Just FYI: I recorded this *before* my latest "Ranking My Builds" video from last week, so when I talk about "Tier 2, Tier 3," etc., it's going to be slightly off because at the time there were only 4 tiers, and now there are 5 :).
As You mentioned Eldritch Knight, here is the one that can make 3 attacks with Shadow Blade without Haste. EK would get Shadow Blade one level earlier than this build, but that's probably the only advantage damage-wise. For upcasting You'd have to wait for level 13, and level 11 for 3 attacks.
Excellent as always, Colby! Appreciate all your work. 1 point of order about Hex. Select Con saves as part of the hex, and saves for stunning strike are at a disadvantage. 🤓
Love the flavor of the shadow Blade monk! However! Martial Arts don't add Dex to the kensei longsword when the character wears armor. But if you use a rapier instead of a longsword it still works. and having it as a backup when concentration drops can be good.
You have no idea how much I appreciate the subtitles on these videos as a person who speaks English as their second language! It helps so much to keep up with the conversation! Thanks for the extra effort 🙏
I always feel like a rival professor taking notes at a lecture hall whenever I watch Colby's videos... I end up saying things like "He cracked the formula I'd been stuck on for weeks!" and "Of course, I failed to take the [Shadow Blade] spell into consideration, no wonder the equation always seemed incomplete..."
There is one other, easy way to make 3 attacks/round with a Shadow Bade: level 11 Eldritch Knight. Downside: you get the third attack with the Shadow Blade 2 levels later. Upside: you get the Shadow Blade 2 levels earlier.
Plus, if you take 12 levels in EK and the rest in a primary spellcaster, you get to fifth level spell slots by level 17. And if you take Sorcerer, you can quicken to take better advantage of Eldritch Strike. The downside is that you don’t get the to hit bonus that Kensei gets.
But, you can't get Shadow Blade with Eldritch Knight since its an illusion spell and not an abjuration or evocation spell ? You would have to multiclass with the warlock or wizard to get access to Shadow Blade ?
@@TheJeSTeR7530 You can get the Shadow Blade as a spell from any school of magic. Eldritch Knights get those at 3rd, 8th, 14th and 20th level. You can also replace one of those spells when you level up.
Omg, I played in a game where my DM gave me, a Shadow Monk, a feature that allowed me to cast Shadow Blade the same way you could cast the spells that came with the subclass and it was such a blast!
Yeah I'm playing a Shadow Monk with that same allowance, and it has been great. Even have the ability to spend more ki to upcast it, can change it's damage to necrotic or cold, and remove the verbal component(annoying that a stealthy in flavor spell could break stealth)
It's incredible how the pacing and rhythm of these videos have improved over time, my most sincere compliments. As simple as these videos are, you have to recognize your talent in knowing how to entertain and present your topics. Now that I have your attention, please: 3.5
You know, I never even thought of monks as something I'd like to play. But after watching what must be over a hundred hours of your stuff I think you may be winning me over.
LOL… My 2nd monk lost and died to a giant rat at level 1. For this campaign, we had to roll up random characters. So for the replacement, I rolled up a bard as my character.
Hey Colby! Since your playing around with the editing and stuff, I was thinking it might be a cool thing to do to edit dice into your damage reports that pop up whenever you are listing all the damage roll stacks. Or maybe just the numbers. I think it’d be a good touch, especially for smooth brains who enjoy cool visuals like me😂
This may be my favorite build you've made so far. Warlock and Monk are my first and second favorite classes. Never thought a great multi class with them would be possible. And the flavor is fantastic! Thank you!
Woah. An elf I’m excited to try. Kinda feels like this character has two “modes.” The typical, blade of my fore fathers, armored version vs the “oh no, you caught me by surprise and I don’t have my armor on. What ever will I do?” 😈
Great video! I know the idea of this video is to put an Armor on Monks, so im not going to knock it off that much, but i would pretty much just prefer to go Mage Armor + Dexterity + Mirror Image for my Armor Class. It leaves a hand free for a posible Shield Reaction if i REALLY NEED to avoid a hit. This builds a possible avenue for two modes of Attack: This Entire Build, Three Attacks with Shadow Blade at posible advantage, single target damage and sure fire way to hit. However, against Enemies resistant to Psychic Damage, you have a Hex (or Hexblade's Curse to conserve Spell Slots) + 4 Unarmed Attacks (D6 o D8 depending on your level). Also, obligatory mention that adding 2 Levels of Fighter means Action Surge, since after Monk (13) and Warlock (5) you have two free Levels that offer stuff you could live without.
For the PYF invocation, I recommend also considering Gift of the Everliving Ones since this is a chain warlock. While it doesn't increase your offense, it can be nice to have all healing on you be maximized.
I’ve been an advocate for Chris’s armored monk forever, it’s definitely a different kind of monk but it can be awesome and lead to fun multiclass potential
Love this build, what a cool idea, I'm sure a lot of people have wanted to make an armored monk work for a long time. I'm just always happy when I see a monk build that can handle itself in combat. Hey, Colby, I know you've loved the Dungeon Dudes' stuff and I had a thought (No pressure to reply of course, your comment sections just seem like a fun place to talk builds). It hit me tonight that the Dungeon Dudes' Old Gods barbarian gets a huge damage upgrade, in terms of their D12 damage while raging thing, and the ability it gets to grapple or shove after hitting an attack seemed useful too. Especially with the later ability to hit a creature with a grappled creature to damage both that comes online later. I was looking at what to pair it with and Soul Knife Rogue came to mind. Expertise in Athletics, psi-bolstered knack to help stick the grapples and shoves, and your psychic blades doing d12 damage, plus rage damage, plus sneak attack for the first hit seemed really interesting. If you do see this and have time I'd love to hear your thoughts on how you'd do something like that.
As seen in Ludic's run of the Gauntlet, Focused Aim was the low key MVP. Super underrated ability, especially if you've figured out enemy ACs and at higher levels.
While I do love the unique marriage between Shadow Blade and Sharpen the Blade...it does feel like an arranged marriage. After Monk 8, we can skip a dead level and go straight into Fighter for the Dueling Fighting style. That's +2 damage on all our attacks right there. Sharpen the Blade is a steep Bonus Action setup. It's a significant amount of Ki to use. So it's kind of like the same amount of Ki if we multiclass out at this point. It's also overkill on the attack modifier. So Dueling is nearly as strong, and we can can just keep going to Action Surge and Battle Master. Dueling and Maneuvers with a maximized DC will add a lot more damage + utility per short rest than Sharpen the Blade can hope to. Even at very high ACs since Triple Advantage and still a huge modifier is putting in serious work.
Cool idea, thanks for the build! If I recall correctly, you have done another build in which you utilize three SB attacks: the Eldritch Blademaster. It was only at higher levels and needed DM approval that SB could have the Booming Blade rider, but still counts IMO 🙂
Wow, the flavor of this build is so. damn. cool... I have never actually been excited to play a monk before... but I think this might be my next character. Well done Colby, you really outdid yourself here!
