As far as I can tell Blade Ward isn't very useful.
It gives you resistance to BPS damage until the end of your next turn.
Why not just take the dodge action?
The only thing I can see it helping with is opportunity attack damage and maybe something that lets you cast it as a bonus action (quicken spell or warcaster) might make it more useful
Why should I take this cantrip, am I missing something?
I love drow, rogues and Chinese weapons. I mean come on, rope darts are awesome.
My current character is a drow shadow monk, with a "unique" honor code (give him some time, he's working through some stuff). He also sucks on the socialization side of interacting with all other living creatures. which is very fun to RP.
Blade Ward is mostly pointless on a vast majority of spellcasters, yeah.
Blade Ward is fantastic on a two-weapon fighting level 6+ Bladesinger wizard.
The Bladesinger's outrageously busted Multiattack lets you substitute one of your two attacks from the Attack action for a one-action cantrip. Blade Ward meets the criteria. A Bladesinger can attack with their blade, then use Blade Ward as their second attack, and then use a bonus action for an offhand swipe. They get two attacks in the same turn they Blade Ward with, at will with no limit. It's not a ferocious amount of damage and you're still a wizard in melee, but it's a heckload more damage than anybody else can get while casting Blade Ward every turn, and there's half a dozen different feats you could take to make it even better.
If a spellcaster is about to cast a higher level spell that requires an attack roll and they absolutely do not want it to miss, that’s when Blade Ward is useful.
Heh. No no Sposta, Blade Ward is the cantrip that gives you resistance to mundane weapon damage for a turn. True Strike is the one that gives you advantage on the next turn. Sadly, the only high-level spell that requires a spell attack actually doesn't require a spell attack (I will never not be pissed at WotC for making Disintegrate a saving throw despite it being a LITERAL FINGER LASER OF DOOM that does nothing on a failed save...JUST LIKE WIFFING A SPELL ATTACK...for the specific reason "we can't let our boss monsters take damage from Disintegrate! We're gonna make it a save so they can force you to automatically miss with legendary resistances!" No-balls move there, WotC), so there's still no point to True Strike. One of those spells that's just kind of an unfortunate remnant of older editions, vestigial and doomed to die.
I’m so used to everyone wondering “why true strike I just replied on autopilot. What a jack455.
Yes, now that I’ve embarrassed the bejeepers outta myself, and having read your (Yurei’s) post, yes. BioWiz is currently playing a Bladesinger and would love to be able to use it but the DM has houseruled it and it now doesn’t serve that function quite as well anymore. (It serves a different function now as an emergency in tier-1 or against mooks.) So BW just dodges whenever he would have cast that. 🤷♂️
I have made good use of Blade Ward as a kind of last resort for my Mark of Warding Dwarf Abjurer.
My main move is to upcast Armor of Agathys with a level 4th spell slot (granting 20 THP and causing the same amount of damage against whoever hits me in melee) and at level 9 with max INT, I’m sitting on top of 23 Arcane Ward hit points as well.
In couple situations where I decided to save some spells slots or actually didn’t have spells slots to replenish my Arcane Ward, I deployed Blade Ward to give me resistance and thanks to that my Armor of Agathys was up for two additional rounds, where I capitalized lots of retributive damage. It was funny to see two Chimeras attacking me three times each, I took exactly 19 damage (if not by Blade Ward, I would take 38), distributing 60 cold damage in retribution, effectively killing both.
Heh. No no Sposta, Blade Ward is the cantrip that gives you resistance to mundane weapon damage for a turn. True Strike is the one that gives you advantage on the next turn. Sadly, the only high-level spell that requires a spell attack actually doesn't require a spell attack (I will never not be pissed at WotC for making Disintegrate a saving throw despite it being a LITERAL FINGER LASER OF DOOM that does nothing on a failed save...JUST LIKE WIFFING A SPELL ATTACK...for the specific reason "we can't let our boss monsters take damage from Disintegrate! We're gonna make it a save so they can force you to automatically miss with legendary resistances!" No-balls move there, WotC), so there's still no point to True Strike. One of those spells that's just kind of an unfortunate remnant of older editions, vestigial and doomed to die.
Contagion being about the only spell I’d vaguely consider using with True Strike - applying the un-save-able poisoned condition can be very useful and it would be worth using an advantage on that roll. Beyond that… yeah. I got nothing. Unless maybe you couldn’t reach your target on round 1 and you have no ranged attacks?
