I was looking at the gunslinger subclass for fighters, and felt it was somewhat underwhelming (aside from their disarm throwing the weapon 10ft away, that’s legit good). Adding to that, the subclass might not be accepted by some tables. So I took a look at what you’d could do without that subclass and this is what I came up with.
I originally had Piercer before Sharpshooter, because you can use piercer without loosing accuracy. But the range and cover benefits of Sharpshooter were hard to delay. Alongside that, the optional feature Steady aim can help make use of Sharpshooters -5hit +10dam without much loss of accuracy.
Defensive duelist comes in nicely at character level 13 with your new shiny +5 proficiency bonus, and I like this option as you know if you can block the attack with your reaction, or use uncanny dodge if you can’t. Besides, wielding a blade in your offhand is just more cool than a shield, unless you want that First Avenger vibe. However you cannot use the blade for bonus action attacks as the guns in 5e are not light. Nothing stops you from holding it there to defend with as far as I’m aware. But in any case, you’ll need that blade to remain silent as your boom sticks make a lot of noise.
Final three feats in whatever order seems most important to your game: Lucky, Elven accuracy, Ritual caster(bard).
Ritual casting allows you to primarily gain access to the spell Silence for those ambush/assassinations. But you can also get a decent set of tools such as Comprehend languages, Identify, Detect magic, and Tiny hut.
Elven accuracy may not be accepted at all tables here. My rule is that you only get to take one racial feat. You might not even get to max level, but if you can’t take it you can always swap it for an ASI or Martial adept for the extra dice.
Now, to address the levels waiting till Extra attack. I don’t believe your damage output will suffer very much. After all that’s how rogues are designed as a solo class. With your sneak attack being almost guaranteed every turn thanks to insightful fighting and stead aim, the Extra attack comes in nicely at those later levels much like a full fighter build, albeit one attack less. You’ll still get to ‘fan the hammer’ as an end game character.
Expertise options. I decided Athletics was more useful earlier on as opposed to stealth. I see this character as someone who will be climbing up high often enough, and with your stats in DEX for combat, you will need that boost to your athletics. I also suggest taking the maneuver “Ambush,” which not only makes you the fastest gun in the west, but also helps those stealth rolls if needs be before taking the expertise at level 11.
Expertise in Insight early on is just insurance for your insightful fighting. Might be unnecessary, but it’s kinda core to the build. Intimidation was just a fun theme choice to throw in. Felt right and helps with your Dump stat probably being Charisma.
Maneuvers. I was pretty happy with the choices here, considering they are mostly designed around melee combat. I’d suggest them in this order:
Level 8: Ambush, Precision, Pushing
Level 14: Distracting, Tripping
Level 17: Menacing, and your choice
Pushing, Distracting, Tripping and Menacing all add the dice to your damage with extra effects. Ambush was explained above, and Precision helps mitigate loosing accuracy and therefore damage with Sharpshooter.
Lastly, if you can convince your GM to allow revolvers and hunting rifles, you’re all set. If not, the standard 1d10 pistol will work almost as good.
—————
Let me know if there are any holes in the design. But remember, theme is more important that maxing numbers!
Honestly, it's not hard to improve on the CritRole Gunslinger subclass, if only because that subclass only really exists to try and recreate a Pathfinder class that doesn't exist in D&D. Hell, just using the PHB guns that don't break mid-combat is a huge improvement on that subclass. Overall though I think this seems like a solid design, although it seems extremely Feat heavy. I'm definitely of the mindset that you don't need to max out your stats to be a valuable team member, but to go that hard on feats seems to really assume that you roll very good stats, or have some kind of generous point-buy system.
You’re correct. I hardly ever take stats over Feats. I find feats force a more interesting play style, and help make each build feel more unique. I see them as more of a subclass talent tree to help define your strengths and weaknesses.
We do roll for stats, but you get to take the standard array if you don’t like your rolls at our tables. So the build assumes at least an 18 in your main stat. I don’t usually worry about maxing a stat.
Hmmm... I guess as a Variant Human who takes the Gunner Feat it should be fairly easy to get a fairly high DEX stat, since gunner is a Half-feat that still gives you a +1 to DEX. Although it's kind of more metagamey, you could guarantee an even higher DEX stat if you went for Custom Lineage instead. Variant Human gives two +1s to two distinct stats, while Custom Lineage gives you +2 to a single stat, so you can get yourself a +3 to DEX right at level 1. You can also use it to get darkvision, instead of the skill proficiency that human gets you.
Not that I feel like it's 100% better than playing as a human... for one thing, you have to come up with some kind of excuse for why you're a madeup race instead of one of the established races in D&D. But I just wanted to look up the difference between Custom Lineage and Variant Human.... which honestly, there's not much.
I was looking at the gunslinger subclass for fighters, and felt it was somewhat underwhelming (aside from their disarm throwing the weapon 10ft away, that’s legit good). Adding to that, the subclass might not be accepted by some tables. So I took a look at what you’d could do without that subclass and this is what I came up with.
