Rangers and Warlocks actually have some good synergy via Eldritch Blast. Being able to Repelling Blast people and Lance of Lethargy them is potent combined with Swarmkeeper's default movement abilities and a few choice spells like Spike Growth and Plant Growth. This can work in part because you don't need a high WIS for these Ranger control spells so the points into CHA instead of WIS are not much of a loss.
Arcane Trickster 18 / Bladesinger 2. From the Trickster’s perspective you double your casting at the expense of learning 4th-level spells. So no greater invisibility, but all the 1st-level spells, many of them as Rituals, double the cantrips, and double the daily array of 1st-level spells available per day due to the Wizard’s preparation of spells. And you get an extra 4th-level slot to boot for upcasting.
This multiclass is also one of the few that is effective, but I don't think it's little known either. In any case, it is not at the level of sorcerer + warlock, and I imagine that is why it is not so played. But is it worth it. Of course, it's only worth it if you want to play the arcane triscker in a specific way. It actually looks like a 0-sum multiclass to me. You're not going to be better than singleclass AT, but you're not going to be worse either.
What is not worth it is the opposite (AT3, bladesinger 17). 3 wizard levels is too high a price to pay for anything you're going to get in return.
I dunno about that “0-sum,” it makes the AT a muu—uuch better caster. In my estimation, those 2 Wizard levels almost double the spellcasting capabilities for the AT. If you want to put extra Arcane into your Trickster, there’s no better way to do it.
IMO, a 2 level dip into Artificer would be a 0-sum multiclass for the AT.
A significantly more obscure combo would be mixing Warlock with Rune Knight on a Scourge Aasimar chassis.
Take Rune Knight to level 8 to max your STR and CON. Frost Rune for ability checks. Hill Rune for damage resistance. Fire Rune for control. Why ability checks? So you can grapple like a god.
Take 5 levels in Warlock. On the way up, pick up Misty Visions and False Life. Choose Spider Climb as one of your spells. At level 5, pick up Cloak of Flies and Tomb of Levistus. You might be saying 5 levels of Warlock?! That's MAD!!! Well, just a little. What you've built at this point, folks, is a humanoid Drop Bear. Yes, you can now sneak up on enemy spellcasters and Eldritch archers to take them out of the fight. By combining your Runes for grappling efficacy with stealth abilities like Spider Climb and Misty Visions AND the auto-damage abilities of Cloak of Flies and S Aasimar Radiant Consumption, you become one of the deadliest ambush grapplers possible.
The problem with putting two levels of wizard (bladesinger) in the AT, is that you are going to get your lvl 2 spells when your character is level 9. That is going to mean that most players are playing almost their entire AT career. with lvl 1 spells. But on the other hand you're going to have a lot of lvl 1 spells. And you're going to be able to cast them as a ritual, which gives you a lot of utility. Really, the best way to play it is by choosing as many ritual spells as you can (and writing them in your book if you didn't choose them as a Wizard). And also choose spells that scale, since you're going to get your level 2 spell slots before a sigleclass AT.
That all depends on when you take your two levels in Wiz. I often recommend one mid tier-2, and the other early tier-3, but it works all kinds of ways. I try to limit taking ritual spells as an AT to Detect Magic so I can still cast that quickly as necessary, and really try to only take most of the others after getting that first level in Wiz and only learning them as Wiz spells. And obviously you want spells that scale because this build is gonna upcast a lot to take advantage of the extra 4th-level slot you end up getting without any 4th-level spells.
And the multiclass also works very well with Divination instead of Bladesinger. Really any of the stronger Wizard subs will do which opens up a lot of variety for how to play it at higher levels. I like Bladesinger because of the PB scale on Bladesong, and how well it dovetails with Booming Blade/Green-Flame Blade as main battle cantrips to stack with Sneak Attack.
I was looking at the old Ranger Hunter subclass and noticed that their level 11 ability allows you to make an attack against any number of adjacent enemies for your action. Adding in their 3rd level ability Horde Breaker, you now get to hit everything once, plus another attack. Additionally a GWM feat allows you an extra attack on bonus action if you critically hit, or reduce something to 0hp.
So naturally I built a multi class that is based around being in the middle of the fight.
The revised hunters ability Natures Veil at 10th level which makes you invisible until your next turn, and the Samurai’s 3rd level ability both give you advantage on all your attacks for the turn.
The Paladin gives you a decent way of spending spell slots with divine smite. Save them for the crits, of which you could take the Champion fighter subclass to double how often that happens at the sacrifice of three less advantaged turns per long rest.
GWM + Duelling fighting style, paired with a longsword and shield allows you to swap between being defensive with a +2AC and +2 damage, to being offensive and taking a -5 to hit for +10 damage. Go offensive if your turns attacks are at advantage.
Lastly, your action surge allows you to repeat your level 11th Ranger ability, now you get to attack everything twice. Best case scenario, on a grid you get to make 8 attacks + 8 attacks (action surge) + 1 attack (horde breaker), all at advantage from your pool of up to 9 turns that you can choose to activate. Spice it up with divine smites on every attack, or just the crits.
BUT… it’s a 3 class multiclass. Which means your natural progression could feel very stunted. I’d probably recommend taking mostly Ranger to start with as your horde breaker, multi attack and GWM will still give you 3-4 attacks against 2 or more adjacent enemies. The Paladin smites wouldn’t be super useful early on as spell slots are slow to unlock for a Ranger. And the 3 Fighter levels aren’t much more useful than the next 5 Ranger levels which both give you your turn advantages.
