear them apart in 1-2 turns. So essentially, they are still taking out the boss after about 5 turns of combat, which is what they would be doing anyway if they weren't all cheesy min-maxers. I often just dose the monster with an extra 50-100 hit points in the first or second turn of combat if I feel that I've not provided a tough enough challenge (I assume other DM's do this with homebrew, which is really hard to balance given the myriad factors of feats, magic items, and random dice rolls - the game being exciting matters more than sticking to what you wrote down three Tuesdays ago). So even though it feels like you are more powerful... there's no such thing as power.
While I agree with this, in theory. It's a basic fact of the game that most people who play it, wish to have an effective player. In terms of Gameplay, the half orc champion is likely to be good at only one thing, combat. This is not a bard, warlock, sorcerer or paladin with a really high charisma, who can be the "face" of the party. You probably don't have a high intelligence score and certainly not proficiency, so your investigation and such is lacking. A fighter's role is pretty much combat. So they have to be good at that or they have nothing. The champion subclass has the least going for it, imo. It's really there to be a 3 level dip as a multi-class, from what I can tell. I am going half orc champion, to see if I can make it an effective class. So far, the problem I see the most is...the champion has almost no ability to control the combat. It has one thing that's nice, expanded crit range. But you have no control over that and no way to expand your damage beyond basic attacks ala most other classes and fighter styles.
In Practice Champions are actually able to be good at a lot of things. Your Face complaint? More Easily covered than you think... Or getting that wisdom a bit higher. Or Being a more intelligent fighter. These are much more easily done because of the number of ASI's... Some interesting little tidbit abilities like Remarkable Athlete which provides half your proficiency bonus to something like 1/3 to 1/2 the skills in the game at level 6. As well as a whole slew of other factors. Even their second Fighting Style let's them diversify their combat focus more than other types of Fighter. That Champion Fighter only has a couple of stats to worry about and a whole lot of room to increase others as they wish. Or take Feats if they wish. Particularly since there are 7 of them. And it's easy to pick a race combination that doesn't require more than 4 ASI's to max those two stats out. Meaning you can pick up that extra wis or extra Charisma or Extra intelligence if you want to. Their basic nature actually allow them to be the most customizable thanks to the various tools provided in the game.
This is the odd thing about Champion though....they are encouraged to go STR with the increased chance of crits (bigger die on a crit = better) but the fighting styles for a long time did not encourage STR builds much (GWF is about 1.2 point of damage added and Defense tends to be the default option). Now we have some interesting contenders (Unarmed, Blind, Throwing) that work a lot better with STR builds. The only downside is you get the extra style at level 10 which is late enough that its unlikely to impact your game much as most games end by 10th level.
Overall its better for champion but I do think Rune Knight gives you more bang for your buck in the meat of the play time (5th through 10th).
Both of my Champions were very different. One was built as an outright tank. So yes Defense was it's first fighting STyle. My second one was built mostly for dealing damage and off-tanking if desperate because we had better tanks so I had TWF and eventually archery.
for the longest time it wasn't that the Fighting Styles didn't encourage using strength. But more that for a long time the Fighting Styles were ambivalent about your stat choices with the exception of the Archery fighting style but that was more forced by the nature of Ranged weapons than the fighting styles. This was by design because they were meant to be open to a wide variety of builds as choices. But they actually made some of the best strength based dual wielders in the game (with the appropriate feat of course).
But with the Champion. It's not exactly about what Champion gives you. It does give you some very potent but basic perks. Perks that are found almost nowhere else in fact. The Champion primarily revolves around what you give yourself instead and that's pretty much at all levels. The Champion more than any other class and Subclass primarily is about what you make of it. And not what it pushes you into.
Even the Battle Master which is another fairly neutral subclass kind of pushes you in one direction and it pushed you a lot more into certain styles than the Champion ever did. I'd have to go back and look but I remember about half of the seemingly more interesting Maneuvers initially somehow revolving around tanking with a lot more options being added in only in the last couple of books. The Fighting Styles are a nice addition for all fighters and in some ways the champion in particular for being able to get two. But the champion is still fairly neutral in their regard. The abilities and styles kind of opened up with the new maneuvers though does a lot more for the Battle Master and opens up some interesting combinations that they just didn't have before though you are kind of locking yourself into certain styles still by your combination of choices.
