For me, a character isn't complete until the backstory is sensible.
I do *lot* of theorycrafting (I designed about a dozen characters, both single and multi-classes, but am only playing one). Of that list, I would only play maybe three or four at this point because they have fully developed story lines.
Start with, creating a single-classes character because it sounds fun to play. Then it's start looking at options; what background would cause a person to take up this role/profession? Now I have the character outline. Now I ask, what other class would blend well into this narrative? Can I make it work with the skills I have?
For instance, I wanted to build a Hexblade Warlock. What background would work with that? I went for "Haunted One" from Ravenloft. He somehow spent time in the realm of Ravenloft but was touched by Shadowfell to gain his Hexblade powers. That's pretty good, but I really want him to have some Fighter abilities to really make him a warrior. So how do I mix that in? When do I take levels of each, and how much?
The backstory now goes that he was just a roaming thug and found a cabin hidden in the woods. Thinking he could make some easy money by intimidating the occupant he burst in only to find it belonged to a wizard that was opening a portal to a demiplane to retrieve a lost artifact. The character was caught up in the spell and transported to another plane but without the tools to get back. He spent years fighting for his life against hordes of shadow-touched beings. He finally stumbles upon a door out and makes it back to the Prime Material Plane; but not without a cost. Sure, he's now a better fighter, but something changed inside of him. Something, or someone, is now part of who he is and keeps making him stronger--A warrior that will eventually need to return to that realm and fight one more battle for a dark being.
So now he starts as a plain Fighter, gets a few levels of Hexblade, another level of Fighter, more Hex, a third level of Fighter, and then finish off with Hexblade. He feels like a complete person and becomes truly fun to play whether in a min/max setting or an RP setting.
The bugbear Barbarian is going to sit and wait until his story comes to me...
I see a lot of "I allow multiclassing, but the player has to explain it with a RP backstory that makes sense". I wonder, do you also require players who want to play a Battlemaster Fighter with a Soldier background, or a Divination Wizard with a Sage background, to have a "RP backstory that makes sense"?
I can only guess a GM would put in that restriction because... the GM would need to incorporate that into the campaign. If I say "I'm a Fighter, and want to multi-class into Cleric because that'd be cool!" now the GM needs to figure out how to drop a temple into the middle of the adventure, so you can find your diety?
In my case, my Hexblade criminal who wants to dip into Rogue, I would need to engage my criminal network (already happening) and learn a thing or two specific to my character's goals. I couldn't just learn that stuff from the Paladin or Barbarian in my team. So, the GM has to write that stuff up.
Main sticking point in the aforementioned situation above is my Hexblade's spells would be "stuck" at level 5 while I do the 3 level Rogue dip to get to Swashbuckler. Means I have to pick my spells carefully, for 3 levels...
I see a lot of "I allow multiclassing, but the player has to explain it with a RP backstory that makes sense". I wonder, do you also require players who want to play a Battlemaster Fighter with a Soldier background, or a Divination Wizard with a Sage background, to have a "RP backstory that makes sense"?
I can only guess a GM would put in that restriction because... the GM would need to incorporate that into the campaign. If I say "I'm a Fighter, and want to multi-class into Cleric because that'd be cool!" now the GM needs to figure out how to drop a temple into the middle of the adventure, so you can find your diety?
That makes sense, sure. I'm just irked at some DMs' intolerance of combinations that don't fit their preconceived notions. Like, they wouldn't bat an eyelash at a Barbarian character taking a level of Fighter, because Barbarians are sorta like Fighters anyway. but a Wizard character taking a level or two of Paladin is met with immediate resistance, if not outright forbidden, because "why would a weak-bodied, arcane-minded sage suddenly want to become a knight dedicated to their god?". Well, some "barbarian" concepts clash with "fighter" concepts terribly (a wild, unstructured berserker vs a highly-trained, tactical-minded master of arms), while the opposite can be true of "wizard" and "paladin" (a high elf, devoted follower of Corellon Larethian, wizard by nature, decides to manifest his devotion by following the tenets of the Oath of the Ancients). So it turns into: if I can think of a character concept that works for your mechanical choices, you don't have to even tell me what your concept is, I'll make one up, whether it agrees with what you were thinking or not... but if I can't think of one, then you must be doing something wrong, and need to convince me to make an exception.
Either require everybody to come up with cohesive character concepts, or don't require anybody to. Either way works. That being said, the DM is running the game, so they're free to put in whichever restrictions they want, for whichever reasons. Doesn't make it right, though.