I love Shadow Blade on a Monk. Namely on the Way of Shadow Monk. Since Shadow Blade is a 2nd lvl spell, we did a slight homebrew to the subclass to add it to the list of spells they can cast with Ki and that's perfect since all the other spells are 2nd lvl as well. We then used the ability that Shadow Sorcerors get to see through magical darkness if they casted it using SP, and gave that to Shadow Monks, just switch SP with KP. Of course if you don't want to homebrew, just multiclass a Shadow Monk and a Shadow Sorc.
i tried the same character concept but as rogue arcane trickster levels 1 through 8 .... 1) check with your DM will allow to combine green flame blade or booming blade with your shadow blade; 2) consider multiclass to fighter after level 8 if you want, going for either battlemaster or eldritch knight; 3) interpret how your character is learning how to use the special blade with each level-up
3:30 fists of unbroken air (4 elements) is not a spell and can be performed while raging. It deals 3d10 damage at range and can knock an enemy prone. It’s a great solution for the barbarian range issue and drops fliers to the ground.
I’ve been thinking on a gimmick build and it’s the Ultimate Chef. A chef that can roll the highest possible on a Cook’s utensils roll, and here’s what I’ve got so far. First start as either Mark of Making human or Mark of Hospitality Halflings, both of these have an ability that’s called Artisan’s Intuition and Ever Hospital both of these gives +1d4 to any artisans tools and arcana which I believe cooks utensils are,from Mark of Making or +1d4 to cooks utensils, brewers supplies and persuasion checks, both of these options can work depending on what play style you want. Mark of Hospitality also gets a racial casting of unseen servant to give you the help action so you can roll with advantage. Next you’ll need the cantrip Guidance which you can pick up from any spell list that has it and there’s gonna be 3 of them in the build. Start as an Artificer 1 so you can get Constitution saving throw proficiency. You also get a couple of tools from the class, thieves tools, Tinker’s tools and one more of your choice, I’d recommend brewers supplies because we are gonna get cooks utensils later and some up to medium armor proficiency and a shield. Magical tinkering gives us some additional effects which can be situationally useful and spell casting will give you some spells but I’ll say wait with Guidance for a bit. Next step is multi class into Druid which at level 1 you learn more spells and 1 language so not much to go over. And for level 3 we’ll go Druid 2 which will give us wild shape which we will utilize with our subclass a Stars Druid which will give us the cantrip Guidance for free and swapping cantrips can be very difficult to do which is why I delayed till here to get it. You also get starry form which can give you extra healing, damage or improved con saves at the cost of your wild shape. Level 4 Druid 3 gives us second level spells and spell slots, pick your favorite spells from the Druid list and let’s move on to the next level. Druid 4, aka level 5, with your ability score improvement pick up the feat Chef so you finally get those Cooks utensils proficiency and some additional short rest healing and temporary hit points after a long rest. At the 5th level of Druid you get 3rd level spells so continue to pick your favorites. With 6th level of Druid we get what I was looking forward to with Cosmic Omen which gives you 2 abilities weal which gives us the ability to add 1d6 to any ability check we perform which tools check are. And Woe which reduces enemies numbers by 1d6 and which if these you get is determined by chance. Now that we have everything here let’s go back to Artificer and go up to level 2 (8 total), who gets infuse items here, pick up a bag of holding since you’ll want to carry all the ingredients with you with no trouble and pick your favorite for the second one. With third level you get, the right tool for the job which lets you make a tool of your choosing like Cooks utensils if they ever break. But more importantly you get a subclass, if your DM allows your Druid to wear metal armor pick Armorer, you’ll be able to get into plate armor if you do which will substantially boost your AC and if not pick Artillerist which adds shield to your spell list. At level 4 boost your primary spell casting ability which is probably wisdom. At level 5 in artificer you get a subclass feature which depending on your subclass selection you picked you either get an extra d8 added to your damaging artificer spells or extra attack. At level 6 you gain the strongest buff of this multi class for our purpose which is Tool expertise you gives expertise in all tools you are proficient in. With level 7 in artificer you have gotten Flash of genius which will be added to your cooks utensils check since they are ability checks. Now we multi class into cleric and pick the peace domain which will give you extra spells a skill proficiency and what we want from this which is Emboldening Bond which lets us add another d4 to the total roll of the cooking check. Now we multi class into bard for bardic inspiration and done more spell casting. With bard 2 (level 16) you get Jack of all trades and song of rest which stacks with your chef feats short rest healing for a total of 2 extra dices when you take a short rest. At level 3 you gain your subclass which in my opinion should be spirits bard as you gain the ability to get the tales from beyond ability which if you expend a bardic inspiration dice and roll an 1 you get Tales of the Clever animal which lets you add a bardic inspiration die to int, Wis, or cha check which ability checks can be and tools can use these ability scores you get to add another die to your chef skills. With the remaining 3 levels to level 20 add more bard levels, you’ll get an upgrade to your bard die and spirit session which if you can get 6 willing creatures to perform with your you’ll be able to learn any 6th level Divination or Necromancy spell from any class. I doubt this will be a particularly strong build but it should have the greatest potential cooks utensils roll available. 1d20 (base roll)+12 (tool expertise)+ Int, Wis or Cha+1d4 (racial bonus)+1d4 (Guidance)+1d4 (Emboldening bond)+1d6 (Weal)+1d8 (Tales of of the Clever animal)= Some massively ridiculous numbers.
The "Bladed Bullseye"? Such a fun build, thanks for the inspiration! Edit: something I wanted to add, in my current game, this is a perfect fit for a character in my current game, Sol who is a starship AI uploaded into a custom body, this is a perfect build for her.
in our current campaign, I am playing a GOO warlock/whispers bard, who has a pistol as his pact weapon, and uses shadowblade in the other hand. some story things transpired, and now he is a kensei monk as well. my first time playing him in this new form is this weekend and i am soo stoked!
I initially looked askance at Resilient: Constitution - but you wouldn't get Diamond Soul until 19th thanks to the five Warlock levels, so it might actually be worthwhile. But if you do reach that level, it would probably be best to ask your DM if they'll let you retrain it into a different CON half-feat. There aren't a lot to choose from, especially once we eliminate the race-locked ones, but Chef is always good, Crusher can work with your unarmed strikes (which could in turn synergise with Agile Parry, making up a little for not getting to use your Martial Arts die), and most characters can find a use for Skill Expert.
You have so many exciting builds, and I love the idea of this one. But, as a slave to the numbers, I think I found a way to make it better and still stick to the theme. I haven't run the numbers (yet), but let me know what you think or if I missed anything. Sorcerer 3 (Con saves, Shadow Blade, and Metamagic; haven't decided on subclass yet). Kensei Monk 11 (for all the reasons you listed). Gloom Stalker Ranger 3 (bumps spell slots to level 3, Dread Ambusher for one more attack and an extra d8 on round one, plus builds on the shadow theme). Finally, to take it all the way to 20, Echo Knight 3 (Fighting Style, Action Surge, Unleash Incarnation for yet another attack with each action). Love your videos. I've thrown several you concepts into my campaign. Thank you so much.
Very excited to hear about your archer monk! I wanna do a longbow sharp shooter build, and that sounds solid. The other thought was a bard-archer aiming for swift quiver, but ki-points for bonus action shot sounds loads easier than "get to 10 bard. Now the build is turned on." Also, I wanted to eat you know directly that your world anvil add sold me on it, and I used your link and your discount code. Cheers Colby!
Honestly Colby, you 100% should rename this build to reflect its incredible accuracy. Also it's preeetty close to what I've been trying to build, just Warlock in place of Bard.
In the past, I’ve taken the Ready action before combat for characters that need a bit of setup time. That way, I can go into the fight with at least one of my buffs ready to go and not run down the timer on it at all.