There are multiple subclasses of fighter that would make a better tank than a Champion. To me, extended crit range says you should be swinging a 2h weapon with all those attacks. As a tank, the Battle Master has many more tools in the toolbox to help protect allies and help control the fight.
If you notice when it comes to Fighters. Most of the Fighters that came in future installments do something like give you new proficiencies with the exception of the Echo Knight (and the rune Knight if your one that thinks Smith's tools don't really count for some reason). Most of them are Proficiencies in one or more skills and usually is a choice of what skill you want. The Psi-Warrior is technically also an exception but it actually does help your proficiencies by having Intelligence be important so it actually gives you more skills by the Design of being somewhat more MAD in a stat that actually improves several skills which lends towards a more skill based warrior as well because of it.
I'd argue that the Rune Knight leans into skills (not necessarily new proficiencies, although it quasi does that) by giving advantage to multiple different skills (or expertise in all your tool proficiencies) at level 3,7,10,15, which at low to mid levels is mostly mathematically better than proficiency, or even expertise if you're already proficient. Or it shores up an existing lack in that primary skills attribute.
I know that it doesn't come up in most campaigns, but that tool expertise really makes me happy, I love the RP options that Rune Knight has.
I will look at the Champion and Battle Master more thoroughly now, they've never interested me as character choices, but people have made good arguments here for me to look at them again with a fresh eye, thank you.
Dexterity-focused champions never bothered me as a concept. Sure, you aren't wielding a big Two-Handed weapon, but a longbow isn't any worse than a longsword in one hand. And if you want the feat, a heavy crossbow hits marginally harder. Their big benefit is getting to act even faster than normal and getting a bump to three skills they're more likely to use. They're versatile.
But if you just want to hit something with a big, honking weapon, Strenth is the way to go.
Or play Dex, but get yourself some gauntlets of ogre power and that Oversized Longbow from Dragon Heist.
I wouldn't ever recommend building a character around what might happen at very high levels. Play the game to enjoy the game now, not for perceived power spikes that might happen a long way down the line.
More than that, play the character to be the RP character you want them to be. Multiclassing is best done for RP reasons, not to power up your character.
Remember that your character's "power level" is purely in your head. My players have min-maxed themselves as much as possible (I told them to go for it) and they are 4 x level 4 characters who take on CR7 creatures and I double all the boss monsters hit points because otherwise the players just tear them apart in 1-2 turns. So essentially, they are still taking out the boss after about 5 turns of combat, which is what they would be doing anyway if they weren't all cheesy min-maxers. I often just dose the monster with an extra 50-100 hit points in the first or second turn of combat if I feel that I've not provided a tough enough challenge (I assume other DM's do this with homebrew, which is really hard to balance given the myriad factors of feats, magic items, and random dice rolls - the game being exciting matters more than sticking to what you wrote down three Tuesdays ago). So even though it feels like you are more powerful... there's no such thing as power.
While I agree with this, in theory. It's a basic fact of the game that most people who play it, wish to have an effective player. In terms of Gameplay, the half orc champion is likely to be good at only one thing, combat. This is not a bard, warlock, sorcerer or paladin with a really high charisma, who can be the "face" of the party. You probably don't have a high intelligence score and certainly not proficiency, so your investigation and such is lacking. A fighter's role is pretty much combat. So they have to be good at that or they have nothing. The champion subclass has the least going for it, imo. It's really there to be a 3 level dip as a multi-class, from what I can tell. I am going half orc champion, to see if I can make it an effective class. So far, the problem I see the most is...the champion has almost no ability to control the combat. It has one thing that's nice, expanded crit range. But you have no control over that and no way to expand your damage beyond basic attacks ala most other classes and fighter styles.
In Practice Champions are actually able to be good at a lot of things. Your Face complaint? More Easily covered than you think... Or getting that wisdom a bit higher. Or Being a more intelligent fighter. These are much more easily done because of the number of ASI's... Some interesting little tidbit abilities like Remarkable Athlete which provides half your proficiency bonus to something like 1/3 to 1/2 the skills in the game at level 6. As well as a whole slew of other factors. Even their second Fighting Style let's them diversify their combat focus more than other types of Fighter. That Champion Fighter only has a couple of stats to worry about and a whole lot of room to increase others as they wish. Or take Feats if they wish. Particularly since there are 7 of them. And it's easy to pick a race combination that doesn't require more than 4 ASI's to max those two stats out. Meaning you can pick up that extra wis or extra Charisma or Extra intelligence if you want to. Their basic nature actually allow them to be the most customizable thanks to the various tools provided in the game.