That makes sense, sure. I'm just irked at some DMs' intolerance of combinations that don't fit their preconceived notions. Like, they wouldn't bat an eyelash at a Barbarian character taking a level of Fighter, because Barbarians are sorta like Fighters anyway. but a Wizard character taking a level or two of Paladin is met with immediate resistance, if not outright forbidden, because "why would a weak-bodied, arcane-minded sage suddenly want to become a knight dedicated to their god?". Well, some "barbarian" concepts clash with "fighter" concepts terribly (a wild, unstructured berserker vs a highly-trained, tactical-minded master of arms), while the opposite can be true of "wizard" and "paladin" (a high elf, devoted follower of Corellon Larethian, wizard by nature, decides to manifest his devotion by following the tenets of the Oath of the Ancients). So it turns into: if I can think of a character concept that works for your mechanical choices, you don't have to even tell me what your concept is, I'll make one up, whether it agrees with what you were thinking or not... but if I can't think of one, then you must be doing something wrong, and need to convince me to make an exception.
Either require everybody to come up with cohesive character concepts, or don't require anybody to. Either way works. That being said, the DM is running the game, so they're free to put in whichever restrictions they want, for whichever reasons. Doesn't make it right, though.
To be fair, wizards and clerics already have a rivalry going on, and there's a rivalry between physical types and spellcaster types. A wizard turning paladin is literally trying to combine two completely rival groups into a single character, and the social repercussions of such a thing should exist. Even if the social repercussion is a glorified cock block. And that's before we start talking about the class focuses - martial might and protection from scholarship? That is very much unusual, and a far larger jump than reckless versus methodical fighting styles. From a typical fantasy setting standpoint, it is indeed very odd for a wizard and paladin to mix, so I would expect more than a bit of scrutiny and resistance over this.
I would say the same for the high elf wizard trying to turn Ancient paladin. In the first place, learning wizardry is already a devotion to the embodiment of arcane magic and crafts (and not nature, like Ancient paladins seem to be). And why not druid? The head of the elven pantheon is renowned for his shapechanging abilities. Why not Arcane Domain Cleric? Or how about a valor bard? Corellon, as a Chaotic diety, isn't a huge fan of oaths or tying to higher powers, leading to a very low amount of clerics and paladins and other church types in elven society, to the point I question if he'd find a Corellon aligned church that trains such paladins. From a completely in game standpoint, this is a very strange request.
How about a paladin of a god of learning? Oghma of Forgotten Realms, or Boccob of Greyhawk. Well, first we'd probably need to actually design a paladin subclass for these gods - there's none that actually fit the knowledge / magic focus. Tyrants, pacificsts, green knights, fiend/undead slayers, justice / revenge seekers... they don't fit, so I would heavily question someone asking for a paladin of magic using those as well. Not when an arcane or knowledge cleric would make far more sense here.
Now, a homebrew paladin subclass devoted to this kind of thing would work well. But then, we're stepping into the territory of creating something with specific flavors to match with wizard, and I think that would very much have an effect on the DMs that would normally block wizard/paladin class combinations.
To be fair, wizards and clerics already have a rivalry going on, and there's a rivalry between physical types and spellcaster types.
What's the source for this? I've never heard of anything along those lines.
A wizard turning paladin is literally trying to combine two completely rival groups into a single character, and the social repercussions of such a thing should exist.
Why? Arcane magic is a tool anyone can learn to wield. Eldritch Knights, Arcane Tricksters and Arcane Archers all combine arcane magic with martial prowess successfully. Multiclassing doesn't mean you're equally committed to both classes either. Why shouldn't a paladin be able to learn some arcane magic on the side, or a wizard decide they want to take a more active role in the cosmic struggle between good and evil?
I would say the same for the high elf wizard trying to turn Ancient paladin. In the first place, learning wizardry is already a devotion to the embodiment of arcane magic and crafts (and not nature, like Ancient paladins seem to be).
That sounds more like an Arcana cleric to me. Wizards treat magic like an academic field.
And why not druid? The head of the elven pantheon is renowned for his shapechanging abilities. Why not Arcane Domain Cleric? Or how about a valor bard?
Those classes all have wildly different places in the world. Druids serve nature, paladins serve good, bards have their own agendas.
Corellon, as a Chaotic diety, isn't a huge fan of oaths or tying to higher powers, leading to a very low amount of clerics and paladins and other church types in elven society, to the point I question if he'd find a Corellon aligned church that trains such paladins. From a completely in game standpoint, this is a very strange request.
Paladins don't have to be devoted to a god though, and an elf paladin doesn't need to receive training for Corellon-worshipping elves. Also, Corellon and the elves are big on personal freedom. Why would they try to stop someone from living life their own way?