Hey Colby! Love the build yet again. I'm pretty sure I've already mentioned this idea for a build but I'll fire it off at you again. I really like to see your tag team builds and have one for you to try out with a par of chromatic dragonborn. At level five chromatic dragonborn can gain immunity to the damage type they normally resist from their race for one minute. This raises some really fun options, likea barbarian knocking enemies prone whist standing inside a flame sphere, wall of fire, or simply the area a wizard is going to cast fireball. This could also work with casting heatmetal on a red dragonborns weapon, and instead of taking damage and dropping it they just smack enemies with it to deal more damage(or maybe casting it on a red dragonborns armor and them grappling an enemy for the same turn after turn effect). Regardless I think that feature could be REALLY potent of combo'd right with a partner.
Way of the Shrouded/Veiled Blade came to mind in the brief discourse about the video name. Still slightly misleading, but gets the point if the sword across, though it sounds more Ninja-esque rather than Samurai.
Shadow Blade is neat. Been running it with a Playtest 7 Warlock (Archfey). Works REALLY well because of how Warlock spells automatically get upcast. At level 12 currently and my 3 attacks deal 5+4D8+1D6 a piece (Shadow Blade + Lifedrinker). Thinking about going into Whispers Bard for the Smite-like Psychic Blades ability.
I'm sure the DM would play ball but a note for the Invocations part. As it's written Thirsting Blade wouldn't work with the Shadow Blade because it only lets you attack twice with your Pact Weapon. Made me sad when trying to make up my own more spell centered Shadow Blade focused build. Getting Extra Attack and 2 3rd level slots that come back on a short rest would of been excellent.
I’ve always said since Tasha’s came out, kensai monks are the most accurate characters in the game. My group also reads kensai’s sharpen blade as applied to that weapon class, so i went darts and all of the darts thrown are +3 magic weapons. A magic weapon is common, but a dozen +3 darts not so much. My build was 4 levels samurai fighter the rest kensai monk. (If you go to only lvl 12, I’d only take 1 lvl fighter or even none just get martial fighting style ranged attacks)
Cool build, with only some minimal DM approval needed to make work. Though it's easier to just ask your DM if you can add Shadow Blade to the Shadow Arts feature of Shadow Monk. It really should be one of the options, but WotC refusal to errata the PHB subclasses meant that any new cool shadowy spell couldn't be retroactively added in
One thing you *could* do if you wanted to stay naked is to pick up armor of shadows (thematic) to pad it a little bit. Not as good as being armored,but i think its a great option for this combo if you want to stay punching with a different monk subclass like way of Shadow
Sweet build! Seems like it would be a cool one to do in a campaign that starts at a higher level especially. I am surprised you downplayed stunning strike - sure, our Wisdom is low, but it gives us the bonus action attack, and if it works it will activate Elven Accuracy for the rest of this turn and the next turn, which would be important when in bright light, not to mention the general benefit of having a stunned enemy.
On the contrary, I think the best part about this build is how the features tell a flavorful story over time. It's got a fantastic built in character arc that is very compelling to me.
Yeah I agree. I think you attack, and if you hit with either attack then you stun. If you miss both, then focused aim to try and at least get the hit and then BA attack.
Your videos are awesome! Thank you for sharing them! Especially for someone who has had to spend more time making concept characters than playing actual games. An idea I had, and please feel free to run with it, an order of the Lycan blood hunter/monk multiclass. I’d be super interested in your take on that combo build.
Oh, how I wish WotC had designed the 5e monk the way they designed the Monk in the recently released UA for OneD&D. After playtesting the OneD&D Monk, going back to playing my 5e Monk is actually painful. It'll be interesting to see if/how the Kensei Monk is changed in OneD&D. This is one awesome video, as always. Thank you for posting it!
Love this! Made me think of the character i helped make for my friend (shes horrible with making new characters and likes coming in surprised). She is a giff gun monk. Kensei monk with guns is sooooo good. After lvl 5 shes probably going to go fighter a few lvls to get the archery fighting style and maybe far enough to get the gunslinger subclass. Love your videos!
Well, on my current game, we stopped our last night right before a heavy and difficult fight. So I'm looking at what I could play next, if we have to create new characters quickly in case something goes wrong... That build seems amazing ! I'm almost, ALMOST, tempted to lose my sorcadin to try this out ! But I'm emotionnally attached to my pally, so I'll not wish him anything harmful... Maybe a suggestion for next builds in the future, could you include a text version of the evolution of the builds ? Maybe on a spreadsheet or something similar ? The creation of the initial template will be a huge work, but after it should ease for everyone. I like how you present your builds, but when you need to find something very specific, it can be hard to jump from timestamps to timestamps and having to watch entire sections of the video This is a little suggestion, I can live with the fact that I'd still need to refer only to the video :) Thanks for what you're doing !
Hey Colby! Love your build this week as always! I’m hoping one day you’ll make a Trickery Cleric build, perhaps with Rogue MC for a sustained damage build, or maybe like Gloomstalker or Shadow Monk or something like that. They’re just my favorite cleric subclass. Thanks!
I just reread the sun soul monk recently and first time around I missed that you add wisdom and dexterity to your ranged spell attacks at level 3. Such a high hit chance early on and lets you consider going more wisdom focused or dexterity focused for multiclassing potential.
Hi Colby, I have been enjoying your builds for a while now (ever since the sorlock cheese grater) and have been trying to make a build of my own revolving around the Echo Knight. I know the best build is likely a melee sentinel setup, doing it from range, but I was interested in making a lowbow version using the echo as a kiting tool or a way to get to an advantageous position easily. I had a lot of options in mind for multiclassing (after 5 levels of fighter): -Gloomstalker would probably do well for burst and if I positioned the echo well I could get off the unleash incarnation attack a lot although it would burn all the uses really quickly. -Swords Bard seems gimicky but fun as you could, with Mobile Flourish, push targets away from you into harzards (or deal bonus damage), run up to them with the bonus move speed and swap with the echo, make a second attack with extra attack and then use unleash incarnation after drawing a melee weapon with the other hand. Probably not as efficient as just using definisive flourish but its flashy and I love it. I'm curious your thoughts on Echo Knight. I know you dont normally use non official material but its critical roll and the magic in the subclass does not seem like anything campaign specific enough that a table wouldn't use it.
I used Echo Knight with Gloomstalker a few months ago, though to be fair, it had lots of monk and even some Druid too :). th-cam.com/video/o9l9U89QOko/w-d-xo.html
I'd probably try to fit a couple levels of fighter in there for action surge and even con proficiency if you started as one, and if there's space go for 3 and the thematic samurai subclass for on tap advantage on an action surged nova round. This does mess with asi gains though it also would free up resilient con.
ב"ה If you want 3 attacks with shadowblade without spending ki you could just go eldritch knight 11, and have a good constitution score. To wrap up the build you go another level of fighter for the extra ASI and a first level as a caster of your choice (as we learned shadow blade through our eldritch knight levels) so you get 3rd level slots at level 13, and by level 17 you have a 5th level slot. I might actually go death cleric just for the nice channel divinity burst damage option. Starting with constitution save peoficiency and getting the shield spell early is really nice. Note that with so many feats you could actually grab great weapon master, so that if you crit with any of your attacks or dropped an enemy to 0 HP you just get a 4th attack as a bonus action (you have around 37% to score at least one critical hit with three attacks with triple advantage, even if there is only a single enemy).
