Hey all! It's been far too long since last time I was on here.
Now that I'm at college, I'm looking to join a group on campus (or help form a new one), so I need to build a character (and not just a silly level 20 build). Right now I'm looking at starting as a paladin but then going fully into bard as soon as I start leveling up. That way, I'll have some ability to tank and a whole lot of spell slots with which to both support/debuff and smite. I'm thinking human for Magic Initiate (Druid) to get shillelagh so I can focus CHA (especially since I'll only have the one paladin level, so no Oath of Devotion), but I would ideally want to play an aasimar. I could find out if my DM is okay with me switching the origin feat from my background (noble), but I don't want to depend on that.
I'd probably go Valor bard as the admittedly obvious choice, though snagging haste or other crazy stuff via Lore is tempting too. (I might be able to get someone else to play a dual-wielding build that can make 4 attacks/turn by level 5, and hasting that would be just insane, especially if he can grab hunter's mark.) I'm definitely not interested in Dance or Glamour; this is going to be a very stoic (but still sensitive!) bard. But Valor vs. Lore might come down to party composition and how my playstyle works out, honestly.
I think I'd plan on grabbing War Caster at 4 to bump CHA to 18 and make me a better tank + support combo.
So, what do the great minds of D&D Beyond think? Is it even worth the paladin level? Should I grab a second paladin level? Should I start bard and dip paladin later? That doesn't seem ideal as I'd miss out on heavy armor. Anything else I should consider? I'm pretty confident this build is what I want to play, but any advice on refining it would be wonderful.
I would actually suggest starting Fighter instead of Paladin if you are planning on being a dual-wielding Valor Bard. The reason for this is mostly because of the multiclassing requirements. Paladin requires a minimum of 13 Strength AND Charisma to multiclass. Fighter requires only 13 in Strength OR Dexterity. This way you can have a better stat spread out the gate without having to invest in Strength at all. Fighter still gets you armor proficiencies, weapon proficiences, and even Constitution Saving Throw proficiency. I would take one level of fighter, equip a Shortsword and Scimitar along with medium armor, then go Valor Bard and never look back. You would also have the option later of taking a second level of Fighter for Action Surge, which is really nice as a way to get off a spell in the first round of combat (like Haste, for example), then still run in and Attack in the same turn.
Edit: P.S. I also recommend taking Magic Initiate - Wizard as your origin feat if you can. You can get a lot of mileage out of the couple Wizards spells you would get. I suggest Booming Blade and Shield. They will be nice additions to your Valor Bard.
I can speak from some experience as a warlock to starting as a fighter like Sequiloise is putting down. Speaking of warlocks, if you want to atack with Charisma, might I suggest a dip in Warlock for Pact of the Blade?
if you do want a Bard Paladin, might I suggest starting with 4 levels of Paladin and then going swords bard if you can for the rest of the way. A 4/16 split means you won’t loose any ASI/Feats. Starting Paladin means you don’t HAVE to have Strength and Charisma at 13, just Charisma. Plus you get access to heavy armor and shields. Just keep in mind if you want to use heavy armor you need a 15+ in stregnth to avoid the -5 feet movement penalty.
But yeah, pairing a full (or nearly full) spellcaster with smites is very powerful!
I would actually suggest starting Fighter instead of Paladin if you are planning on being a dual-wielding Valor Bard. The reason for this is mostly because of the multiclassing requirements. Paladin requires a minimum of 13 Strength AND Charisma to multiclass. Fighter requires only 13 in Strength OR Dexterity. This way you can have a better stat spread out the gate without having to invest in Strength at all. Fighter still gets you armor proficiencies, weapon proficiences, and even Constitution Saving Throw proficiency. I would take one level of fighter, equip a Shortsword and Scimitar along with medium armor, then go Valor Bard and never look back. You would also have the option later of taking a second level of Fighter for Action Surge, which is really nice as a way to get off a spell in the first round of combat (like Haste, for example), then still run in and Attack in the same turn.
Edit: P.S. I also recommend taking Magic Initiate - Wizard as your origin feat if you can. You can get a lot of mileage out of the couple Wizards spells you would get. I suggest Booming Blade and Shield. They will be nice additions to your Valor Bard.
You make good points, and I agree in general it's maybe a more efficient build (especially with CON saves). I don't plan on dual-wielding though; I'll probably go sword-and-board (longsword or battleaxe). I do want the smites and a couple of the paladin spells though, and paladin is my favorite class so I want at least a bit of it in there (since it's still within reason, of course). If the backgrounds worked out better for it, I'd run a DEXadin, but I don't want any of the backgrounds that give DEX and CHA.