This is the odd thing about Champion though....they are encouraged to go STR with the increased chance of crits (bigger die on a crit = better) but the fighting styles for a long time did not encourage STR builds much (GWF is about 1.2 point of damage added and Defense tends to be the default option). Now we have some interesting contenders (Unarmed, Blind, Throwing) that work a lot better with STR builds. The only downside is you get the extra style at level 10 which is late enough that its unlikely to impact your game much as most games end by 10th level.
Overall its better for champion but I do think Rune Knight gives you more bang for your buck in the meat of the play time (5th through 10th).
Both of my Champions were very different. One was built as an outright tank. So yes Defense was it's first fighting STyle. My second one was built mostly for dealing damage and off-tanking if desperate because we had better tanks so I had TWF and eventually archery.
for the longest time it wasn't that the Fighting Styles didn't encourage using strength. But more that for a long time the Fighting Styles were ambivalent about your stat choices with the exception of the Archery fighting style but that was more forced by the nature of Ranged weapons than the fighting styles. This was by design because they were meant to be open to a wide variety of builds as choices. But they actually made some of the best strength based dual wielders in the game (with the appropriate feat of course).
But with the Champion. It's not exactly about what Champion gives you. It does give you some very potent but basic perks. Perks that are found almost nowhere else in fact. The Champion primarily revolves around what you give yourself instead and that's pretty much at all levels. The Champion more than any other class and Subclass primarily is about what you make of it. And not what it pushes you into.
Even the Battle Master which is another fairly neutral subclass kind of pushes you in one direction and it pushed you a lot more into certain styles than the Champion ever did. I'd have to go back and look but I remember about half of the seemingly more interesting Maneuvers initially somehow revolving around tanking with a lot more options being added in only in the last couple of books. The Fighting Styles are a nice addition for all fighters and in some ways the champion in particular for being able to get two. But the champion is still fairly neutral in their regard. The abilities and styles kind of opened up with the new maneuvers though does a lot more for the Battle Master and opens up some interesting combinations that they just didn't have before though you are kind of locking yourself into certain styles still by your combination of choices.
There are multiple subclasses of fighter that would make a better tank than a Champion. To me, extended crit range says you should be swinging a 2h weapon with all those attacks. As a tank, the Battle Master has many more tools in the toolbox to help protect allies and help control the fight.
That concept that increased crit needs that large weapon is a perceptive limitation your putting on them that isn't actually there. The reality is that Champions can make really good tanks because the Increased Crit Range can help to increase their damage and thus their threat while focusing primarily on tanking. This can make them a more dangerous opponent WHILE still being a Defensive one to deal with.
If you notice when it comes to Fighters. Most of the Fighters that came in future installments do something like give you new proficiencies with the exception of the Echo Knight (and the rune Knight if your one that thinks Smith's tools don't really count for some reason). Most of them are Proficiencies in one or more skills and usually is a choice of what skill you want. The Psi-Warrior is technically also an exception but it actually does help your proficiencies by having Intelligence be important so it actually gives you more skills by the Design of being somewhat more MAD in a stat that actually improves several skills which lends towards a more skill based warrior as well because of it.
I'd argue that the Rune Knight leans into skills (not necessarily new proficiencies, although it quasi does that) by giving advantage to multiple different skills (or expertise in all your tool proficiencies) at level 3,7,10,15, which at low to mid levels is mostly mathematically better than proficiency, or even expertise if you're already proficient. Or it shores up an existing lack in that primary skills attribute.
I know that it doesn't come up in most campaigns, but that tool expertise really makes me happy, I love the RP options that Rune Knight has.
I will look at the Champion and Battle Master more thoroughly now, they've never interested me as character choices, but people have made good arguments here for me to look at them again with a fresh eye, thank you.
Your right. I did miss that a couple of the runes actually leans into skills as well. For this I apologize.
But this just reinforces my point by taking yet another Subclass off the list that doesn't have that as a secondary focus somewhere. And I actually think Smithing Does count all on it's own. I've talked to a couple DM's to find ways to make use of it when I could for various reasons. Including Creating things over time. I actually like various tool profiencies and try to look for interesting ways they might actuall add to game play. And I've seen game proficiencies used a couple times for things like Gambling.