All of this also completely overlooks that someone may want to multiclass purely to create a character concept that doesn't quite fit into a single class and not because they want to be considered a full-fledged member of two classes. If someone wants to play an outdoorsy fighter, why deny them 1 level in Ranger? They don't really want to be a ranger in the story sense, but borrowing some of those mechanics would help them express the character they want.
It's a question of versatility versus specialization. With multiclassing, you get more powerful and varied skillsets, but you will never be able to get the highest level skills and spells. The upside is, your character has a better chance of surviving if you are cut off from the rest of your party. For example if your group has one cleric and no one else is a healer, you can multiclass to become a healer yourself.This makes sure you yourself always have healing,and if your healer dies or is incapacitated, you can replace that role for a short time until your healer is back in the fight.
The advantage of not multiclassing is that you will have a lot less to keep track of and can use the entirety of that classes skills.
The character I have as a back up in case my main bites it is a multiclass character. DM said I could make one as we are doing Tomb of Annihilation, So my back up started as a Warlock Hexblade patron Pact of the Blade, Background of Urban Bounty Hunter do to his activity as a bounty hunter his parents were murdered. This gave him pause for self thought he started following Hoar God of Revenge and Retribution, and he became a Paladin of Hoar and will be going Vengeance at 3 level.
The character I have as a back up in case my main bites it is a multiclass character. DM said I could make one as we are doing Tomb of Annihilation, So my back up started as a Warlock Hexblade patron Pact of the Blade, Background of Urban Bounty Hunter do to his activity as a bounty hunter his parents were murdered. This gave him pause for self thought he started following Hoar God of Revenge and Retribution, and he became a Paladin of Hoar and will be going Vengeance at 3 level.
When you need to take vengeance to an artform. Sounds like fun to play.
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"Where words fail, swords prevail. Where blood is spilled, my cup is filled" -Cartaphilus
"I have found the answer to the meaning of life. You ask me what the answer is? You already know what the answer to life is. You fear it more than the strike of a viper, the ravages of disease, the ire of a lover. The answer is always death. But death is a gentle mistress with a sweet embrace, and you owe her a debt of restitution. Life is not a gift, it is a loan."
Never underestimate the power of fluffing mechanics to suit a different theme. Yeah, a holy warrior who sells his soul to demons for a 1d10 cantrip (completely worth it) doesn't make a great deal of sense, so, don't say that's whats happened. Just say your god gave you the cantrip. There's no obligation to RP the intended lore behind a class. Similarly, it's rarely necessary to multi-class for an RP concept unless an ability is actually necessary for the RP to make sense. If you want to be a holy warrior and also want to be a pure fighter, be a pure fighter who yells "DEUS VULT" every time he whacks a guy with his hammer, and spends his nights praying. Boom, holy warrior, no need to multiclass cleric or paladin. Talk it over with your DM, I doubt most would have any issue with saying your hammer glowed with divine radiance as you caved in undead skulls with it.
I run an Arcane trickster/Bladesinger, but I don't use any of the lore behind the bladesinger. I already use mirror images, blur, illusions, shield, and all manner of magical trickery to avoid damage, gaining movement speed and AC with bladesong to me is just another spell I use to be a slippery bastard, rather than an ancient and closely guarded elven secret technique. Lore-wise, I'm just another spellthief who dedicated a bit more time to my magical studies and a bit less to stabbing practice than a straight Arcane trickster.
I run another Arcane trickster/Way of Shadow Monk that doesn't even acknowledge his magic as magic. The character is themed after a Batman-esque stealthy martial artist, using gadgets and other mundane trickery. For example, we'd fluff fog cloud as a smoke bomb, invisibility as just being ridiculously good at stealth, blur being a slippery and hard to read fighter, charm as just being a great manipulator whose victims eventually realize you were full of shit, disguise self as being a master of mundane disguise, fear as just being genuinely terrifying, mage hand legerdemain as being stealthy enough to be unseen in in my approach, nimble enough to fall back to avoid detection, or quickly dodge out of the way of traps to stay safe and unseen in the same way an invisible mage hand would let a trickster stay out of harm's way. They way we fluffed some of this stuff made this character an absolute badass. Where other characters were just moving 30 feet in a turn, I would 'move' to perform acts that were actually being done by mage hand, moving my real movement, vanishing into the darkness and moving somewhere else with what mechanically was a teleportation spell, etc, making it seem like this character just had near-superhuman speed, stealth, and agility, just by using a little imagination to cover up mechanics that didn't fit the character concept out of the box..
Your class(es) is(are) just your toolkit, not your story. As long as the abilities lend themselves well to the character theme, you can fluff the nature and origin of those abilities accordingly to make some really cool stuff.
