I decided that I wanna play a samurai. Not like from the battlefield in full armor, but in cloth street clothes with a flavored longsword at my side. My thought is to try to smite the most dangerous target as combat starts and then go from there. I’ve never played a paladin so I’m uncertain about any of this. Leaning towards Crown for compelled duel, but Glory and Devotion are also things I’m considering. I think I want paladin to go to level 12, mainly for improved divine smite, but if I’m already there why not grab a feat or ASI? Leaving 8 levels to go elsewhere. Currently I’m debating between hexblade, swords bard, swashbuckler, dragon sorcerer, kensei, or a combination of two of them.
If I start as a hexblade I can use charisma for attacks and would only have to have a strength at 13 so I can multiclass. An added bonus would be the ability to cast mage armor and disguise self constantly so being a less human race would t be an issue. And warlock would help me smite more.
With a swords bard I’d likely go shortsword so I could focus on cha and dex. It also helps me with mobility, spell slots for smiting, and who doesn’t want to insult people’s honor until they die?
Swashbuckler would also use a shortsword. Combining smite and sneak attack seems like a good way to eliminate a single threat quickly and I like the idea of adding my cha bonus to my initiative as striking first will help since I will lack armor. It does however limit my number of smites.
Dragon sorcerer would essentially give me permanent mage armor and more slots for smiting.
kensei would help with defense and make my weapon magic (late enough that I assume I’d already have a magic weapon), let me flurry with it, make me more mobile. But all of this would add wisdom to my list of stats that matter meaning I’d need a high dex, high cha and at least a 13 in wis and str, all are doable but feels like a bit much.
Does any one have any advice on a paladin that wears no armor and wields only a long or short sword? The only thing I’m really dead set on is the Paladin class, not even the level or the oath.
Alright so then I guess I’ll go ahead and add this. I’m speaking of the pop culture samurai, I added doesn’t wear armor because predominantly if a samurai knew he were going to a fight yes he likely would’ve taken his armor with him in most eras. But I’m talking about the pop culture samurai such as Ruroni Kenshin, the leads from Samurai Champloo, Yang from Warriors Way, Zatoichi, or god only knows how many other movies, anime, comics, manga, and god knows what else. I really figured this went without saying, but meh, here we are.
Armor of Shadows (infinite Mage Armour) Cloak of Flies [5th Level] (Cha Mod poison damage to enemies that start their turn within 5 ft of you.) Eldritch Smite [5th Level, Pact of the Blade] (works the same as Divine Smite but does force damage, instead of extra damage to undead, it knocks Huge and smaller targets prone) Improved Pact Weapon [Pact of the Blade] (lets you use the weapon as an arcane focus so if dual-wielding you won't need warcaster feat) Lifedrinker [12th level, Pact of the Blade] (pact weapon deals necrotic damage equal to charisma modifer).
If you're taking less than 5 levels of Paladin then consider Thirsting Blade invocation so you can still get extra attack.
-
You will be best dual-wielding so get the Dual Wielder feat. - It was actually common for samurai to carry 3 blades with them: the katana (longsword), the wakizashi (shortsword) and the tanto (dagger). The longsword was for main outdoor fighting, the shortsword was for indoor fighting and the dagger was a backup.
You will want your pact weapon to be your primary weapon and apply the hexblade feature to a secondary weapon. If you have the dual-wielder feat they can both be longswords. This way you have 3 attacks per turn - 2 from the pact weapon, 1 as a bonus from dual-wielding. They'll all use Charisma as the stat.
Divine Smite and Eldritch smite can stack together. In other words, you can do both on a single hit.
You will want to favour Warlock much more heavily than Paladin, to get the higher level invocations and more of them plus get more warlock slots and higher level.
Even if you run out of slots, your features and extras are still enough with maxed charisma and all 3 hit:: you'll be doing 5 poison from cloak of flies when they start turns, 10 necrotic from lifedrinker, + 3x prof from hb curse all on top of your regular weapon damage.
I'd recommend a minimum of 14 levels warlock, 4 levels of Paladin and I'd consider throwing in 2 levels Fighter for second wind, fighting style, and action surge.