One niche use is if you have a concentration spell up you really want to keep. Dodge reduces the chance of getting hit but not the damage. If something hits for 40 damage you are likely 5o lose concentration but 20 would rarely be a problem. Having said that I can not think of anything that does that much bsp damage in a hit.
It is only weapon attacks so you can not even use it to reduce damage from a fall..
Blade Ward is better than Dodge Action if you're fighting high level enemies who are probably going to hit you anyways, disadvantage or no. Especially if you have some way to Quicken it or Action Surge so you don't have to use your whole action doing just that. I think it might actually be slightly more useful as an emergency button in later level play than it is earlier on.
Blade Ward is better than Dodge Action if you're fighting high level enemies who are probably going to hit you anyways, disadvantage or no. Especially if you have some way to Quicken it or Action Surge so you don't have to use your whole action doing just that. I think it might actually be slightly more useful as an emergency button in later level play than it is earlier on.
Anything that can reliably hit you despite you using the Dodge action is going to kill you if you stick around and get hit, Blade Ward or no. What Blade Ward does better than Dodge is handle BPS damage from things Dodge won't help against - sure, that includes attacks from attackers you can't see, but more generally, anything that either uses a non-Dex save or applies automatically, Blade Ward will handle better. For example, Blade Ward will work against Spike Growth. Dodge won't. Blade Ward will reduce falling damage. Dodge won't. I don't think Blade Ward is a very good spell and usually there are better things you can do with your action, but certainly there are ways to suffer BPS damage without Dodge being able to protect you.
It could be useful for a sorceror trying to hold concentration on something else while in the path of danger. Dodge might guarantee fewer hits, but blade ward ensures hits small enough not to break concentration generally.
But its a cantrip. Its not meant to be the most powerful.
Bladeward has a few things going for it for “regular” tactics. 1st thing is that bladeward might become more useful than dodge when a creatures chance to hit the caster exceeds 50%. This is more likely on a non multiclassed wizard or sorcerer.
2nd thing is that the damage being halved might be enough to make concentration saves drastically more passable.
3rd thing is that dodge is only effective when there are no other sources of advantage/disadvantage auto canceling things, like with fog cloud. Dodge also requires that the would be caster be able to see the attacker to impose disadvantage on the attacks vs the caster.
the resistance also lasts until the end of your next turn, so it can be used to tease out opportunity attacks potentially two or three times depending on class features and reaction triggers.
Heh. No no Sposta, Blade Ward is the cantrip that gives you resistance to mundane weapon damage for a turn. True Strike is the one that gives you advantage on the next turn. Sadly, the only high-level spell that requires a spell attack actually doesn't require a spell attack (I will never not be pissed at WotC for making Disintegrate a saving throw despite it being a LITERAL FINGER LASER OF DOOM that does nothing on a failed save...JUST LIKE WIFFING A SPELL ATTACK...for the specific reason "we can't let our boss monsters take damage from Disintegrate! We're gonna make it a save so they can force you to automatically miss with legendary resistances!" No-balls move there, WotC), so there's still no point to True Strike. One of those spells that's just kind of an unfortunate remnant of older editions, vestigial and doomed to die.
Contagion being about the only spell I’d vaguely consider using with True Strike - applying the un-save-able poisoned condition can be very useful and it would be worth using an advantage on that roll. Beyond that… yeah. I got nothing. Unless maybe you couldn’t reach your target on round 1 and you have no ranged attacks?
I guess you could use True Strike if you wanted to upcast Chromatic Orb or Inflict Wounds.
Can't think of a good reason why you'd do that, but it's technically something you could do.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
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.
Blade Ward is mostly pointless on a vast majority of spellcasters, yeah.
Blade Ward is fantastic on a two-weapon fighting level 6+ Bladesinger wizard.
The Bladesinger's outrageously busted Multiattack lets you substitute one of your two attacks from the Attack action for a one-action cantrip. Blade Ward meets the criteria. A Bladesinger can attack with their blade, then use Blade Ward as their second attack, and then use a bonus action for an offhand swipe. They get two attacks in the same turn they Blade Ward with, at will with no limit. It's not a ferocious amount of damage and you're still a wizard in melee, but it's a heckload more damage than anybody else can get while casting Blade Ward every turn, and there's half a dozen different feats you could take to make it even better.