If you use pact of the chain you should choose an imp or quasit since they can give you magic resistance as well as being invisible. Thus they are better than a sprite that cannot give you that.
Consistently getting 3 shadow blade attacks is fairly easy. Eldritch knight can do it after level 11. But most games end there. So monk will be intersting!
Now this is how you build "Mulan" -- A Wood Elven Minor Nobles child who is not Samurai, not quite Ronin, nor truly a monk... Who steals away with the family's Armour and joins the Army to save their father's life. (Noble, Soldier backgrounds?) The Warlock Patron 'Ancestor Spirits' (Reflavored Hexblade Patron) who only really cares about saving the Family's 'honor' from the debacle the character has caused, which is always on the verge of discovery and disgrace, so he works thru agents as opposed to directly communicating to the Warlock to save face. A Familiar, Mushu, (Reptilian themed Sprite who always claims to be a dra-gon) who was sent to awaken the 'Ancestor Spirits' most powerful agent 'The Great Stone Dragon' to fix the mess; however, thru antics and mishaps, he botches it and is also one step away from being kicked out of the Patrons service. Then again, for a much more darker bend, there is always building Arya Stark... “valar morghulis” Mushu : Hey! Dragon. *Dra-gon*, not lizard. I don't do that tongue thing.
Hey Colby, I left a comment on your last video, but don't know if you've seen it, so I'll restate it here: I have a build challenge inspired by your and Chris's positive videos on the new playtest monk, as a kind of final reckoning with the 5e monk class: The MiniMonk. Make a build that feels and plays like a monk (a fast, agile, bare-chested and fisted martial artist) while having as few monk levels as possible. Then compare it to a straight class monk. My take is a Barbarian 1/Monk 1/Battlemaster Fighter X, but I'd love to se your take on the idea and the creative methods used to get the effectiveness and flavour right.
You know, I've had an Archer Hexblade in my back pocket for a while now, and I've been wondering what to do past level 11 (since you've gotten all your best archery features by that point). Kensei Monk may just be PERFECT for that concept. Thanks for that nifty idea. :D The lack of bonus action attacks were really the only thing keeping that build from being really solid. Now I have an avenue for that! Plus, since I don't have to cast Shadow Blade, I can nab Spirit Shroud and have a very similar experience as kind of a mid-range SAD archer.
Ok, I get the flavor choice for Hexblade, but wouldn’t be better to go with Bladesinger instead? Bladesong would help a lot, having more spells slots for Shield, Absord Elements and Silvery Barb at lower levels and the rituals for outside the battlefield
A minor note, but with point buy, you'd be better off taking a 14 CON +1 and a 13 CHA +0, as opposed to the 15 CON +0 and 12 CHA +1 that you suggested. Going from 14 to 15 costs 2/27 points, whereas going from 12 to 13 only costs 1/27 points, so you'll have an extra point to put somewhere (this may very well just turn an 8 into a 9 so it barely matters, but nevertheless).
Would you be able to add an accuracy and/or save collum(s) to the spreadsheet? It wouldn't necessarily change the ranking numbers but maybe add another dimension. I also might not understand how the number is determined if you already incorporate that into it. Just a thought. Loved the build btw. Monks are my favorite class as well and it's cool to see a unique use of the hexblade warlock. Great Vid!
Thanks! I do account for hit chance and enemy AC and even saving throws (sometimes... especially if it's a damaging spell or effect that they're saving against, etc.) - I just use the tool by Ludic Savant linked in the video description for calculations!
True, though a lot of people (me included) don't actually play with those optional flanking rules from the DMG :(. Maybe I'll be able to convince my DM to change his mind on that...
Do you think multiclassing a battle smith with a wizard and using shadowblade would be strong? as far as I know, shadow blade would count as a "magic weapon" for the battle ready feature, allowing you to use intelligence for attacks using it, and you would gain con saving throws and extra attack over a normal wizard using it. I dip wizard on most of my artificers anyway, so I don't think that would be a huge cost. Sorry if you already covered this in a different video.
Now I kinda want to see a spellcaster monk that focuses on survivability. Like armor of Agathys, shield, maybe mage armor if you can't get those other spells from a wisdom caster. Like just imagine a monk waving their hand and speaking some Buddhist scripture and golden ice armoring their bodies. I might still suggest warlock for hex so the flurry of blows get better too...
I do love your channel. And... WE GOT THE SAME FAVORITE STUFF! Monks, Shadow blade, elves, elven accuracy, aaaaaaah, AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH
Build Idea: Strength based Swordsbard with quarterstaff, Crusherfeat and Polearmmaster. With Mobile Flourish and Crusher one can keep pushing enemys around the battlefield. With Tashas Custom Lineage one can start pushing at level 4 2 times a turn.
Idk if you’ve done it before, but I thought of a fun burst damage build using armorer artificer’s lightning launchers; they’re ranger weapons so you can apply stuff like sharpshooter but also can use sneak attack, which pairs well with the advantage stealth the infiltrator armor gives you, and since it’s lightening damage you could use tempest cleric’s channel divinity to max the damage. I think 3-5 levels in artificer for the armor and maybe extra attack, 2 cleric levels that would probably be best to add later in the build once you have a lot of damage to be worth maxing out, and then the rest in rogue, assassin being the best for burst damage if you can get surprise for free crits. It’s mad but being able to max crit sneak attack damage is pretty insane and probably worth taking some 13’s for multiclassing minimums.
Just FYI: I recorded this *before* my latest "Ranking My Builds" video from last week, so when I talk about "Tier 2, Tier 3," etc., it's going to be slightly off because at the time there were only 4 tiers, and now there are 5 :).
As You mentioned Eldritch Knight, here is the one that can make 3 attacks with Shadow Blade without Haste.
EK would get Shadow Blade one level earlier than this build, but that's probably the only advantage damage-wise. For upcasting You'd have to wait for level 13, and level 11 for 3 attacks.
Excellent as always, Colby! Appreciate all your work. 1 point of order about Hex. Select Con saves as part of the hex, and saves for stunning strike are at a disadvantage. 🤓
@@rcschmidt668 I wish hex effected saves :). Alas, it’s ability checks only!
Love the flavor of the shadow Blade monk! However! Martial Arts don't add Dex to the kensei longsword when the character wears armor. But if you use a rapier instead of a longsword it still works. and having it as a backup when concentration drops can be good.
You have no idea how much I appreciate the subtitles on these videos as a person who speaks English as their second language! It helps so much to keep up with the conversation! Thanks for the extra effort 🙏
I think the subtitles are just the closed captions provided by TH-cam.
Still very helpful!
@@RobThePrincessNope, there's a non auto option!
They actually are the auto-generated subtitles from YT :). Glad they help though!
TH-cam has a surprisingly lousy speech to text recognition when it comes to D&D content. They should train their language model better!
Thanks also for those whose hearing is not what it used to be. The captioning is very helpful.
I always feel like a rival professor taking notes at a lecture hall whenever I watch Colby's videos... I end up saying things like "He cracked the formula I'd been stuck on for weeks!" and "Of course, I failed to take the [Shadow Blade] spell into consideration, no wonder the equation always seemed incomplete..."