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Wow. That’s a very insightful post. I truly appreciate it. Unless I’m dissecting a particular part of my plan most posts I’ve made elsewhere has pretty much been answered with “don’t make a paladin for this” or 2 or three word answers with minimal explanation.
you could pick a tortle.....or stop analyzing and just pick whatever you want and not worry about it. Whatever you pick isn't really going to matter anyway. I've never had a memorable character be memorable because of its equipment. ...or even its class or race for that matter.
Very true HeathSmith, however I fear that what I’m wanting to do is suboptimal by a large margin. I’m trying to ensure that the players around me don’t have to carry me too much.
That's why I recommended going kensei. It fits the flavor of what you're aiming at and does not require multiclassing repeatedly to min-max a whole bunch of different classes to cherry pick individual class abilities for exact synergies. Because those types of character builds tend to have a lot of levels where you don't have the needed synergies and effectively mean you've got a lot of dead levels.
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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.
Just use a Paladin with the goal of getting a Mithral Breastplate. It would conceal under normal clothing. No silly multiclassing, you achieve your character concept. Or actually go sans any armor as a monk, as already suggested.
I wouldn't recommend touching Kensei if you are going to Multiclass because of how MAD you will be - you would need 13+ in Strength and Charisma but you're also going to want to get Dexterity, Constitution, and Wisdom as high as possible. You're obviously aware of this already, but I wanted to restate it. It's only really an option if you roll stats, and roll high.
Hexblade, as mentioned, is a better choice. You will still need Strength at 13, at least, but you can dump Wisdom. Armor of Shadows, as mentioned, will help a little bit but I wouldn't expect to have more than a 17 AC for most of your career. You're gonna be a little hungry for ASIs, and you will have some tough choices to make regarding invocations
Barbarian: Dexterity barbarians are a thing, but I think you'd be best served just focusing on Strength and Constitution, with maybe a 14 in Dexterity and Charisma. Reckless attack provides smite opportunities, rage resistances coupled with your Paladin aura help keep you standing despite low AC.
Lizardfolk: You didn't say you were set on a race, and this is the easiest solution. Japanese pop culture and mythology are rich with anthropomorphic animals (Guin Saga being one of my favorite examples). Ability prerequisites don't apply if you don't multiclass, so you could ignore Strength completely, relying only on your Natural Armor, which would hit 18 fairly fast. Bonus points if your DM let's you go Monster Hunter and make swords out of your enemy.
You could go fully DEX based. Str as a dump stat. Use a rapier and just skin it like a katana. The initiative boost will fit the flavor well of the samurai who stares at a guy before making a quick first strike. Then, as you’d noted, a dip into draconic sorcerer if you want an AC boost from that. Or lobby the party that you should get any magic rings or bracers that give AC.
If you are wanting to go Paladin with no armor, you will need a higher dex with a reasonable constition. The only exceptions to this would be to go Loxodon to get 12 + con modifier AC or Tortle for a flat 17 AC. Both can still benefit from a shield to also increase your AC. Both longsword and shortsword can be used with a shield, but that may break your visual.
Assuming that those are not palatable, I'll second Ursus_the_Grim's suggestions. Barb has no multiclass stat prerequisite conflict with Paladin, you'll already want a dex of at least 14 and higher constitution, and Paladin as a spellcaster conflicts less with Barbarian rage when you are saving spell slots with smites and Barbarian can use a shield with their unarmored defense. The d10 and d12 hit dice combined with a high constitution ensure that you have a lot of hit points. Assuming that your spell slots aren't going to be used for offensive spells involving attacks or forcing saves, your primary offensive stat can be strength. A standard array would see likely see the 15 in either constitution or strength and probably the 14 in the other. The dex and the charisma would probably take the 13 and the 12. Wisdom would be the 10 and intelligence the 8. This might be adjusted depending on your racial bonuses. This would mean that you'd need to put a full ASI into the dex/charisma tier to get the 14 dex/13 charisma minimum for multiclass and to simulate medium armor with unarmored defense or grab a race with a bonus to 1 or the other.