Bladesingers can't fight with 2 weapons;
You can use a bonus action to start the Bladesong, which lasts for 1 minute. It ends early if you are incapacitated, if you don medium or heavy armor or a shield, or if you use two hands to make an attack with a weapon. You can also dismiss the Bladesong at any time (no action required).
You can use a bonus action to start the Bladesong, which lasts for 1 minute. It ends early if you are incapacitated, if you don medium or heavy armor or a shield, or if you use two hands to make an attack with a weapon. You can also dismiss the Bladesong at any time (no action required).
You have misinterpreted that. They cannot use weapons with the two-handed property, nor can they use the higher damage dice provided by versatile weapons since that requires two hands to make the attack. Two-weapon fighting does not require creatures to “use two hands to make an attack with a weapon,” it allows them to make an additional attack with a completely separate one-handed weapon held in a different hand.
Two-Weapon Fighting
When you take the Attack action and attack with a light melee weapon that you're holding in one hand, you can use a bonus action to attack with a different light melee weapon that you're holding in the other hand. You don't add your ability modifier to the damage of the bonus attack, unless that modifier is negative.
If either weapon has the thrown property, you can throw the weapon, instead of making a melee attack with it.
That’s a totally different thing. You are confusing the Bladesinger’s prohibition against using two hands to make a single attack with a single weapon, with making multiple attacks with multiple weapons each with a separate hand.
"it allows them to make an additional attack with a completely separate one-handed weapon held in a different hand"
So what you are saying is, making an attack with your left hand, followed by making an attack with your right hand is different to making an attack with each of your two hands....
"it allows them to make an additional attack with a completely separate one-handed weapon held in a different hand"
So what you are saying is, making an attack with your left hand, followed by making an attack with your right hand is different to making an attack with each of your two hands....
The key part you are missing from Bladesong is the " if you use 2 hands to make an attack with a weapon" part. Emphasis on "a weapon" meaning ONE weapon. Two weapon fighting uses TWO weapons. That is the fundamental difference.
The other reason Blade Ward exists is because it's a legacy spell. If you want to try to cobble something together that feels kind of like a swordmage, Bladesinger with BW is about as close as you can get.
"it allows them to make an additional attack with a completely separate one-handed weapon held in a different hand"
So what you are saying is, making an attack with your left hand, followed by making an attack with your right hand is different to making an attack with each of your two hands....
As any HEMA instructor, or even any martial artist with basic weapons training, would say? Absolutely these are two different things. They're so wildly different that entire martial forms and styles have been built around the differences.
In D&D terms, also yes. Making an attack with two hands means rolling one attack roll using a weapon held in both hands. Rolling an attack roll with a right-handed weapon, and then a second attack roll with a left-handed weapon, is two separate attacks made with one hand. It's no different whatsoever to using a [magicitem]scimitar of speed[/scimitar] to make a bonus action attack. TWF is already generally a very poor use of your bonus action, and in this case it necessitates the Bladesinger finding a way to turn one of their weapons into a spell focus or acquiring the War Caster feat to cast with two fistfuls of sword. There's no good reason to disallow it when the investment is so high for a middling payoff. Frankly, this one niche build making Blade Ward usable doesn't bother the rest of D&D at all.
"it allows them to make an additional attack with a completely separate one-handed weapon held in a different hand"
So what you are saying is, making an attack with your left hand, followed by making an attack with your right hand is different to making an attack with each of your two hands....
No, but also that's not a difference that anyone is suggesting. It's different from making an attack with both of your two hands. Making an attack with each of your two hands is making two one-handed attacks. That is different from making one two-handed attack.
The bladesinger restriction applies to making an attack (singular) with two hands (plural). You can make as many attacks as you have attacks for as long as each one is only made with one hand.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
As far as I can tell Blade Ward isn't very useful.
It gives you resistance to BPS damage until the end of your next turn.
Why not just take the dodge action?
The only thing I can see it helping with is opportunity attack damage and maybe something that lets you cast it as a bonus action (quicken spell or warcaster) might make it more useful
Why should I take this cantrip, am I missing something?
I love drow, rogues and Chinese weapons. I mean come on, rope darts are awesome.