Eek seems like mostnecrothreading... Sorry. I came looking for insights on balance but it seems like folk against multiclassing just have some silly notion that if you go rp first mechanics second you somehow have the moral high ground. Seems a bit.. limiting. Maybe i just haven't seen any super cheese builds and the venom is warranted.
I've played/dmed multi-dip-multi toons with all 20 levels, down to every ASI, preplanned, with stories tailored to explain, as well as below suboptimal multiclass concepts where if the classes followed the whims of the story with never a plan for what class or ability to take next. And, many games that fell in between.
They were all great fun. The only times you have issues is when players at the table are selfish. You can even mix minmaxers with rp elitists if everyone at the table is as interested in seeing their fellows shine as they are in their own glory.
As 5th level EK in a lengthy campaign, where all party members were dumped on a strange world (like predator had a movie about), and we all had prior backstories we thought would be based in our own world. My character chose vecna as deity at creation, and on this new world, there is no vecna. So.... I plan to take 1 level of knowledge cleric (only cleric that is associated with vecna) so that the world will finally have its first cleric of vecna, albeit a single level cleric, and rest will remain ek. The pantheon temple in the largest city had an empty room, where I had my ek go to petition for a quest for a halberd (hard to pam/sentinel without polearm) and while there, petitioning an empty room in vecnas name, his symbol arose from an otherwise empty altar.
I am soooo happy the dm chose to continue my backstory on this new world that itmademe change focus from pure ek. Dm is actually planning on allowing it. Wont be happening until 6th level though. Knowledge cleric 1st level is pretty bland, but its legit cleric. So, I'll still be happy. I figure we are about 35-40% campaign progression so far, so level 15 is probably our cap. 1 dip doesnt look bad imo.
This thread seems to think that you can either role play or min max. Not both. Personally I always min-max my characters but I always also try to role play. People who play d&d for play different reasons. Some people just love the combat system and play d&d for the combat. Some people play it mainly for role play but why can’t you do both. Can’t you role play a highly min-maxed character? This all depends on the player. How do they want to play d&d.
IS there a way for a group with maybe very few players to make it so on there character sheet on this website of D&D beyond they can lvl multiple class to max? If not could that be something they could implement?
Depends. I multiclass if I have to (eg Thornton a bard 1/draconic bloodline sorcerer 1 because of a lousy starting armor class, a 13 w/ leather armor) or a have an EPIC master plan (eg my evocation wizard 4/fighter 1; looking back I should have gone paladin with crazy CHA and STR for a wiz)
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Rogue Shadow, the DM (and occasional) PC with schemes of inventive thinking
IS there a way for a group with maybe very few players to make it so on there character sheet on this website of D&D beyond they can lvl multiple class to max? If not could that be something they could implement?
If you're asking whether you can have, for example, a Wizard 20/Fighter 20, then no, that's not something you can legally do with the rules, and therefore not something you can do on this site. Unless WotC introduces such a feature to D&D 5e, you almost certainly will not see that ever implemented here.
I love to multiclass for straight-up mechanical, theorycrafting reasons. But to assume, therefore, that I am bad at or uninterested in RP and storytelling would be an error.
To me, a class is like a kit of legos. It's kinda fun to make something by following the directions. But it's far more fun to mix the kits together and build cool shit. And it's usually easy to build a fun backstory around that.
An elf noble who goes adventuring because the spirits talking in his head force him to. (Ancestral Guardian/Echo Knight).
A craft guild member from Silverymoon who aspires to join the Spellguard and elevate his station in life (EK/Wizard).
Cleric who is cast out of his temple for unorthodox practice and heresy (Tempest Cleric/Draconic Sorc)
Ship's officer who serves as the navigator/engineer but defects to a foreign nation because his homeland has come under control of a corrupt government (Artificer/Fighter.)
Mechanically, the hardest part of multiclassing is making the class fun for most of the campaign. Especially when most campaigns only last to level 10 or so. For instance, in the echo knight/ancestral guardian example, the best level split at 10 is 6 barbarian/4 Echo K. But that more-or-less means going to at least five in barbarian to get to multiattack quickly. Which is more boring than playing echo knight. The other option is to start Echo Knight for tactical shenanigans, and settle for taking multiattack much, much later. Or compromising by going to 5 echo knight before mcing into barb.
I am a "purist" so I don't like multi-classing. Whenever possible I want to get the high-level features for a given class. But this is a personal choice.
Some features from different classes work very well together. In the end, I believe it is just how a player feel about his/her character.