Zealot, bear totem, and Ancestral Guardians are all widely considered to be among the better (if not best) barb subclasses and could fit in with a spiritually centered Paladin. Zealot gives more offense while the others give different takes on the defensive aspects. Wolf totem works in a melee dominate party to give your party advantage (though it does nothing for spell saves or ranged attackers).
See Ursus's post above for the details on the others.
I would do something to bump up your AC beyond just your dexterity bonus. It doesn’t matter what you do very much because there are a lot of different options. One thing that I’d consider is the synergies of planning your character with another player’s character in your group who will routinely cast Mage Armor or Barkskin on you. At 2nd level you’ll be able to cast Shield of Faith on yourself too. Just be warned, almost nothing stacks with Barkskin.
I would lean towards Oath of the Crown because Samurai place a huge amount of importance on paths of loyalty towards their lord and it fits their lore so well.
Other than that, I’d take the Great Weapon Fighting fighting style and use a Long Sword reflavored as a Katana since the Katana was traditionally used in either one or two hands and the Long Sword is Versatile.
I would do something to bump up your AC beyond just your dexterity bonus. It doesn’t matter what you do very much because there are a lot of different options. One thing that I’d consider is the synergies of planning your character with another player’s character in your group who will routinely cast Mage Armor or Barkskin on you. At 2nd level you’ll be able to cast Shield of Faith on yourself too. Just be warned, almost nothing stacks with Barkskin.
I would lean towards Oath of the Crown because Samurai place a huge amount of importance on paths of loyalty towards their lord and it fits their lore so well.
Other than that, I’d take the Great Weapon Fighting fighting style and use a Long Sword reflavored as a Katana since the Katana was traditionally used in either one or two hands and the Long Sword is Versatile.
Barkskin, the forgotten spell. Warforged with a shield works with that. Oh! No it doesn't because it simply sets the minimum at 16 and doesn't care once you are higher than that. Still, it could be used to great weapon attack with the equivalent of chain mail. Once that threshold is surpassed, swap it out with something more useful.
You can also use the Dueling fighting style with a Long Sword, it fits the character too.
I used to play a Wizard in a party with 2 Circle of the Moon Druids. I used half of my 1st level spell slots every day casting Mage Armor on them. it worked better than anything else I could have done with those spell slots since it gave every beast form they changed into a boost to their AC. It wasn’t perfect because it replaced Natural Armor instead of augmenting it, but their Wild Shapes lasted longer in combat and that meant my wizard was safe and sound out of melee combat!
Wow. That’s a very insightful post. I truly appreciate it. Unless I’m dissecting a particular part of my plan most posts I’ve made elsewhere has pretty much been answered with “don’t make a paladin for this” or 2 or three word answers with minimal explanation.
I don't want to seem hostile, but you keep getting that advice because it's an exceedingly bad idea. Heavy armor is a part of the core design of the class. It's really unclear why you're so dead set on Paladin. Is it just for smites? I think you really need to step back and look at what you're gaining from Paladin versus what you're giving up. You're trying to stick a square peg in a round hole. Nearly every other class you mention in the first post would be a better approach on its own - hexblade, swords bard, swashbuckler, kensei - all solid bases for an unarmored pop culture samurai character. It's like saying you want to be an armored knight with a massive sword but it needs to be a druid.
Now I'm not trying to ruin your idea. It's fine to play an unoptimized character as long as you're not a complete drag on the other players. But you shouldn't get snarky when you ask people to help make the character better and they give you the most helpful answer possible if you were willing to hear it - this guy should not be a Paladin.
Perhaps it would help to state what specific aspects of Paladin make it so essential to the character concept.
Honestly scatterbraind that quote had no intended snark, it truly is informative and I really am grateful that cyber put the time into it. There’s plenty of snark elsewhere but that wasn’t the goal in that post.
and the reason I wanted to try to use paladin is because as far as being the guy that carefully chooses when to draw their blade, strikes an opponent once, and then returns it to its sheath is concerned kensei doesn’t have the single strike damage to be able to do it to anyone that’s isn’t so far beneath them that it would be dishonorable. Not to mention compelled duel lets me go “hey you, I’m here to kill you” which fit the plan. Iaijutsu duels were what made my mind start on this course and kensei would be awesome for the lack of armor but wouldn’t cover heavy single strike damage needed to finish it in that way.