My current character is a drow shadow monk, with a "unique" honor code (give him some time, he's working through some stuff). He also sucks on the socialization side of interacting with all other living creatures. which is very fun to RP.
Blade Ward is mostly pointless on a vast majority of spellcasters, yeah.
Blade Ward is fantastic on a two-weapon fighting level 6+ Bladesinger wizard.
The Bladesinger's outrageously busted Multiattack lets you substitute one of your two attacks from the Attack action for a one-action cantrip. Blade Ward meets the criteria. A Bladesinger can attack with their blade, then use Blade Ward as their second attack, and then use a bonus action for an offhand swipe. They get two attacks in the same turn they Blade Ward with, at will with no limit. It's not a ferocious amount of damage and you're still a wizard in melee, but it's a heckload more damage than anybody else can get while casting Blade Ward every turn, and there's half a dozen different feats you could take to make it even better.
Please do not contact or message me.
If a spellcaster is about to cast a higher level spell that requires an attack roll and they absolutely do not want it to miss, that’s when Blade Ward is useful.
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting
Heh. No no Sposta, Blade Ward is the cantrip that gives you resistance to mundane weapon damage for a turn. True Strike is the one that gives you advantage on the next turn. Sadly, the only high-level spell that requires a spell attack actually doesn't require a spell attack (I will never not be pissed at WotC for making Disintegrate a saving throw despite it being a LITERAL FINGER LASER OF DOOM that does nothing on a failed save...JUST LIKE WIFFING A SPELL ATTACK...for the specific reason "we can't let our boss monsters take damage from Disintegrate! We're gonna make it a save so they can force you to automatically miss with legendary resistances!" No-balls move there, WotC), so there's still no point to True Strike. One of those spells that's just kind of an unfortunate remnant of older editions, vestigial and doomed to die.
Please do not contact or message me.
Oh Jesus. 🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️
I’m so used to everyone wondering “why true strike I just replied on autopilot. What a jack455.
Yes, now that I’ve embarrassed the bejeepers outta myself, and having read your (Yurei’s) post, yes. BioWiz is currently playing a Bladesinger and would love to be able to use it but the DM has houseruled it and it now doesn’t serve that function quite as well anymore. (It serves a different function now as an emergency in tier-1 or against mooks.) So BW just dodges whenever he would have cast that. 🤷♂️
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting
I have made good use of Blade Ward as a kind of last resort for my Mark of Warding Dwarf Abjurer.
My main move is to upcast Armor of Agathys with a level 4th spell slot (granting 20 THP and causing the same amount of damage against whoever hits me in melee) and at level 9 with max INT, I’m sitting on top of 23 Arcane Ward hit points as well.
In couple situations where I decided to save some spells slots or actually didn’t have spells slots to replenish my Arcane Ward, I deployed Blade Ward to give me resistance and thanks to that my Armor of Agathys was up for two additional rounds, where I capitalized lots of retributive damage. It was funny to see two Chimeras attacking me three times each, I took exactly 19 damage (if not by Blade Ward, I would take 38), distributing 60 cold damage in retribution, effectively killing both.
I know it’s niche, but it is cool.
Contagion being about the only spell I’d vaguely consider using with True Strike - applying the un-save-able poisoned condition can be very useful and it would be worth using an advantage on that roll. Beyond that… yeah. I got nothing. Unless maybe you couldn’t reach your target on round 1 and you have no ranged attacks?
One niche use is if you have a concentration spell up you really want to keep. Dodge reduces the chance of getting hit but not the damage. If something hits for 40 damage you are likely 5o lose concentration but 20 would rarely be a problem. Having said that I can not think of anything that does that much bsp damage in a hit.
It is only weapon attacks so you can not even use it to reduce damage from a fall..
Blade Ward is better than Dodge Action if you're fighting high level enemies who are probably going to hit you anyways, disadvantage or no. Especially if you have some way to Quicken it or Action Surge so you don't have to use your whole action doing just that. I think it might actually be slightly more useful as an emergency button in later level play than it is earlier on.
Anything that can reliably hit you despite you using the Dodge action is going to kill you if you stick around and get hit, Blade Ward or no. What Blade Ward does better than Dodge is handle BPS damage from things Dodge won't help against - sure, that includes attacks from attackers you can't see, but more generally, anything that either uses a non-Dex save or applies automatically, Blade Ward will handle better. For example, Blade Ward will work against Spike Growth. Dodge won't. Blade Ward will reduce falling damage. Dodge won't. I don't think Blade Ward is a very good spell and usually there are better things you can do with your action, but certainly there are ways to suffer BPS damage without Dodge being able to protect you.