The Shadow Blade Monk: D&D Build #151
Level 1:(see above) [monk 1 & race]
Level 2:(see above) [monk 2]
Level 3:(@14:22) [monk 3 & subclass]
Level 4:(@17:31) [monk 4 & ASI]
Level 5:(@19:17) [monk 5]
Level 6:(@21:37) [monk 6]
Level 7:(see above) [warlock 1 & patron]
Level 8:(@29:15) [warlock 2]
Level 9:(@30:08) [warlock 3 & subclass]
Level 10:(see above) [warlock 4 & ASI]
Level 11:(@39:12) [warlock 5]
Level 12:(@42:26) [monk 7]
Level 13:(see above Level 14-17) [monk 8 & ASI]
Level 14:(@45:30) [monk 9]
Level 15:(@46:13) [monk 10]
Level 16:(@46:20) [monk 11]
Level 17:(@48:12) [monk 12 & ASI]
There is one other, easy way to make 3 attacks/round with a Shadow Bade: level 11 Eldritch Knight.
Downside: you get the third attack with the Shadow Blade 2 levels later.
Upside: you get the Shadow Blade 2 levels earlier.
Plus, if you take 12 levels in EK and the rest in a primary spellcaster, you get to fifth level spell slots by level 17. And if you take Sorcerer, you can quicken to take better advantage of Eldritch Strike. The downside is that you don’t get the to hit bonus that Kensei gets.
But, you can't get Shadow Blade with Eldritch Knight since its an illusion spell and not an abjuration or evocation spell ?
You would have to multiclass with the warlock or wizard to get access to Shadow Blade ?
@TheJeSTeR7530 sorcerer can also get shadow blade but a popular multiclass is Eldritch knight and war wizard which also is a thematic multiclass.
@@TheJeSTeR7530 You can get the Shadow Blade as a spell from any school of magic. Eldritch Knights get those at 3rd, 8th, 14th and 20th level. You can also replace one of those spells when you level up.
Omg, I played in a game where my DM gave me, a Shadow Monk, a feature that allowed me to cast Shadow Blade the same way you could cast the spells that came with the subclass and it was such a blast!
Yeah I'm playing a Shadow Monk with that same allowance, and it has been great. Even have the ability to spend more ki to upcast it, can change it's damage to necrotic or cold, and remove the verbal component(annoying that a stealthy in flavor spell could break stealth)
It's incredible how the pacing and rhythm of these videos have improved over time, my most sincere compliments. As simple as these videos are, you have to recognize your talent in knowing how to entertain and present your topics. Now that I have your attention, please: 3.5
You know, I never even thought of monks as something I'd like to play. But after watching what must be over a hundred hours of your stuff I think you may be winning me over.
I’m waiting for the new players handbook Monk to try out my first monk.
But you can bet it’s going to be one of Colby’s builds when I do!
LOL… My 2nd monk lost and died to a giant rat at level 1. For this campaign, we had to roll up random characters. So for the replacement, I rolled up a bard as my character.
I love the new “damage report” screen! That’s super cool!
Hey Colby! Since your playing around with the editing and stuff, I was thinking it might be a cool thing to do to edit dice into your damage reports that pop up whenever you are listing all the damage roll stacks. Or maybe just the numbers. I think it’d be a good touch, especially for smooth brains who enjoy cool visuals like me😂
If it done rigth it woud be amazing
I think quickened healing has great value specifically as a nice way to dump any remaining ki points into health right before a short rest.
This may be my favorite build you've made so far. Warlock and Monk are my first and second favorite classes. Never thought a great multi class with them would be possible. And the flavor is fantastic! Thank you!
As soon as you started talking about Shadow blade and ki fueled attack I could feel Kensei coming and, YES, I love kensei. It's so fun to play.
Thanks Colby! I love monk builds- can’t wait for 5.5 for all the new possibilities for multiclassing them
Woah. An elf I’m excited to try. Kinda feels like this character has two “modes.” The typical, blade of my fore fathers, armored version vs the “oh no, you caught me by surprise and I don’t have my armor on. What ever will I do?” 😈
I thought the same thing
Great video! I know the idea of this video is to put an Armor on Monks, so im not going to knock it off that much, but i would pretty much just prefer to go Mage Armor + Dexterity + Mirror Image for my Armor Class.
It leaves a hand free for a posible Shield Reaction if i REALLY NEED to avoid a hit.
This builds a possible avenue for two modes of Attack:
This Entire Build, Three Attacks with Shadow Blade at posible advantage, single target damage and sure fire way to hit.
However, against Enemies resistant to Psychic Damage, you have a Hex (or Hexblade's Curse to conserve Spell Slots) + 4 Unarmed Attacks (D6 o D8 depending on your level).
Also, obligatory mention that adding 2 Levels of Fighter means Action Surge, since after Monk (13) and Warlock (5) you have two free Levels that offer stuff you could live without.
For the PYF invocation, I recommend also considering Gift of the Everliving Ones since this is a chain warlock. While it doesn't increase your offense, it can be nice to have all healing on you be maximized.
I’ve been an advocate for Chris’s armored monk forever, it’s definitely a different kind of monk but it can be awesome and lead to fun multiclass potential
This is one of most Jedi build I have seen
Love this build, what a cool idea, I'm sure a lot of people have wanted to make an armored monk work for a long time. I'm just always happy when I see a monk build that can handle itself in combat.
Hey, Colby, I know you've loved the Dungeon Dudes' stuff and I had a thought (No pressure to reply of course, your comment sections just seem like a fun place to talk builds).
It hit me tonight that the Dungeon Dudes' Old Gods barbarian gets a huge damage upgrade, in terms of their D12 damage while raging thing, and the ability it gets to grapple or shove after hitting an attack seemed useful too. Especially with the later ability to hit a creature with a grappled creature to damage both that comes online later.
I was looking at what to pair it with and Soul Knife Rogue came to mind. Expertise in Athletics, psi-bolstered knack to help stick the grapples and shoves, and your psychic blades doing d12 damage, plus rage damage, plus sneak attack for the first hit seemed really interesting.
If you do see this and have time I'd love to hear your thoughts on how you'd do something like that.
As seen in Ludic's run of the Gauntlet, Focused Aim was the low key MVP. Super underrated ability, especially if you've figured out enemy ACs and at higher levels.
Hope we get to see a build with the UA 8 monk soon!
Colby’s gotten burned by using UA in the past. I think he should wait till it’s published.
Loved the little sound effects!
While I do love the unique marriage between Shadow Blade and Sharpen the Blade...it does feel like an arranged marriage. After Monk 8, we can skip a dead level and go straight into Fighter for the Dueling Fighting style. That's +2 damage on all our attacks right there. Sharpen the Blade is a steep Bonus Action setup. It's a significant amount of Ki to use. So it's kind of like the same amount of Ki if we multiclass out at this point. It's also overkill on the attack modifier. So Dueling is nearly as strong, and we can can just keep going to Action Surge and Battle Master.
Dueling and Maneuvers with a maximized DC will add a lot more damage + utility per short rest than Sharpen the Blade can hope to. Even at very high ACs since Triple Advantage and still a huge modifier is putting in serious work.
Well put.
Cool idea, thanks for the build! If I recall correctly, you have done another build in which you utilize three SB attacks: the Eldritch Blademaster. It was only at higher levels and needed DM approval that SB could have the Booming Blade rider, but still counts IMO 🙂
Wow, the flavor of this build is so. damn. cool... I have never actually been excited to play a monk before... but I think this might be my next character.
Well done Colby, you really outdid yourself here!