I've seen a few dex-based pallies, and they were performing pretty well. Maybe you could refluff studded leather armor as "heavy clothes" or something.
I decided that I wanna play a samurai. Not like from the battlefield in full armor, but in cloth street clothes with a flavored longsword at my side. My thought is to try to smite the most dangerous target as combat starts and then go from there. I’ve never played a paladin so I’m uncertain about any of this. Leaning towards Crown for compelled duel, but Glory and Devotion are also things I’m considering. I think I want paladin to go to level 12, mainly for improved divine smite, but if I’m already there why not grab a feat or ASI? Leaving 8 levels to go elsewhere. Currently I’m debating between hexblade, swords bard, swashbuckler, dragon sorcerer, kensei, or a combination of two of them.
If I start as a hexblade I can use charisma for attacks and would only have to have a strength at 13 so I can multiclass. An added bonus would be the ability to cast mage armor and disguise self constantly so being a less human race would t be an issue. And warlock would help me smite more.
With a swords bard I’d likely go shortsword so I could focus on cha and dex. It also helps me with mobility, spell slots for smiting, and who doesn’t want to insult people’s honor until they die?
Swashbuckler would also use a shortsword. Combining smite and sneak attack seems like a good way to eliminate a single threat quickly and I like the idea of adding my cha bonus to my initiative as striking first will help since I will lack armor. It does however limit my number of smites.
Dragon sorcerer would essentially give me permanent mage armor and more slots for smiting.
kensei would help with defense and make my weapon magic (late enough that I assume I’d already have a magic weapon), let me flurry with it, make me more mobile. But all of this would add wisdom to my list of stats that matter meaning I’d need a high dex, high cha and at least a 13 in wis and str, all are doable but feels like a bit much.
Does any one have any advice on a paladin that wears no armor and wields only a long or short sword? The only thing I’m really dead set on is the Paladin class, not even the level or the oath.
Alright so then I guess I’ll go ahead and add this. I’m speaking of the pop culture samurai, I added doesn’t wear armor because predominantly if a samurai knew he were going to a fight yes he likely would’ve taken his armor with him in most eras. But I’m talking about the pop culture samurai such as Ruroni Kenshin, the leads from Samurai Champloo, Yang from Warriors Way, Zatoichi, or god only knows how many other movies, anime, comics, manga, and god knows what else. I really figured this went without saying, but meh, here we are.
Thanks in advance.
You'd probably be better off just playing a Kensei Monk, that would fit the theme of the unarmed swordmaster.
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.
Well, I suppose “don’t do it” is advice.
Warlock Paladin multiclass.
Be Hexblade - Pact of the Blade.
Invocations:
Armor of Shadows (infinite Mage Armour)
Cloak of Flies [5th Level] (Cha Mod poison damage to enemies that start their turn within 5 ft of you.)
Eldritch Smite [5th Level, Pact of the Blade] (works the same as Divine Smite but does force damage, instead of extra damage to undead, it knocks Huge and smaller targets prone)
Improved Pact Weapon [Pact of the Blade] (lets you use the weapon as an arcane focus so if dual-wielding you won't need warcaster feat)
Lifedrinker [12th level, Pact of the Blade] (pact weapon deals necrotic damage equal to charisma modifer).
If you're taking less than 5 levels of Paladin then consider Thirsting Blade invocation so you can still get extra attack.
-
You will be best dual-wielding so get the Dual Wielder feat. - It was actually common for samurai to carry 3 blades with them: the katana (longsword), the wakizashi (shortsword) and the tanto (dagger). The longsword was for main outdoor fighting, the shortsword was for indoor fighting and the dagger was a backup.
You will want your pact weapon to be your primary weapon and apply the hexblade feature to a secondary weapon. If you have the dual-wielder feat they can both be longswords. This way you have 3 attacks per turn - 2 from the pact weapon, 1 as a bonus from dual-wielding. They'll all use Charisma as the stat.
Divine Smite and Eldritch smite can stack together. In other words, you can do both on a single hit.
You will want to favour Warlock much more heavily than Paladin, to get the higher level invocations and more of them plus get more warlock slots and higher level.