Multiclassing can be strong, but if you don't have a sold understanding of the game mechanics, it's very easy to go wrong.
You can never go wrong by staying in the same class. I go both ways, depending on the game and my character.
This thread seems to think that you can either role play or min max. Not both. Personally I always min-max my characters but I always also try to role play. People who play d&d for play different reasons. Some people just love the combat system and play d&d for the combat. Some people play it mainly for role play but why can’t you do both. Can’t you role play a highly min-maxed character? This all depends on the player. How do they want to play d&d.
No matter how many times this is addressed, the misconception continues to persist. I don't know why.
My group tends not to Multi-class. We have a mix of experience in our group but I find that their character concepts (we are very RP heavy in our group) don't lend often to multi-classing. I know that mine do not when I am a player.
In college we used Gestalt rules a couple times but those games were often Min/Max video game-esque affairs where players were not encouraged to RP very much. So, having little experience in multi-classing, I wanted to reach out to everyone and see their thoughts. I notice a lot of class threads I have read here mention using Multi-Classing.
Why do you do it? Or why don't you?
I enjoy multiclassing because it feels more authentic for most of my characters, who tend to grow and change as a result of the story. I think it can be organically worked into the roleplay pretty easily, actually.
My dragonborn sorcerer actually always wanted to be a knight, but was kept from the battlefield by an overprotective parent. It made sense for him to pick up levels of Paladin as he opposed the Cult of the Dragon (and eventually Tiamat), and his call to serve Bahamut became more and more pronounced.
My tiefling warlock never liked the idea that her power came from someone else and not herself. When the opportunity to interact with a trapped aboleth arose, she took it and was actually pleasantly surprised to be able to multiclass into sorcerer with the new aberrant mind subclass.
I love to multiclass for straight-up mechanical, theorycrafting reasons. But to assume, therefore, that I am bad at or uninterested in RP and storytelling would be an error.
To me, a class is like a kit of legos. It's kinda fun to make something by following the directions. But it's far more fun to mix the kits together and build cool shit. And it's usually easy to build a fun backstory around that.
An elf noble who goes adventuring because the spirits talking in his head force him to. (Ancestral Guardian/Echo Knight).
A craft guild member from Silverymoon who aspires to join the Spellguard and elevate his station in life (EK/Wizard).
Cleric who is cast out of his temple for unorthodox practice and heresy (Tempest Cleric/Draconic Sorc)
Ship's officer who serves as the navigator/engineer but defects to a foreign nation because his homeland has come under control of a corrupt government (Artificer/Fighter.)
Mechanically, the hardest part of multiclassing is making the class fun for most of the campaign. Especially when most campaigns only last to level 10 or so. For instance, in the echo knight/ancestral guardian example, the best level split at 10 is 6 barbarian/4 Echo K. But that more-or-less means going to at least five in barbarian to get to multiattack quickly. Which is more boring than playing echo knight. The other option is to start Echo Knight for tactical shenanigans, and settle for taking multiattack much, much later. Or compromising by going to 5 echo knight before mcing into barb.
Do you also build out "sandbox" versions of characters that you're going to multiclass to see what your potential options are?
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For me, a character isn't complete until the backstory is sensible.
I do *lot* of theorycrafting (I designed about a dozen characters, both single and multi-classes, but am only playing one). Of that list, I would only play maybe three or four at this point because they have fully developed story lines.
Start with, creating a single-classes character because it sounds fun to play. Then it's start looking at options; what background would cause a person to take up this role/profession? Now I have the character outline. Now I ask, what other class would blend well into this narrative? Can I make it work with the skills I have?
For instance, I wanted to build a Hexblade Warlock. What background would work with that? I went for "Haunted One" from Ravenloft. He somehow spent time in the realm of Ravenloft but was touched by Shadowfell to gain his Hexblade powers. That's pretty good, but I really want him to have some Fighter abilities to really make him a warrior. So how do I mix that in? When do I take levels of each, and how much?
The backstory now goes that he was just a roaming thug and found a cabin hidden in the woods. Thinking he could make some easy money by intimidating the occupant he burst in only to find it belonged to a wizard that was opening a portal to a demiplane to retrieve a lost artifact. The character was caught up in the spell and transported to another plane but without the tools to get back. He spent years fighting for his life against hordes of shadow-touched beings. He finally stumbles upon a door out and makes it back to the Prime Material Plane; but not without a cost. Sure, he's now a better fighter, but something changed inside of him. Something, or someone, is now part of who he is and keeps making him stronger--A warrior that will eventually need to return to that realm and fight one more battle for a dark being.