I love Shadow Blade on a Monk. Namely on the Way of Shadow Monk. Since Shadow Blade is a 2nd lvl spell, we did a slight homebrew to the subclass to add it to the list of spells they can cast with Ki and that's perfect since all the other spells are 2nd lvl as well. We then used the ability that Shadow Sorcerors get to see through magical darkness if they casted it using SP, and gave that to Shadow Monks, just switch SP with KP. Of course if you don't want to homebrew, just multiclass a Shadow Monk and a Shadow Sorc.
i tried the same character concept but as rogue arcane trickster levels 1 through 8 .... 1) check with your DM will allow to combine green flame blade or booming blade with your shadow blade; 2) consider multiclass to fighter after level 8 if you want, going for either battlemaster or eldritch knight; 3) interpret how your character is learning how to use the special blade with each level-up
This build works surprisingly well. I'm impressed.
3:30 fists of unbroken air (4 elements) is not a spell and can be performed while raging. It deals 3d10 damage at range and can knock an enemy prone. It’s a great solution for the barbarian range issue and drops fliers to the ground.
I’ve been thinking on a gimmick build and it’s the Ultimate Chef. A chef that can roll the highest possible on a Cook’s utensils roll, and here’s what I’ve got so far.
First start as either Mark of Making human or Mark of Hospitality Halflings, both of these have an ability that’s called Artisan’s Intuition and Ever Hospital both of these gives +1d4 to any artisans tools and arcana which I believe cooks utensils are,from Mark of Making or +1d4 to cooks utensils, brewers supplies and persuasion checks, both of these options can work depending on what play style you want. Mark of Hospitality also gets a racial casting of unseen servant to give you the help action so you can roll with advantage.
Next you’ll need the cantrip Guidance which you can pick up from any spell list that has it and there’s gonna be 3 of them in the build. Start as an Artificer 1 so you can get Constitution saving throw proficiency. You also get a couple of tools from the class, thieves tools, Tinker’s tools and one more of your choice, I’d recommend brewers supplies because we are gonna get cooks utensils later and some up to medium armor proficiency and a shield. Magical tinkering gives us some additional effects which can be situationally useful and spell casting will give you some spells but I’ll say wait with Guidance for a bit.
Next step is multi class into Druid which at level 1 you learn more spells and 1 language so not much to go over.
And for level 3 we’ll go Druid 2 which will give us wild shape which we will utilize with our subclass a Stars Druid which will give us the cantrip Guidance for free and swapping cantrips can be very difficult to do which is why I delayed till here to get it. You also get starry form which can give you extra healing, damage or improved con saves at the cost of your wild shape.
Level 4 Druid 3 gives us second level spells and spell slots, pick your favorite spells from the Druid list and let’s move on to the next level.
Druid 4, aka level 5, with your ability score improvement pick up the feat Chef so you finally get those Cooks utensils proficiency and some additional short rest healing and temporary hit points after a long rest.
At the 5th level of Druid you get 3rd level spells so continue to pick your favorites.
With 6th level of Druid we get what I was looking forward to with Cosmic Omen which gives you 2 abilities weal which gives us the ability to add 1d6 to any ability check we perform which tools check are. And Woe which reduces enemies numbers by 1d6 and which if these you get is determined by chance.
Now that we have everything here let’s go back to Artificer and go up to level 2 (8 total), who gets infuse items here, pick up a bag of holding since you’ll want to carry all the ingredients with you with no trouble and pick your favorite for the second one.
With third level you get, the right tool for the job which lets you make a tool of your choosing like Cooks utensils if they ever break. But more importantly you get a subclass, if your DM allows your Druid to wear metal armor pick Armorer, you’ll be able to get into plate armor if you do which will substantially boost your AC and if not pick Artillerist which adds shield to your spell list.
At level 4 boost your primary spell casting ability which is probably wisdom.
At level 5 in artificer you get a subclass feature which depending on your subclass selection you picked you either get an extra d8 added to your damaging artificer spells or extra attack.
At level 6 you gain the strongest buff of this multi class for our purpose which is Tool expertise you gives expertise in all tools you are proficient in.
With level 7 in artificer you have gotten Flash of genius which will be added to your cooks utensils check since they are ability checks.
Now we multi class into cleric and pick the peace domain which will give you extra spells a skill proficiency and what we want from this which is Emboldening Bond which lets us add another d4 to the total roll of the cooking check.
Now we multi class into bard for bardic inspiration and done more spell casting.
With bard 2 (level 16) you get Jack of all trades and song of rest which stacks with your chef feats short rest healing for a total of 2 extra dices when you take a short rest.
At level 3 you gain your subclass which in my opinion should be spirits bard as you gain the ability to get the tales from beyond ability which if you expend a bardic inspiration dice and roll an 1 you get Tales of the Clever animal which lets you add a bardic inspiration die to int, Wis, or cha check which ability checks can be and tools can use these ability scores you get to add another die to your chef skills.
With the remaining 3 levels to level 20 add more bard levels, you’ll get an upgrade to your bard die and spirit session which if you can get 6 willing creatures to perform with your you’ll be able to learn any 6th level Divination or Necromancy spell from any class.
I doubt this will be a particularly strong build but it should have the greatest potential cooks utensils roll available.
1d20 (base roll)+12 (tool expertise)+ Int, Wis or Cha+1d4 (racial bonus)+1d4 (Guidance)+1d4 (Emboldening bond)+1d6 (Weal)+1d8 (Tales of of the Clever animal)= Some massively ridiculous numbers.
The "Bladed Bullseye"?
Such a fun build, thanks for the inspiration!
Edit: something I wanted to add, in my current game, this is a perfect fit for a character in my current game, Sol who is a starship AI uploaded into a custom body, this is a perfect build for her.
in our current campaign, I am playing a GOO warlock/whispers bard, who has a pistol as his pact weapon, and uses shadowblade in the other hand. some story things transpired, and now he is a kensei monk as well. my first time playing him in this new form is this weekend and i am soo stoked!
I initially looked askance at Resilient: Constitution - but you wouldn't get Diamond Soul until 19th thanks to the five Warlock levels, so it might actually be worthwhile. But if you do reach that level, it would probably be best to ask your DM if they'll let you retrain it into a different CON half-feat. There aren't a lot to choose from, especially once we eliminate the race-locked ones, but Chef is always good, Crusher can work with your unarmed strikes (which could in turn synergise with Agile Parry, making up a little for not getting to use your Martial Arts die), and most characters can find a use for Skill Expert.
You have so many exciting builds, and I love the idea of this one. But, as a slave to the numbers, I think I found a way to make it better and still stick to the theme. I haven't run the numbers (yet), but let me know what you think or if I missed anything.
Sorcerer 3 (Con saves, Shadow Blade, and Metamagic; haven't decided on subclass yet).
Kensei Monk 11 (for all the reasons you listed).
Gloom Stalker Ranger 3 (bumps spell slots to level 3, Dread Ambusher for one more attack and an extra d8 on round one, plus builds on the shadow theme).
Finally, to take it all the way to 20, Echo Knight 3 (Fighting Style, Action Surge, Unleash Incarnation for yet another attack with each action).
Love your videos. I've thrown several you concepts into my campaign. Thank you so much.
Very excited to hear about your archer monk! I wanna do a longbow sharp shooter build, and that sounds solid. The other thought was a bard-archer aiming for swift quiver, but ki-points for bonus action shot sounds loads easier than "get to 10 bard. Now the build is turned on."