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I just hit level three as a fighter and kind of new to 5e. I am a half orc fighter, who was planning on going 17 champion/3 barbarian for crit fishing. But have been reading about rune knight and thinking...just pure rune knight might be better. By only having 3 levels in barbarian, I would only be able to rage 3 times per long rest. Now during that time, I would have resistance to most melee attacks. Also, I would gain advantage on attacks, but give advantage on attacks against me per reckless attacks. I would have crits on 18-20, which would give me an extra weapon damage die roll as a half orc. With advantage and crits on 18-20, I am guessing my crit rate would be around 27-28%. But none of that seems to be as good as all that the rune knight brings to the table! Add to that, I would be able to wear heavy armor as a pure fighter.
Am I missing anything? Has anybody played both a fighter/barbarian and a rune knight, who can give me the run down on both? Seems to me that rune knight is insanely good.
Any help or thoughts are appreciated.
Im playing a Rune knight in Mad Mage campaign and I have to say the subclass is incredibly fun! Soooo many options and so much utility and power! You feel like a spellcaster yet you dont cast spells.
With that said though I have found a few hiccups with the subclass:
- You absolutely need ranged weaponry. This is mostly just to hit from anywhere, plus its nice to not be hit while still providing "cover" for allies. Also Giants might will work on ranged weapons.
-from my experience the cloud, hill, and storm runes are the absolute best (ymmv however).
-highly suggest avoiding dual wielding blades for just how often you probably will be using your bonus action with your rune (this depends on the difficulty of the fight and again ymmv)
Outside of these things I absolutely LOVE this subclass. I probably will be playing in one soon again and using a revolver over my current greatsword.
Here's something to consider-- you come online much later as a fighter barbarian. Rune Knight gets all their features right on schedule without sacrificing anything. Now keep in mind, those features of raging are a lot more limiting at a lvl 3 dip, they'd be far more situational and you'd end up relying more on your rageless gameplay, and you'd have a lot less AC or be limited to half plate at best most of the time.
Sounds a little like you’ve already made up your mind. Go with the one that will be more fun, not the one that you picked because the math said you’ll do more damage on average. The more memorable characters are the ones that had a personality, not the ones that were mathematically superior.
Or create one with both. I always attempt min/'max, but unless I can create a personality for my pc's they won't see the light of day.
I went with the champion fighter, to later multiclass into barbarian. I already had the character concept and backstory written, but Rune Knight was trying to flirt with me from across the room! lol
Yeah delaying Extra Attack is a huge set back IMO so I would go barb 5 then fighter from there...but its up to you.
I am planning on going fighter 6, then barb 3, then the rest all fighter. Currently our campaign is only going to 12, but DM has talked about finding something else to take us on after we finish Rime of the Frostmaiden. Not sure if he will have to homebrew something or maybe can find some module/campaign settings from non-WOTC sources. Seems like there is a demand for 12-20 level campaigns, just not what it is going to be for the lower levels.
I wouldn't ever recommend building a character around what might happen at very high levels. Play the game to enjoy the game now, not for perceived power spikes that might happen a long way down the line.
More than that, play the character to be the RP character you want them to be. Multiclassing is best done for RP reasons, not to power up your character.
Remember that your character's "power level" is purely in your head. My players have min-maxed themselves as much as possible (I told them to go for it) and they are 4 x level 4 characters who take on CR7 creatures and I double all the boss monsters hit points because otherwise the players just tear them apart in 1-2 turns. So essentially, they are still taking out the boss after about 5 turns of combat, which is what they would be doing anyway if they weren't all cheesy min-maxers. I often just dose the monster with an extra 50-100 hit points in the first or second turn of combat if I feel that I've not provided a tough enough challenge (I assume other DM's do this with homebrew, which is really hard to balance given the myriad factors of feats, magic items, and random dice rolls - the game being exciting matters more than sticking to what you wrote down three Tuesdays ago). So even though it feels like you are more powerful... there's no such thing as power.
While I agree with this, in theory. It's a basic fact of the game that most people who play it, wish to have an effective player. In terms of Gameplay, the half orc champion is likely to be good at only one thing, combat. This is not a bard, warlock, sorcerer or paladin with a really high charisma, who can be the "face" of the party. You probably don't have a high intelligence score and certainly not proficiency, so your investigation and such is lacking. A fighter's role is pretty much combat. So they have to be good at that or they have nothing. The champion subclass has the least going for it, imo. It's really there to be a 3 level dip as a multi-class, from what I can tell. I am going half orc champion, to see if I can make it an effective class. So far, the problem I see the most is...the champion has almost no ability to control the combat. It has one thing that's nice, expanded crit range. But you have no control over that and no way to expand your damage beyond basic attacks ala most other classes and fighter styles.