My plan is to be more of a support-ish frontliner, so I want stuff like compelled duel and shield of faith from paladin and debuff/control stuff from bard, in addition to the option to blow those bard slots on smites. (Yes, I know 1 level of paladin only gets me 2 prepared spells per day, but heavy armor + shield should usually be enough that shield of faith is unnecessary.) Valor Bard's Flourishes play better with that flexible-ish style than, say, sorcerer levels (I assume), and I'm not really interested in Warlock for this one (though I built a paladin/warlock for a session once and it was wild).
Your suggestion of getting a couple wizard spells via the origin feat is not a bad one. Would booming blade and shield make up for using STR for my attacks, which I won't upgrade for quite a while? I suppose if I'm mostly worried about my spells, that's not necessarily a huge thing, and I can still start with 16 STR to be functional at low levels. There are a couple druid spells that would be solid to have though, like entangle or fog cloud.
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Paladin main who spends most of his D&D time worldbuilding or DMing, not Paladin-ing.
I can speak from some experience as a warlock to starting as a fighter like Sequiloise is putting down. Speaking of warlocks, if you want to atack with Charisma, might I suggest a dip in Warlock for Pact of the Blade?
if you do want a Bard Paladin, might I suggest starting with 4 levels of Paladin and then going swords bard if you can for the rest of the way. A 4/16 split means you won’t loose any ASI/Feats. Starting Paladin means you don’t HAVE to have Strength and Charisma at 13, just Charisma. Plus you get access to heavy armor and shields. Just keep in mind if you want to use heavy armor you need a 15+ in stregnth to avoid the -5 feet movement penalty.
But yeah, pairing a full (or nearly full) spellcaster with smites is very powerful!
The main problems with the 4/X splits are (1) I don't know how long the campaign will go, so it might be a weird balance and never really come into any powerful spellcasting, and (2) I wouldn't get any form of Extra Attack until level 10. At that point I should just go 6/X or full paladin, but I want to be predominantly a caster. So yeah, if we were starting higher or I knew it was going to go to 20, I'd definitely consider that, but the way it is I don't know if I could justify switching to bard at that point in my paladin progression. I don't know what the table's like, including anything about the campaign or progression, so I'd rather play something that comes online sooner than later.
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Paladin main who spends most of his D&D time worldbuilding or DMing, not Paladin-ing.
If you're taking your first level as a Paladin, then you don't need to worry about the Paladin multiclass requirements. Per the rules, you only need to meet the prerequisites for the added classes when multiclassing, so you could dump Strength, as long as you're going full Shillelagh for your build (keep in mind, you can only use a Club or Quarterstaff as your weapon, I know you'd mentioned you were considering a [Tooltip Not Found]). Go full CHA, dump STR, and get your Topple on. Also opens up your background options a little.
If you're taking your first level as a Paladin, then you don't need to worry about the Paladin multiclass requirements. Per the rules, you only need to meet the prerequisites for the added classes when multiclassing
This is not correct, though. The Multiclassing rules say you need to meet the prerequisites for both classes in order to multiclass. See here.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
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Hey all! It's been far too long since last time I was on here.
Now that I'm at college, I'm looking to join a group on campus (or help form a new one), so I need to build a character (and not just a silly level 20 build). Right now I'm looking at starting as a paladin but then going fully into bard as soon as I start leveling up. That way, I'll have some ability to tank and a whole lot of spell slots with which to both support/debuff and smite. I'm thinking human for Magic Initiate (Druid) to get shillelagh so I can focus CHA (especially since I'll only have the one paladin level, so no Oath of Devotion), but I would ideally want to play an aasimar. I could find out if my DM is okay with me switching the origin feat from my background (noble), but I don't want to depend on that.
I'd probably go Valor bard as the admittedly obvious choice, though snagging haste or other crazy stuff via Lore is tempting too. (I might be able to get someone else to play a dual-wielding build that can make 4 attacks/turn by level 5, and hasting that would be just insane, especially if he can grab hunter's mark.) I'm definitely not interested in Dance or Glamour; this is going to be a very stoic (but still sensitive!) bard. But Valor vs. Lore might come down to party composition and how my playstyle works out, honestly.
I think I'd plan on grabbing War Caster at 4 to bump CHA to 18 and make me a better tank + support combo.
So, what do the great minds of D&D Beyond think? Is it even worth the paladin level? Should I grab a second paladin level? Should I start bard and dip paladin later? That doesn't seem ideal as I'd miss out on heavy armor. Anything else I should consider? I'm pretty confident this build is what I want to play, but any advice on refining it would be wonderful.