Even if you run out of slots, your features and extras are still enough with maxed charisma and all 3 hit:: you'll be doing 5 poison from cloak of flies when they start turns, 10 necrotic from lifedrinker, + 3x prof from hb curse all on top of your regular weapon damage.
I'd recommend a minimum of 14 levels warlock, 4 levels of Paladin and I'd consider throwing in 2 levels Fighter for second wind, fighting style, and action surge.
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I'd go kensei monk/ paladin, but focus more heavily on the monk side.
Wow. That’s a very insightful post. I truly appreciate it. Unless I’m dissecting a particular part of my plan most posts I’ve made elsewhere has pretty much been answered with “don’t make a paladin for this” or 2 or three word answers with minimal explanation.
you could pick a tortle.....or stop analyzing and just pick whatever you want and not worry about it. Whatever you pick isn't really going to matter anyway. I've never had a memorable character be memorable because of its equipment. ...or even its class or race for that matter.
Guide to the Five Factions (PWYW)
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Very true HeathSmith, however I fear that what I’m wanting to do is suboptimal by a large margin. I’m trying to ensure that the players around me don’t have to carry me too much.
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.
Just use a Paladin with the goal of getting a Mithral Breastplate. It would conceal under normal clothing. No silly multiclassing, you achieve your character concept. Or actually go sans any armor as a monk, as already suggested.
I wouldn't recommend touching Kensei if you are going to Multiclass because of how MAD you will be - you would need 13+ in Strength and Charisma but you're also going to want to get Dexterity, Constitution, and Wisdom as high as possible. You're obviously aware of this already, but I wanted to restate it. It's only really an option if you roll stats, and roll high.
Hexblade, as mentioned, is a better choice. You will still need Strength at 13, at least, but you can dump Wisdom. Armor of Shadows, as mentioned, will help a little bit but I wouldn't expect to have more than a 17 AC for most of your career. You're gonna be a little hungry for ASIs, and you will have some tough choices to make regarding invocations
Sorcadin is a classic for a reason. I'm assuming you've already seen https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?502673-Unlimited-Blade-Works-The-Guide-to-the-Ultimate-Paladin-Sorcerer-Multiclass. If you're aiming for pop-culture swordsman, they should be right up your alley.
I also have two less obvious suggestions for you:
Barbarian: Dexterity barbarians are a thing, but I think you'd be best served just focusing on Strength and Constitution, with maybe a 14 in Dexterity and Charisma. Reckless attack provides smite opportunities, rage resistances coupled with your Paladin aura help keep you standing despite low AC.
Lizardfolk: You didn't say you were set on a race, and this is the easiest solution. Japanese pop culture and mythology are rich with anthropomorphic animals (Guin Saga being one of my favorite examples). Ability prerequisites don't apply if you don't multiclass, so you could ignore Strength completely, relying only on your Natural Armor, which would hit 18 fairly fast. Bonus points if your DM let's you go Monster Hunter and make swords out of your enemy.
Another medical problem. Indefinite hiatus. Sorry, all.
You could go fully DEX based. Str as a dump stat. Use a rapier and just skin it like a katana. The initiative boost will fit the flavor well of the samurai who stares at a guy before making a quick first strike. Then, as you’d noted, a dip into draconic sorcerer if you want an AC boost from that. Or lobby the party that you should get any magic rings or bracers that give AC.
If you are wanting to go Paladin with no armor, you will need a higher dex with a reasonable constition. The only exceptions to this would be to go Loxodon to get 12 + con modifier AC or Tortle for a flat 17 AC. Both can still benefit from a shield to also increase your AC. Both longsword and shortsword can be used with a shield, but that may break your visual.
Assuming that those are not palatable, I'll second Ursus_the_Grim's suggestions. Barb has no multiclass stat prerequisite conflict with Paladin, you'll already want a dex of at least 14 and higher constitution, and Paladin as a spellcaster conflicts less with Barbarian rage when you are saving spell slots with smites and Barbarian can use a shield with their unarmored defense. The d10 and d12 hit dice combined with a high constitution ensure that you have a lot of hit points. Assuming that your spell slots aren't going to be used for offensive spells involving attacks or forcing saves, your primary offensive stat can be strength. A standard array would see likely see the 15 in either constitution or strength and probably the 14 in the other. The dex and the charisma would probably take the 13 and the 12. Wisdom would be the 10 and intelligence the 8. This might be adjusted depending on your racial bonuses. This would mean that you'd need to put a full ASI into the dex/charisma tier to get the 14 dex/13 charisma minimum for multiclass and to simulate medium armor with unarmored defense or grab a race with a bonus to 1 or the other.