In Practice Champions are actually able to be good at a lot of things. Your Face complaint? More Easily covered than you think... Or getting that wisdom a bit higher. Or Being a more intelligent fighter. These are much more easily done because of the number of ASI's... Some interesting little tidbit abilities like Remarkable Athlete which provides half your proficiency bonus to something like 1/3 to 1/2 the skills in the game at level 6. As well as a whole slew of other factors. Even their second Fighting Style let's them diversify their combat focus more than other types of Fighter. That Champion Fighter only has a couple of stats to worry about and a whole lot of room to increase others as they wish. Or take Feats if they wish. Particularly since there are 7 of them. And it's easy to pick a race combination that doesn't require more than 4 ASI's to max those two stats out. Meaning you can pick up that extra wis or extra Charisma or Extra intelligence if you want to. Their basic nature actually allow them to be the most customizable thanks to the various tools provided in the game.
This is the odd thing about Champion though....they are encouraged to go STR with the increased chance of crits (bigger die on a crit = better) but the fighting styles for a long time did not encourage STR builds much (GWF is about 1.2 point of damage added and Defense tends to be the default option). Now we have some interesting contenders (Unarmed, Blind, Throwing) that work a lot better with STR builds. The only downside is you get the extra style at level 10 which is late enough that its unlikely to impact your game much as most games end by 10th level.
Overall its better for champion but I do think Rune Knight gives you more bang for your buck in the meat of the play time (5th through 10th).
Both of my Champions were very different. One was built as an outright tank. So yes Defense was it's first fighting STyle. My second one was built mostly for dealing damage and off-tanking if desperate because we had better tanks so I had TWF and eventually archery.
for the longest time it wasn't that the Fighting Styles didn't encourage using strength. But more that for a long time the Fighting Styles were ambivalent about your stat choices with the exception of the Archery fighting style but that was more forced by the nature of Ranged weapons than the fighting styles. This was by design because they were meant to be open to a wide variety of builds as choices. But they actually made some of the best strength based dual wielders in the game (with the appropriate feat of course).
But with the Champion. It's not exactly about what Champion gives you. It does give you some very potent but basic perks. Perks that are found almost nowhere else in fact. The Champion primarily revolves around what you give yourself instead and that's pretty much at all levels. The Champion more than any other class and Subclass primarily is about what you make of it. And not what it pushes you into.
Even the Battle Master which is another fairly neutral subclass kind of pushes you in one direction and it pushed you a lot more into certain styles than the Champion ever did. I'd have to go back and look but I remember about half of the seemingly more interesting Maneuvers initially somehow revolving around tanking with a lot more options being added in only in the last couple of books. The Fighting Styles are a nice addition for all fighters and in some ways the champion in particular for being able to get two. But the champion is still fairly neutral in their regard. The abilities and styles kind of opened up with the new maneuvers though does a lot more for the Battle Master and opens up some interesting combinations that they just didn't have before though you are kind of locking yourself into certain styles still by your combination of choices.
I honestly feel the opposite about Battlemaster as I think it had a bunch of different options that appealed to a variety of builds. Menacing attack you could use as a TWF to hit 3 targets at level 5 and make them all frightened which plays much differently than someone who took Precision attack and GWM to really kill that one thing in the room.
I do feel like that for Samurai though...its mostly geared towards the power attack builds (GWM or Sharpshooter) with sharpshooter being the prevailing approach due to Elven Accuracy and the "super advantage" it creates.
I actually think Battlemaster is more versatile now out of combat with the add of Ambush and other skill based uses of the die. It really helps you mold a character to exactly how you want them to play.
Champion to me was the "simple" fighter that had a chance (albeit a small one) of producing something exciting every attack with the critical and you had a lot of free reign in the RP as you stated.
Menacing attack only hits one target. But even if you spent 3 of your superiority die to do it 3 times. Menacing attack leans heavily into tanking because it's a good tool for denying space to the enemy. Which pairs up with things like Parry, Goading, Pushing, trip, evasive footwork, maneuvering and even some extent Riposte for making a strong tank with some control options that Fighters actually kind of need to help with their Tanking either to affect enemy movements or to make themselves more threatening.