It could be useful for a sorceror trying to hold concentration on something else while in the path of danger. Dodge might guarantee fewer hits, but blade ward ensures hits small enough not to break concentration generally.
But its a cantrip. Its not meant to be the most powerful.
Bladeward has a few things going for it for “regular” tactics.
1st thing is that bladeward might become more useful than dodge when a creatures chance to hit the caster exceeds 50%. This is more likely on a non multiclassed wizard or sorcerer.
2nd thing is that the damage being halved might be enough to make concentration saves drastically more passable.
3rd thing is that dodge is only effective when there are no other sources of advantage/disadvantage auto canceling things, like with fog cloud. Dodge also requires that the would be caster be able to see the attacker to impose disadvantage on the attacks vs the caster.
the resistance also lasts until the end of your next turn, so it can be used to tease out opportunity attacks potentially two or three times depending on class features and reaction triggers.
I guess you could use True Strike if you wanted to upcast Chromatic Orb or Inflict Wounds.
Can't think of a good reason why you'd do that, but it's technically something you could do.
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.
Bladesingers can't fight with 2 weapons;
You can use a bonus action to start the Bladesong, which lasts for 1 minute. It ends early if you are incapacitated, if you don medium or heavy armor or a shield, or if you use two hands to make an attack with a weapon. You can also dismiss the Bladesong at any time (no action required).
You have misinterpreted that. They cannot use weapons with the two-handed property, nor can they use the higher damage dice provided by versatile weapons since that requires two hands to make the attack. Two-weapon fighting does not require creatures to “use two hands to make an attack with a weapon,” it allows them to make an additional attack with a completely separate one-handed weapon held in a different hand.
That’s a totally different thing. You are confusing the Bladesinger’s prohibition against using two hands to make a single attack with a single weapon, with making multiple attacks with multiple weapons each with a separate hand.
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting
"it allows them to make an additional attack with a completely separate one-handed weapon held in a different hand"
So what you are saying is, making an attack with your left hand, followed by making an attack with your right hand is different to making an attack with each of your two hands....
The key part you are missing from Bladesong is the " if you use 2 hands to make an attack with a weapon" part. Emphasis on "a weapon" meaning ONE weapon. Two weapon fighting uses TWO weapons. That is the fundamental difference.
The other reason Blade Ward exists is because it's a legacy spell. If you want to try to cobble something together that feels kind of like a swordmage, Bladesinger with BW is about as close as you can get.
My homebrew subclasses (full list here)
(Artificer) Swordmage | Glasswright | (Barbarian) Path of the Savage Embrace
(Bard) College of Dance | (Fighter) Warlord | Cannoneer
(Monk) Way of the Elements | (Ranger) Blade Dancer
(Rogue) DaggerMaster | Inquisitor | (Sorcerer) Riftwalker | Spellfist
(Warlock) The Swarm
As any HEMA instructor, or even any martial artist with basic weapons training, would say?
Absolutely these are two different things. They're so wildly different that entire martial forms and styles have been built around the differences.
In D&D terms, also yes. Making an attack with two hands means rolling one attack roll using a weapon held in both hands. Rolling an attack roll with a right-handed weapon, and then a second attack roll with a left-handed weapon, is two separate attacks made with one hand. It's no different whatsoever to using a [magicitem]scimitar of speed[/scimitar] to make a bonus action attack. TWF is already generally a very poor use of your bonus action, and in this case it necessitates the Bladesinger finding a way to turn one of their weapons into a spell focus or acquiring the War Caster feat to cast with two fistfuls of sword. There's no good reason to disallow it when the investment is so high for a middling payoff. Frankly, this one niche build making Blade Ward usable doesn't bother the rest of D&D at all.
Please do not contact or message me.
No, but also that's not a difference that anyone is suggesting. It's different from making an attack with both of your two hands. Making an attack with each of your two hands is making two one-handed attacks. That is different from making one two-handed attack.
The bladesinger restriction applies to making an attack (singular) with two hands (plural). You can make as many attacks as you have attacks for as long as each one is only made with one hand.