So now he starts as a plain Fighter, gets a few levels of Hexblade, another level of Fighter, more Hex, a third level of Fighter, and then finish off with Hexblade. He feels like a complete person and becomes truly fun to play whether in a min/max setting or an RP setting.
The bugbear Barbarian is going to sit and wait until his story comes to me...
I can only guess a GM would put in that restriction because... the GM would need to incorporate that into the campaign. If I say "I'm a Fighter, and want to multi-class into Cleric because that'd be cool!" now the GM needs to figure out how to drop a temple into the middle of the adventure, so you can find your diety?
In my case, my Hexblade criminal who wants to dip into Rogue, I would need to engage my criminal network (already happening) and learn a thing or two specific to my character's goals. I couldn't just learn that stuff from the Paladin or Barbarian in my team. So, the GM has to write that stuff up.
Main sticking point in the aforementioned situation above is my Hexblade's spells would be "stuck" at level 5 while I do the 3 level Rogue dip to get to Swashbuckler. Means I have to pick my spells carefully, for 3 levels...
That makes sense, sure. I'm just irked at some DMs' intolerance of combinations that don't fit their preconceived notions. Like, they wouldn't bat an eyelash at a Barbarian character taking a level of Fighter, because Barbarians are sorta like Fighters anyway. but a Wizard character taking a level or two of Paladin is met with immediate resistance, if not outright forbidden, because "why would a weak-bodied, arcane-minded sage suddenly want to become a knight dedicated to their god?". Well, some "barbarian" concepts clash with "fighter" concepts terribly (a wild, unstructured berserker vs a highly-trained, tactical-minded master of arms), while the opposite can be true of "wizard" and "paladin" (a high elf, devoted follower of Corellon Larethian, wizard by nature, decides to manifest his devotion by following the tenets of the Oath of the Ancients). So it turns into: if I can think of a character concept that works for your mechanical choices, you don't have to even tell me what your concept is, I'll make one up, whether it agrees with what you were thinking or not... but if I can't think of one, then you must be doing something wrong, and need to convince me to make an exception.
Either require everybody to come up with cohesive character concepts, or don't require anybody to. Either way works. That being said, the DM is running the game, so they're free to put in whichever restrictions they want, for whichever reasons. Doesn't make it right, though.
To be fair, wizards and clerics already have a rivalry going on, and there's a rivalry between physical types and spellcaster types. A wizard turning paladin is literally trying to combine two completely rival groups into a single character, and the social repercussions of such a thing should exist. Even if the social repercussion is a glorified cock block. And that's before we start talking about the class focuses - martial might and protection from scholarship? That is very much unusual, and a far larger jump than reckless versus methodical fighting styles. From a typical fantasy setting standpoint, it is indeed very odd for a wizard and paladin to mix, so I would expect more than a bit of scrutiny and resistance over this.
I would say the same for the high elf wizard trying to turn Ancient paladin. In the first place, learning wizardry is already a devotion to the embodiment of arcane magic and crafts (and not nature, like Ancient paladins seem to be). And why not druid? The head of the elven pantheon is renowned for his shapechanging abilities. Why not Arcane Domain Cleric? Or how about a valor bard? Corellon, as a Chaotic diety, isn't a huge fan of oaths or tying to higher powers, leading to a very low amount of clerics and paladins and other church types in elven society, to the point I question if he'd find a Corellon aligned church that trains such paladins. From a completely in game standpoint, this is a very strange request.
How about a paladin of a god of learning? Oghma of Forgotten Realms, or Boccob of Greyhawk. Well, first we'd probably need to actually design a paladin subclass for these gods - there's none that actually fit the knowledge / magic focus. Tyrants, pacificsts, green knights, fiend/undead slayers, justice / revenge seekers... they don't fit, so I would heavily question someone asking for a paladin of magic using those as well. Not when an arcane or knowledge cleric would make far more sense here.
Now, a homebrew paladin subclass devoted to this kind of thing would work well. But then, we're stepping into the territory of creating something with specific flavors to match with wizard, and I think that would very much have an effect on the DMs that would normally block wizard/paladin class combinations.
What's the source for this? I've never heard of anything along those lines.
Why? Arcane magic is a tool anyone can learn to wield. Eldritch Knights, Arcane Tricksters and Arcane Archers all combine arcane magic with martial prowess successfully. Multiclassing doesn't mean you're equally committed to both classes either. Why shouldn't a paladin be able to learn some arcane magic on the side, or a wizard decide they want to take a more active role in the cosmic struggle between good and evil?
That sounds more like an Arcana cleric to me. Wizards treat magic like an academic field.
Those classes all have wildly different places in the world. Druids serve nature, paladins serve good, bards have their own agendas.