Precision attack is going to be more of a striker dps move but that's really the second category of moves you got in the core book for the most part along with Feinting attack, Sweeping Attack, lunging attack, and even distracting Strike.
Now that's not to say there isn't some variation within these depending on what you pick. But they really just lean in two directions.
Then when you get the newer ones you get things like Ambush, Brace, Commanding Presence, and Tactical Assessment which 3 of the 4 just these actually rely fully on skills for the first time. This opens up a whole new type of fighter. The Skill Based Fighter. Something the Champion could do before by being so simple is now open to the Battle Master to focus on various different skills and get improvements on them through their Maneuvers for the first time. This is the first real shift for the Battle Master and it's something the Champion was easily doing all along and even low key encouraged to do all along but people didn't really notice or didn't really consider because all they considered was "what do you my features enable me to do" and not "What does my Character enable me to do" which the second is what the Champion truly excelled at but the Battle Master is finally catching up.
If you notice when it comes to Fighters. Most of the Fighters that came in future installments do something like give you new proficiencies with the exception of the Echo Knight (and the rune Knight if your one that thinks Smith's tools don't really count for some reason). Most of them are Proficiencies in one or more skills and usually is a choice of what skill you want. The Psi-Warrior is technically also an exception but it actually does help your proficiencies by having Intelligence be important so it actually gives you more skills by the Design of being somewhat more MAD in a stat that actually improves several skills which lends towards a more skill based warrior as well because of it.
You can use menacing with any weapon attack so even an archer can use it so its hardly just for tanking.
You can trip attack from a distance too so you can prone the guy in front of your friend if you know he is going next.
Things like Riposte on a monk means you can off turn stun a guy and end their turn.
Commander's strike is great if you have a paladin key'd up to smite some fools.
Battle master is pretty versatile....not quite as versatile as Eldritch Knight but fairly close. It pairs well with literally any marital build and since it keys off your DEX or STR your DC will always be fairly high.
It has debuffs (Trip attack, Menacing, Disarm), Damage (Precision, Riposte), Movement (Evasive Footwork, maneuvering attack, pushing attack), Buff (Distracting, Commander's Strike),
And most of these can be with melee or ranged. Yes you can push attack with an arrow and knock it away from your friend.
There are multiple subclasses of fighter that would make a better tank than a Champion. To me, extended crit range says you should be swinging a 2h weapon with all those attacks. As a tank, the Battle Master has many more tools in the toolbox to help protect allies and help control the fight.
I'd argue that the Rune Knight leans into skills (not necessarily new proficiencies, although it quasi does that) by giving advantage to multiple different skills (or expertise in all your tool proficiencies) at level 3,7,10,15, which at low to mid levels is mostly mathematically better than proficiency, or even expertise if you're already proficient. Or it shores up an existing lack in that primary skills attribute.
I know that it doesn't come up in most campaigns, but that tool expertise really makes me happy, I love the RP options that Rune Knight has.
I will look at the Champion and Battle Master more thoroughly now, they've never interested me as character choices, but people have made good arguments here for me to look at them again with a fresh eye, thank you.
Dexterity-focused champions never bothered me as a concept. Sure, you aren't wielding a big Two-Handed weapon, but a longbow isn't any worse than a longsword in one hand. And if you want the feat, a heavy crossbow hits marginally harder. Their big benefit is getting to act even faster than normal and getting a bump to three skills they're more likely to use. They're versatile.
But if you just want to hit something with a big, honking weapon, Strenth is the way to go.
Or play Dex, but get yourself some gauntlets of ogre power and that Oversized Longbow from Dragon Heist.
That concept that increased crit needs that large weapon is a perceptive limitation your putting on them that isn't actually there. The reality is that Champions can make really good tanks because the Increased Crit Range can help to increase their damage and thus their threat while focusing primarily on tanking. This can make them a more dangerous opponent WHILE still being a Defensive one to deal with.
Your right. I did miss that a couple of the runes actually leans into skills as well. For this I apologize.
But this just reinforces my point by taking yet another Subclass off the list that doesn't have that as a secondary focus somewhere. And I actually think Smithing Does count all on it's own. I've talked to a couple DM's to find ways to make use of it when I could for various reasons. Including Creating things over time. I actually like various tool profiencies and try to look for interesting ways they might actuall add to game play. And I've seen game proficiencies used a couple times for things like Gambling.