Paladin main who spends most of his D&D time worldbuilding or DMing, not Paladin-ing.
I would actually suggest starting Fighter instead of Paladin if you are planning on being a dual-wielding Valor Bard. The reason for this is mostly because of the multiclassing requirements. Paladin requires a minimum of 13 Strength AND Charisma to multiclass. Fighter requires only 13 in Strength OR Dexterity. This way you can have a better stat spread out the gate without having to invest in Strength at all. Fighter still gets you armor proficiencies, weapon proficiences, and even Constitution Saving Throw proficiency. I would take one level of fighter, equip a Shortsword and Scimitar along with medium armor, then go Valor Bard and never look back. You would also have the option later of taking a second level of Fighter for Action Surge, which is really nice as a way to get off a spell in the first round of combat (like Haste, for example), then still run in and Attack in the same turn.
Edit: P.S. I also recommend taking Magic Initiate - Wizard as your origin feat if you can. You can get a lot of mileage out of the couple Wizards spells you would get. I suggest Booming Blade and Shield. They will be nice additions to your Valor Bard.
First and foremost, welcome back!
I can speak from some experience as a warlock to starting as a fighter like Sequiloise is putting down. Speaking of warlocks, if you want to atack with Charisma, might I suggest a dip in Warlock for Pact of the Blade?
if you do want a Bard Paladin, might I suggest starting with 4 levels of Paladin and then going swords bard if you can for the rest of the way. A 4/16 split means you won’t loose any ASI/Feats. Starting Paladin means you don’t HAVE to have Strength and Charisma at 13, just Charisma. Plus you get access to heavy armor and shields. Just keep in mind if you want to use heavy armor you need a 15+ in stregnth to avoid the -5 feet movement penalty.
But yeah, pairing a full (or nearly full) spellcaster with smites is very powerful!
You make good points, and I agree in general it's maybe a more efficient build (especially with CON saves). I don't plan on dual-wielding though; I'll probably go sword-and-board (longsword or battleaxe). I do want the smites and a couple of the paladin spells though, and paladin is my favorite class so I want at least a bit of it in there (since it's still within reason, of course). If the backgrounds worked out better for it, I'd run a DEXadin, but I don't want any of the backgrounds that give DEX and CHA.
My plan is to be more of a support-ish frontliner, so I want stuff like compelled duel and shield of faith from paladin and debuff/control stuff from bard, in addition to the option to blow those bard slots on smites. (Yes, I know 1 level of paladin only gets me 2 prepared spells per day, but heavy armor + shield should usually be enough that shield of faith is unnecessary.) Valor Bard's Flourishes play better with that flexible-ish style than, say, sorcerer levels (I assume), and I'm not really interested in Warlock for this one (though I built a paladin/warlock for a session once and it was wild).
Your suggestion of getting a couple wizard spells via the origin feat is not a bad one. Would booming blade and shield make up for using STR for my attacks, which I won't upgrade for quite a while? I suppose if I'm mostly worried about my spells, that's not necessarily a huge thing, and I can still start with 16 STR to be functional at low levels. There are a couple druid spells that would be solid to have though, like entangle or fog cloud.
Paladin main who spends most of his D&D time worldbuilding or DMing, not Paladin-ing.
The main problems with the 4/X splits are (1) I don't know how long the campaign will go, so it might be a weird balance and never really come into any powerful spellcasting, and (2) I wouldn't get any form of Extra Attack until level 10. At that point I should just go 6/X or full paladin, but I want to be predominantly a caster. So yeah, if we were starting higher or I knew it was going to go to 20, I'd definitely consider that, but the way it is I don't know if I could justify switching to bard at that point in my paladin progression. I don't know what the table's like, including anything about the campaign or progression, so I'd rather play something that comes online sooner than later.
Paladin main who spends most of his D&D time worldbuilding or DMing, not Paladin-ing.
If you're taking your first level as a Paladin, then you don't need to worry about the Paladin multiclass requirements. Per the rules, you only need to meet the prerequisites for the added classes when multiclassing, so you could dump Strength, as long as you're going full Shillelagh for your build (keep in mind, you can only use a Club or Quarterstaff as your weapon, I know you'd mentioned you were considering a [Tooltip Not Found]). Go full CHA, dump STR, and get your Topple on. Also opens up your background options a little.
This is not correct, though. The Multiclassing rules say you need to meet the prerequisites for both classes in order to multiclass. See here.
pronouns: he/she/they