Paladins don't have to be devoted to a god though, and an elf paladin doesn't need to receive training for Corellon-worshipping elves. Also, Corellon and the elves are big on personal freedom. Why would they try to stop someone from living life their own way?
All of this also completely overlooks that someone may want to multiclass purely to create a character concept that doesn't quite fit into a single class and not because they want to be considered a full-fledged member of two classes. If someone wants to play an outdoorsy fighter, why deny them 1 level in Ranger? They don't really want to be a ranger in the story sense, but borrowing some of those mechanics would help them express the character they want.
It's a question of versatility versus specialization. With multiclassing, you get more powerful and varied skillsets, but you will never be able to get the highest level skills and spells. The upside is, your character has a better chance of surviving if you are cut off from the rest of your party. For example if your group has one cleric and no one else is a healer, you can multiclass to become a healer yourself.This makes sure you yourself always have healing,and if your healer dies or is incapacitated, you can replace that role for a short time until your healer is back in the fight.
The advantage of not multiclassing is that you will have a lot less to keep track of and can use the entirety of that classes skills.
The character I have as a back up in case my main bites it is a multiclass character. DM said I could make one as we are doing Tomb of Annihilation, So my back up started as a Warlock Hexblade patron Pact of the Blade, Background of Urban Bounty Hunter do to his activity as a bounty hunter his parents were murdered. This gave him pause for self thought he started following Hoar God of Revenge and Retribution, and he became a Paladin of Hoar and will be going Vengeance at 3 level.
When you need to take vengeance to an artform. Sounds like fun to play.
"Where words fail, swords prevail. Where blood is spilled, my cup is filled" -Cartaphilus
"I have found the answer to the meaning of life. You ask me what the answer is? You already know what the answer to life is. You fear it more than the strike of a viper, the ravages of disease, the ire of a lover. The answer is always death. But death is a gentle mistress with a sweet embrace, and you owe her a debt of restitution. Life is not a gift, it is a loan."
Never underestimate the power of fluffing mechanics to suit a different theme. Yeah, a holy warrior who sells his soul to demons for a 1d10 cantrip (completely worth it) doesn't make a great deal of sense, so, don't say that's whats happened. Just say your god gave you the cantrip. There's no obligation to RP the intended lore behind a class. Similarly, it's rarely necessary to multi-class for an RP concept unless an ability is actually necessary for the RP to make sense. If you want to be a holy warrior and also want to be a pure fighter, be a pure fighter who yells "DEUS VULT" every time he whacks a guy with his hammer, and spends his nights praying. Boom, holy warrior, no need to multiclass cleric or paladin. Talk it over with your DM, I doubt most would have any issue with saying your hammer glowed with divine radiance as you caved in undead skulls with it.
I run an Arcane trickster/Bladesinger, but I don't use any of the lore behind the bladesinger. I already use mirror images, blur, illusions, shield, and all manner of magical trickery to avoid damage, gaining movement speed and AC with bladesong to me is just another spell I use to be a slippery bastard, rather than an ancient and closely guarded elven secret technique. Lore-wise, I'm just another spellthief who dedicated a bit more time to my magical studies and a bit less to stabbing practice than a straight Arcane trickster.
I run another Arcane trickster/Way of Shadow Monk that doesn't even acknowledge his magic as magic. The character is themed after a Batman-esque stealthy martial artist, using gadgets and other mundane trickery. For example, we'd fluff fog cloud as a smoke bomb, invisibility as just being ridiculously good at stealth, blur being a slippery and hard to read fighter, charm as just being a great manipulator whose victims eventually realize you were full of shit, disguise self as being a master of mundane disguise, fear as just being genuinely terrifying, mage hand legerdemain as being stealthy enough to be unseen in in my approach, nimble enough to fall back to avoid detection, or quickly dodge out of the way of traps to stay safe and unseen in the same way an invisible mage hand would let a trickster stay out of harm's way. They way we fluffed some of this stuff made this character an absolute badass. Where other characters were just moving 30 feet in a turn, I would 'move' to perform acts that were actually being done by mage hand, moving my real movement, vanishing into the darkness and moving somewhere else with what mechanically was a teleportation spell, etc, making it seem like this character just had near-superhuman speed, stealth, and agility, just by using a little imagination to cover up mechanics that didn't fit the character concept out of the box..
Your class(es) is(are) just your toolkit, not your story. As long as the abilities lend themselves well to the character theme, you can fluff the nature and origin of those abilities accordingly to make some really cool stuff.