Also, I wanted to eat you know directly that your world anvil add sold me on it, and I used your link and your discount code. Cheers Colby!
Honestly Colby, you 100% should rename this build to reflect its incredible accuracy. Also it's preeetty close to what I've been trying to build, just Warlock in place of Bard.
In the past, I’ve taken the Ready action before combat for characters that need a bit of setup time. That way, I can go into the fight with at least one of my buffs ready to go and not run down the timer on it at all.
Hey Colby! Love the build yet again. I'm pretty sure I've already mentioned this idea for a build but I'll fire it off at you again. I really like to see your tag team builds and have one for you to try out with a par of chromatic dragonborn. At level five chromatic dragonborn can gain immunity to the damage type they normally resist from their race for one minute. This raises some really fun options, likea barbarian knocking enemies prone whist standing inside a flame sphere, wall of fire, or simply the area a wizard is going to cast fireball. This could also work with casting heatmetal on a red dragonborns weapon, and instead of taking damage and dropping it they just smack enemies with it to deal more damage(or maybe casting it on a red dragonborns armor and them grappling an enemy for the same turn after turn effect).
Regardless I think that feature could be REALLY potent of combo'd right with a partner.
Before even watching the video I need to say that shirt is amazing! Loved it lol
As always, i love the unique ideas of bountiful inspiration. Now i finally know what to play next saturday.
This is prapobly one of most Creativa builds
Way of the Shrouded/Veiled Blade came to mind in the brief discourse about the video name. Still slightly misleading, but gets the point if the sword across, though it sounds more Ninja-esque rather than Samurai.
This resonates so much with my ideas. Always nice to get some inspiration!
Shadow Blade is neat. Been running it with a Playtest 7 Warlock (Archfey). Works REALLY well because of how Warlock spells automatically get upcast.
At level 12 currently and my 3 attacks deal 5+4D8+1D6 a piece (Shadow Blade + Lifedrinker). Thinking about going into Whispers Bard for the Smite-like Psychic Blades ability.
Omg… I love your shirt in this video
I'm sure the DM would play ball but a note for the Invocations part. As it's written Thirsting Blade wouldn't work with the Shadow Blade because it only lets you attack twice with your Pact Weapon. Made me sad when trying to make up my own more spell centered Shadow Blade focused build. Getting Extra Attack and 2 3rd level slots that come back on a short rest would of been excellent.
I’ve always said since Tasha’s came out, kensai monks are the most accurate characters in the game. My group also reads kensai’s sharpen blade as applied to that weapon class, so i went darts and all of the darts thrown are +3 magic weapons. A magic weapon is common, but a dozen +3 darts not so much.
My build was 4 levels samurai fighter the rest kensai monk.
(If you go to only lvl 12, I’d only take 1 lvl fighter or even none just get martial fighting style ranged attacks)
Cool build, with only some minimal DM approval needed to make work. Though it's easier to just ask your DM if you can add Shadow Blade to the Shadow Arts feature of Shadow Monk. It really should be one of the options, but WotC refusal to errata the PHB subclasses meant that any new cool shadowy spell couldn't be retroactively added in
One thing you *could* do if you wanted to stay naked is to pick up armor of shadows (thematic) to pad it a little bit. Not as good as being armored,but i think its a great option for this combo if you want to stay punching with a different monk subclass like way of Shadow
Sweet build! Seems like it would be a cool one to do in a campaign that starts at a higher level especially. I am surprised you downplayed stunning strike - sure, our Wisdom is low, but it gives us the bonus action attack, and if it works it will activate Elven Accuracy for the rest of this turn and the next turn, which would be important when in bright light, not to mention the general benefit of having a stunned enemy.
On the contrary, I think the best part about this build is how the features tell a flavorful story over time. It's got a fantastic built in character arc that is very compelling to me.
Yeah I agree. I think you attack, and if you hit with either attack then you stun. If you miss both, then focused aim to try and at least get the hit and then BA attack.
Your videos are awesome! Thank you for sharing them!
Especially for someone who has had to spend more time making concept characters than playing actual games.
An idea I had, and please feel free to run with it, an order of the Lycan blood hunter/monk multiclass. I’d be super interested in your take on that combo build.
Oh, how I wish WotC had designed the 5e monk the way they designed the Monk in the recently released UA for OneD&D. After playtesting the OneD&D Monk, going back to playing my 5e Monk is actually painful. It'll be interesting to see if/how the Kensei Monk is changed in OneD&D.
This is one awesome video, as always. Thank you for posting it!
Love this! Made me think of the character i helped make for my friend (shes horrible with making new characters and likes coming in surprised). She is a giff gun monk. Kensei monk with guns is sooooo good. After lvl 5 shes probably going to go fighter a few lvls to get the archery fighting style and maybe far enough to get the gunslinger subclass. Love your videos!
I have actually been playing the original shadowblade build and have been having a blast! Excited to see how yhis compares
such a fun episode - I love monks as well! Also - mad complement Colby, you're looking esp. smexy and swole of late -- well done good sir!
Excited to listen podcast-style on my lunch break!
Well, on my current game, we stopped our last night right before a heavy and difficult fight. So I'm looking at what I could play next, if we have to create new characters quickly in case something goes wrong... That build seems amazing ! I'm almost, ALMOST, tempted to lose my sorcadin to try this out ! But I'm emotionnally attached to my pally, so I'll not wish him anything harmful...
Maybe a suggestion for next builds in the future, could you include a text version of the evolution of the builds ? Maybe on a spreadsheet or something similar ? The creation of the initial template will be a huge work, but after it should ease for everyone. I like how you present your builds, but when you need to find something very specific, it can be hard to jump from timestamps to timestamps and having to watch entire sections of the video
This is a little suggestion, I can live with the fact that I'd still need to refer only to the video :) Thanks for what you're doing !
I think i found something interessting. Warlock Artificer could be an really interessting combination. Would love to see an build on this.
Hey Colby! Love your build this week as always!
I’m hoping one day you’ll make a Trickery Cleric build, perhaps with Rogue MC for a sustained damage build, or maybe like Gloomstalker or Shadow Monk or something like that. They’re just my favorite cleric subclass. Thanks!
Came for the build. Stayed for the fight against the sun and the slow decent into insanity. 😂
😂😂😂
I just reread the sun soul monk recently and first time around I missed that you add wisdom and dexterity to your ranged spell attacks at level 3. Such a high hit chance early on and lets you consider going more wisdom focused or dexterity focused for multiclassing potential.
Colby, do you have an idea for this?
Always down for a monk build, heck yeah
This Shadow blade build with blink could be very fun 😊
"My favorite class paired with my favorite spell!"
Bladesinger: "Your WHAT?!"
Would love to see more "checklist" build. Like the Kaladin build.
Hi Colby, I have been enjoying your builds for a while now (ever since the sorlock cheese grater) and have been trying to make a build of my own revolving around the Echo Knight. I know the best build is likely a melee sentinel setup, doing it from range, but I was interested in making a lowbow version using the echo as a kiting tool or a way to get to an advantageous position easily.
I had a lot of options in mind for multiclassing (after 5 levels of fighter):
-Gloomstalker would probably do well for burst and if I positioned the echo well I could get off the unleash incarnation attack a lot although it would burn all the uses really quickly.