Zealot, bear totem, and Ancestral Guardians are all widely considered to be among the better (if not best) barb subclasses and could fit in with a spiritually centered Paladin. Zealot gives more offense while the others give different takes on the defensive aspects. Wolf totem works in a melee dominate party to give your party advantage (though it does nothing for spell saves or ranged attackers).
See Ursus's post above for the details on the others.
I would do something to bump up your AC beyond just your dexterity bonus. It doesn’t matter what you do very much because there are a lot of different options. One thing that I’d consider is the synergies of planning your character with another player’s character in your group who will routinely cast Mage Armor or Barkskin on you. At 2nd level you’ll be able to cast Shield of Faith on yourself too. Just be warned, almost nothing stacks with Barkskin.
I would lean towards Oath of the Crown because Samurai place a huge amount of importance on paths of loyalty towards their lord and it fits their lore so well.
Other than that, I’d take the Great Weapon Fighting fighting style and use a Long Sword reflavored as a Katana since the Katana was traditionally used in either one or two hands and the Long Sword is Versatile.
Professional computer geek
Barkskin, the forgotten spell. Warforged with a shield works with that. Oh! No it doesn't because it simply sets the minimum at 16 and doesn't care once you are higher than that. Still, it could be used to great weapon attack with the equivalent of chain mail. Once that threshold is surpassed, swap it out with something more useful.
Agreed. Barkskin is useful if you have a Druid in your party, but it’s not always the best option.
Professional computer geek
You can also use the Dueling fighting style with a Long Sword, it fits the character too.
I used to play a Wizard in a party with 2 Circle of the Moon Druids. I used half of my 1st level spell slots every day casting Mage Armor on them. it worked better than anything else I could have done with those spell slots since it gave every beast form they changed into a boost to their AC. It wasn’t perfect because it replaced Natural Armor instead of augmenting it, but their Wild Shapes lasted longer in combat and that meant my wizard was safe and sound out of melee combat!
Professional computer geek
I don't want to seem hostile, but you keep getting that advice because it's an exceedingly bad idea. Heavy armor is a part of the core design of the class. It's really unclear why you're so dead set on Paladin. Is it just for smites? I think you really need to step back and look at what you're gaining from Paladin versus what you're giving up. You're trying to stick a square peg in a round hole. Nearly every other class you mention in the first post would be a better approach on its own - hexblade, swords bard, swashbuckler, kensei - all solid bases for an unarmored pop culture samurai character. It's like saying you want to be an armored knight with a massive sword but it needs to be a druid.
Now I'm not trying to ruin your idea. It's fine to play an unoptimized character as long as you're not a complete drag on the other players. But you shouldn't get snarky when you ask people to help make the character better and they give you the most helpful answer possible if you were willing to hear it - this guy should not be a Paladin.
Perhaps it would help to state what specific aspects of Paladin make it so essential to the character concept.
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
Honestly scatterbraind that quote had no intended snark, it truly is informative and I really am grateful that cyber put the time into it. There’s plenty of snark elsewhere but that wasn’t the goal in that post.
and the reason I wanted to try to use paladin is because as far as being the guy that carefully chooses when to draw their blade, strikes an opponent once, and then returns it to its sheath is concerned kensei doesn’t have the single strike damage to be able to do it to anyone that’s isn’t so far beneath them that it would be dishonorable. Not to mention compelled duel lets me go “hey you, I’m here to kill you” which fit the plan. Iaijutsu duels were what made my mind start on this course and kensei would be awesome for the lack of armor but wouldn’t cover heavy single strike damage needed to finish it in that way.
I've seen a few dex-based pallies, and they were performing pretty well. Maybe you could refluff studded leather armor as "heavy clothes" or something.
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