Eek seems like mostnecrothreading... Sorry. I came looking for insights on balance but it seems like folk against multiclassing just have some silly notion that if you go rp first mechanics second you somehow have the moral high ground. Seems a bit.. limiting. Maybe i just haven't seen any super cheese builds and the venom is warranted.
I've played/dmed multi-dip-multi toons with all 20 levels, down to every ASI, preplanned, with stories tailored to explain, as well as below suboptimal multiclass concepts where if the classes followed the whims of the story with never a plan for what class or ability to take next. And, many games that fell in between.
They were all great fun. The only times you have issues is when players at the table are selfish. You can even mix minmaxers with rp elitists if everyone at the table is as interested in seeing their fellows shine as they are in their own glory.
As 5th level EK in a lengthy campaign, where all party members were dumped on a strange world (like predator had a movie about), and we all had prior backstories we thought would be based in our own world. My character chose vecna as deity at creation, and on this new world, there is no vecna. So.... I plan to take 1 level of knowledge cleric (only cleric that is associated with vecna) so that the world will finally have its first cleric of vecna, albeit a single level cleric, and rest will remain ek. The pantheon temple in the largest city had an empty room, where I had my ek go to petition for a quest for a halberd (hard to pam/sentinel without polearm) and while there, petitioning an empty room in vecnas name, his symbol arose from an otherwise empty altar.
I am soooo happy the dm chose to continue my backstory on this new world that itmademe change focus from pure ek. Dm is actually planning on allowing it. Wont be happening until 6th level though. Knowledge cleric 1st level is pretty bland, but its legit cleric. So, I'll still be happy. I figure we are about 35-40% campaign progression so far, so level 15 is probably our cap. 1 dip doesnt look bad imo.
This thread seems to think that you can either role play or min max. Not both. Personally I always min-max my characters but I always also try to role play. People who play d&d for play different reasons. Some people just love the combat system and play d&d for the combat. Some people play it mainly for role play but why can’t you do both. Can’t you role play a highly min-maxed character? This all depends on the player. How do they want to play d&d.
When players get creative.
IS there a way for a group with maybe very few players to make it so on there character sheet on this website of D&D beyond they can lvl multiple class to max? If not could that be something they could implement?
Depends. I multiclass if I have to (eg Thornton a bard 1/draconic bloodline sorcerer 1 because of a lousy starting armor class, a 13 w/ leather armor) or a have an EPIC master plan (eg my evocation wizard 4/fighter 1; looking back I should have gone paladin with crazy CHA and STR for a wiz)
Rogue Shadow, the DM (and occasional) PC with schemes of inventive thinking
If you're asking whether you can have, for example, a Wizard 20/Fighter 20, then no, that's not something you can legally do with the rules, and therefore not something you can do on this site. Unless WotC introduces such a feature to D&D 5e, you almost certainly will not see that ever implemented here.
I love to multiclass for straight-up mechanical, theorycrafting reasons. But to assume, therefore, that I am bad at or uninterested in RP and storytelling would be an error.
To me, a class is like a kit of legos. It's kinda fun to make something by following the directions. But it's far more fun to mix the kits together and build cool shit. And it's usually easy to build a fun backstory around that.
Mechanically, the hardest part of multiclassing is making the class fun for most of the campaign. Especially when most campaigns only last to level 10 or so. For instance, in the echo knight/ancestral guardian example, the best level split at 10 is 6 barbarian/4 Echo K. But that more-or-less means going to at least five in barbarian to get to multiattack quickly. Which is more boring than playing echo knight. The other option is to start Echo Knight for tactical shenanigans, and settle for taking multiattack much, much later. Or compromising by going to 5 echo knight before mcing into barb.
Multiclassing can be strong, but if you don't have a sold understanding of the game mechanics, it's very easy to go wrong.
You can never go wrong by staying in the same class. I go both ways, depending on the game and my character.
No matter how many times this is addressed, the misconception continues to persist. I don't know why.
I enjoy multiclassing because it feels more authentic for most of my characters, who tend to grow and change as a result of the story. I think it can be organically worked into the roleplay pretty easily, actually.
My dragonborn sorcerer actually always wanted to be a knight, but was kept from the battlefield by an overprotective parent. It made sense for him to pick up levels of Paladin as he opposed the Cult of the Dragon (and eventually Tiamat), and his call to serve Bahamut became more and more pronounced.
My tiefling warlock never liked the idea that her power came from someone else and not herself. When the opportunity to interact with a trapped aboleth arose, she took it and was actually pleasantly surprised to be able to multiclass into sorcerer with the new aberrant mind subclass.
Do you also build out "sandbox" versions of characters that you're going to multiclass to see what your potential options are?