At the end of the day, it’s a little more complicated than running a full Fighter build and situationally better when vastly outnumbered. So it’s mostly a joke build.. but I couldn’t resist when I saw an ability that wasn’t limited to “once per turn”
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Rangers and Warlocks actually have some good synergy via Eldritch Blast. Being able to Repelling Blast people and Lance of Lethargy them is potent combined with Swarmkeeper's default movement abilities and a few choice spells like Spike Growth and Plant Growth. This can work in part because you don't need a high WIS for these Ranger control spells so the points into CHA instead of WIS are not much of a loss.
I dunno about that “0-sum,” it makes the AT a muu—uuch better caster. In my estimation, those 2 Wizard levels almost double the spellcasting capabilities for the AT. If you want to put extra Arcane into your Trickster, there’s no better way to do it.
IMO, a 2 level dip into Artificer would be a 0-sum multiclass for the AT.
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A significantly more obscure combo would be mixing Warlock with Rune Knight on a Scourge Aasimar chassis.
Take Rune Knight to level 8 to max your STR and CON. Frost Rune for ability checks. Hill Rune for damage resistance. Fire Rune for control. Why ability checks? So you can grapple like a god.
Take 5 levels in Warlock. On the way up, pick up Misty Visions and False Life. Choose Spider Climb as one of your spells. At level 5, pick up Cloak of Flies and Tomb of Levistus. You might be saying 5 levels of Warlock?! That's MAD!!! Well, just a little. What you've built at this point, folks, is a humanoid Drop Bear. Yes, you can now sneak up on enemy spellcasters and Eldritch archers to take them out of the fight. By combining your Runes for grappling efficacy with stealth abilities like Spider Climb and Misty Visions AND the auto-damage abilities of Cloak of Flies and S Aasimar Radiant Consumption, you become one of the deadliest ambush grapplers possible.
Now that I think about it more deeply, an Arcane Trickster 17/Armorer 3 (infiltrator) would actually be a great multiclass.
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The problem with putting two levels of wizard (bladesinger) in the AT, is that you are going to get your lvl 2 spells when your character is level 9. That is going to mean that most players are playing almost their entire AT career. with lvl 1 spells. But on the other hand you're going to have a lot of lvl 1 spells. And you're going to be able to cast them as a ritual, which gives you a lot of utility. Really, the best way to play it is by choosing as many ritual spells as you can (and writing them in your book if you didn't choose them as a Wizard). And also choose spells that scale, since you're going to get your level 2 spell slots before a sigleclass AT.
That all depends on when you take your two levels in Wiz. I often recommend one mid tier-2, and the other early tier-3, but it works all kinds of ways. I try to limit taking ritual spells as an AT to Detect Magic so I can still cast that quickly as necessary, and really try to only take most of the others after getting that first level in Wiz and only learning them as Wiz spells. And obviously you want spells that scale because this build is gonna upcast a lot to take advantage of the extra 4th-level slot you end up getting without any 4th-level spells.
And the multiclass also works very well with Divination instead of Bladesinger. Really any of the stronger Wizard subs will do which opens up a lot of variety for how to play it at higher levels. I like Bladesinger because of the PB scale on Bladesong, and how well it dovetails with Booming Blade/Green-Flame Blade as main battle cantrips to stack with Sneak Attack.
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If you level the wizard levels before doing the final rouge level Im sure you could swap out a spell for greater invisibility.
I was looking at the old Ranger Hunter subclass and noticed that their level 11 ability allows you to make an attack against any number of adjacent enemies for your action. Adding in their 3rd level ability Horde Breaker, you now get to hit everything once, plus another attack. Additionally a GWM feat allows you an extra attack on bonus action if you critically hit, or reduce something to 0hp.
So naturally I built a multi class that is based around being in the middle of the fight.
15 Ranger(Hunter) - 3 Fighter(Samurai) - 2 Paladin
The revised hunters ability Natures Veil at 10th level which makes you invisible until your next turn, and the Samurai’s 3rd level ability both give you advantage on all your attacks for the turn.
The Paladin gives you a decent way of spending spell slots with divine smite. Save them for the crits, of which you could take the Champion fighter subclass to double how often that happens at the sacrifice of three less advantaged turns per long rest.
GWM + Duelling fighting style, paired with a longsword and shield allows you to swap between being defensive with a +2AC and +2 damage, to being offensive and taking a -5 to hit for +10 damage. Go offensive if your turns attacks are at advantage.
Lastly, your action surge allows you to repeat your level 11th Ranger ability, now you get to attack everything twice. Best case scenario, on a grid you get to make 8 attacks + 8 attacks (action surge) + 1 attack (horde breaker), all at advantage from your pool of up to 9 turns that you can choose to activate. Spice it up with divine smites on every attack, or just the crits.
BUT… it’s a 3 class multiclass. Which means your natural progression could feel very stunted. I’d probably recommend taking mostly Ranger to start with as your horde breaker, multi attack and GWM will still give you 3-4 attacks against 2 or more adjacent enemies. The Paladin smites wouldn’t be super useful early on as spell slots are slow to unlock for a Ranger. And the 3 Fighter levels aren’t much more useful than the next 5 Ranger levels which both give you your turn advantages.
At the end of the day, it’s a little more complicated than running a full Fighter build and situationally better when vastly outnumbered. So it’s mostly a joke build.. but I couldn’t resist when I saw an ability that wasn’t limited to “once per turn”