(12) Fighter - Battle master; (8) Rogue - Inquisitive
Progression
(0) Human variant - FEAT Gunner
I originally had Piercer before Sharpshooter, because you can use piercer without loosing accuracy. But the range and cover benefits of Sharpshooter were hard to delay. Alongside that, the optional feature Steady aim can help make use of Sharpshooters -5hit +10dam without much loss of accuracy.
Defensive duelist comes in nicely at character level 13 with your new shiny +5 proficiency bonus, and I like this option as you know if you can block the attack with your reaction, or use uncanny dodge if you can’t. Besides, wielding a blade in your offhand is just more cool than a shield, unless you want that First Avenger vibe. However you cannot use the blade for bonus action attacks as the guns in 5e are not light. Nothing stops you from holding it there to defend with as far as I’m aware. But in any case, you’ll need that blade to remain silent as your boom sticks make a lot of noise.
Final three feats in whatever order seems most important to your game: Lucky, Elven accuracy, Ritual caster(bard).
Ritual casting allows you to primarily gain access to the spell Silence for those ambush/assassinations. But you can also get a decent set of tools such as Comprehend languages, Identify, Detect magic, and Tiny hut.
Elven accuracy may not be accepted at all tables here. My rule is that you only get to take one racial feat. You might not even get to max level, but if you can’t take it you can always swap it for an ASI or Martial adept for the extra dice.
Now, to address the levels waiting till Extra attack. I don’t believe your damage output will suffer very much. After all that’s how rogues are designed as a solo class. With your sneak attack being almost guaranteed every turn thanks to insightful fighting and stead aim, the Extra attack comes in nicely at those later levels much like a full fighter build, albeit one attack less. You’ll still get to ‘fan the hammer’ as an end game character.
Expertise options. I decided Athletics was more useful earlier on as opposed to stealth. I see this character as someone who will be climbing up high often enough, and with your stats in DEX for combat, you will need that boost to your athletics. I also suggest taking the maneuver “Ambush,” which not only makes you the fastest gun in the west, but also helps those stealth rolls if needs be before taking the expertise at level 11.
Expertise in Insight early on is just insurance for your insightful fighting. Might be unnecessary, but it’s kinda core to the build. Intimidation was just a fun theme choice to throw in. Felt right and helps with your Dump stat probably being Charisma.
Maneuvers. I was pretty happy with the choices here, considering they are mostly designed around melee combat. I’d suggest them in this order:
Level 8: Ambush, Precision, Pushing
Level 14: Distracting, Tripping
Level 17: Menacing, and your choice
Pushing, Distracting, Tripping and Menacing all add the dice to your damage with extra effects. Ambush was explained above, and Precision helps mitigate loosing accuracy and therefore damage with Sharpshooter.
Lastly, if you can convince your GM to allow revolvers and hunting rifles, you’re all set. If not, the standard 1d10 pistol will work almost as good.
—————
Let me know if there are any holes in the design. But remember, theme is more important that maxing numbers!
Honestly, it's not hard to improve on the CritRole Gunslinger subclass, if only because that subclass only really exists to try and recreate a Pathfinder class that doesn't exist in D&D. Hell, just using the PHB guns that don't break mid-combat is a huge improvement on that subclass. Overall though I think this seems like a solid design, although it seems extremely Feat heavy. I'm definitely of the mindset that you don't need to max out your stats to be a valuable team member, but to go that hard on feats seems to really assume that you roll very good stats, or have some kind of generous point-buy system.
Watch Crits for Breakfast, an adults-only RP-Heavy Roll20 Livestream at twitch.tv/afterdisbooty
And now you too can play with the amazing art and assets we use in Roll20 for our campaign at Hazel's Emporium
Yeah the only feat there I'd consider before maxing out my DEX would be Sharpshooter. Seems like a fun build!
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
You’re correct. I hardly ever take stats over Feats. I find feats force a more interesting play style, and help make each build feel more unique. I see them as more of a subclass talent tree to help define your strengths and weaknesses.
We do roll for stats, but you get to take the standard array if you don’t like your rolls at our tables. So the build assumes at least an 18 in your main stat. I don’t usually worry about maxing a stat.
Thanks for the feedback :)
Hmmm... I guess as a Variant Human who takes the Gunner Feat it should be fairly easy to get a fairly high DEX stat, since gunner is a Half-feat that still gives you a +1 to DEX. Although it's kind of more metagamey, you could guarantee an even higher DEX stat if you went for Custom Lineage instead. Variant Human gives two +1s to two distinct stats, while Custom Lineage gives you +2 to a single stat, so you can get yourself a +3 to DEX right at level 1. You can also use it to get darkvision, instead of the skill proficiency that human gets you.
Not that I feel like it's 100% better than playing as a human... for one thing, you have to come up with some kind of excuse for why you're a madeup race instead of one of the established races in D&D. But I just wanted to look up the difference between Custom Lineage and Variant Human.... which honestly, there's not much.
Watch Crits for Breakfast, an adults-only RP-Heavy Roll20 Livestream at twitch.tv/afterdisbooty
And now you too can play with the amazing art and assets we use in Roll20 for our campaign at Hazel's Emporium