-Swords Bard seems gimicky but fun as you could, with Mobile Flourish, push targets away from you into harzards (or deal bonus damage), run up to them with the bonus move speed and swap with the echo, make a second attack with extra attack and then use unleash incarnation after drawing a melee weapon with the other hand. Probably not as efficient as just using definisive flourish but its flashy and I love it.
I'm curious your thoughts on Echo Knight. I know you dont normally use non official material but its critical roll and the magic in the subclass does not seem like anything campaign specific enough that a table wouldn't use it.
I used Echo Knight with Gloomstalker a few months ago, though to be fair, it had lots of monk and even some Druid too :). th-cam.com/video/o9l9U89QOko/w-d-xo.html
@@DnDDeepDive Oh cool ill check that out :)
Colby, I would love a conquest paladin, dragon fear build. Just letting you know. You're doing awesome work, your vids are like my podcasts
Wait whatttttttt!!!!!!!!! Someone is prepping for one dnd monks 😉
Hi Colby- love your videos!
David Grey's Life in Slow Motion album is excellent and the song Ain't No Love is especially wonderful
Hope you enjoy
I'd probably try to fit a couple levels of fighter in there for action surge and even con proficiency if you started as one, and if there's space go for 3 and the thematic samurai subclass for on tap advantage on an action surged nova round. This does mess with asi gains though it also would free up resilient con.
A much needed break in a terrible week 😅 thanks Colby
FYI you get more stat points in total if you do Con 14 +1 and Charisma 13, compared to Con 15 and Charisma 12+1, thanks to point buy mechanics
Depending on what survives UA, we could see a lot of competition from a base monk. Which is awesome
ב"ה
If you want 3 attacks with shadowblade without spending ki you could just go eldritch knight 11, and have a good constitution score. To wrap up the build you go another level of fighter for the extra ASI and a first level as a caster of your choice (as we learned shadow blade through our eldritch knight levels) so you get 3rd level slots at level 13, and by level 17 you have a 5th level slot. I might actually go death cleric just for the nice channel divinity burst damage option. Starting with constitution save peoficiency and getting the shield spell early is really nice. Note that with so many feats you could actually grab great weapon master, so that if you crit with any of your attacks or dropped an enemy to 0 HP you just get a 4th attack as a bonus action (you have around 37% to score at least one critical hit with three attacks with triple advantage, even if there is only a single enemy).
If you use pact of the chain you should choose an imp or quasit since they can give you magic resistance as well as being invisible. Thus they are better than a sprite that cannot give you that.
Consistently getting 3 shadow blade attacks is fairly easy. Eldritch knight can do it after level 11. But most games end there. So monk will be intersting!
Now this is how you build "Mulan" --
A Wood Elven Minor Nobles child who is not Samurai, not quite Ronin, nor truly a monk... Who steals away with the family's Armour and joins the Army to save their father's life. (Noble, Soldier backgrounds?)
The Warlock Patron 'Ancestor Spirits' (Reflavored Hexblade Patron) who only really cares about saving the Family's 'honor' from the debacle the character has caused, which is always on the verge of discovery and disgrace, so he works thru agents as opposed to directly communicating to the Warlock to save face.
A Familiar, Mushu, (Reptilian themed Sprite who always claims to be a dra-gon) who was sent to awaken the 'Ancestor Spirits' most powerful agent 'The Great Stone Dragon' to fix the mess; however, thru antics and mishaps, he botches it and is also one step away from being kicked out of the Patrons service.
Then again, for a much more darker bend, there is always building Arya Stark... “valar morghulis”
Mushu : Hey! Dragon. *Dra-gon*, not lizard. I don't do that tongue thing.
Eldritch Knight can get multiple attacks with Shadow Blade. You just have to wait until 14th level to do it!
Okay, but you were totally rocking the 90s Saved By the Bell hair lolololol Also, the monklock build was super cool! Never thought to pair those two.
Hey Colby, I left a comment on your last video, but don't know if you've seen it, so I'll restate it here:
I have a build challenge inspired by your and Chris's positive videos on the new playtest monk, as a kind of final reckoning with the 5e monk class: The MiniMonk.
Make a build that feels and plays like a monk (a fast, agile, bare-chested and fisted martial artist) while having as few monk levels as possible. Then compare it to a straight class monk.
My take is a Barbarian 1/Monk 1/Battlemaster Fighter X, but I'd love to se your take on the idea and the creative methods used to get the effectiveness and flavour right.
Shadow Ninja has a nice ring to it too!
Oooh we're going against the grain!!!!
cheeky
You know, I've had an Archer Hexblade in my back pocket for a while now, and I've been wondering what to do past level 11 (since you've gotten all your best archery features by that point). Kensei Monk may just be PERFECT for that concept. Thanks for that nifty idea. :D
The lack of bonus action attacks were really the only thing keeping that build from being really solid. Now I have an avenue for that! Plus, since I don't have to cast Shadow Blade, I can nab Spirit Shroud and have a very similar experience as kind of a mid-range SAD archer.
I've got the Hexbow on my to do list... just never quite seem to get around to building it!
@@DnDDeepDive Well, hurry it up, Colby. :P Those characters aren't gonna build themselves!
Ok, I get the flavor choice for Hexblade, but wouldn’t be better to go with Bladesinger instead? Bladesong would help a lot, having more spells slots for Shield, Absord Elements and Silvery Barb at lower levels and the rituals for outside the battlefield
Simic Hybrid Path of the Giant Barbarian is really fun
A minor note, but with point buy, you'd be better off taking a 14 CON +1 and a 13 CHA +0, as opposed to the 15 CON +0 and 12 CHA +1 that you suggested. Going from 14 to 15 costs 2/27 points, whereas going from 12 to 13 only costs 1/27 points, so you'll have an extra point to put somewhere (this may very well just turn an 8 into a 9 so it barely matters, but nevertheless).
Would you be able to add an accuracy and/or save collum(s) to the spreadsheet? It wouldn't necessarily change the ranking numbers but maybe add another dimension. I also might not understand how the number is determined if you already incorporate that into it. Just a thought. Loved the build btw. Monks are my favorite class as well and it's cool to see a unique use of the hexblade warlock. Great Vid!
Thanks! I do account for hit chance and enemy AC and even saving throws (sometimes... especially if it's a damaging spell or effect that they're saving against, etc.) - I just use the tool by Ludic Savant linked in the video description for calculations!
Song suggestion for one of the upcoming outtakes: Glory Road from The New Roses - my wife would love it 😊
You can flank if you are inv. No help action required. 3 attacks with elven accuracy.
True, though a lot of people (me included) don't actually play with those optional flanking rules from the DMG :(. Maybe I'll be able to convince my DM to change his mind on that...
@@DnDDeepDive fair. Most old school players do because it wasnt optional in past additions
Do you think multiclassing a battle smith with a wizard and using shadowblade would be strong? as far as I know, shadow blade would count as a "magic weapon" for the battle ready feature, allowing you to use intelligence for attacks using it, and you would gain con saving throws and extra attack over a normal wizard using it. I dip wizard on most of my artificers anyway, so I don't think that would be a huge cost. Sorry if you already covered this in a different video.
Now I kinda want to see a spellcaster monk that focuses on survivability. Like armor of Agathys, shield, maybe mage armor if you can't get those other spells from a wisdom caster. Like just imagine a monk waving their hand and speaking some Buddhist scripture and golden ice armoring their bodies. I might still suggest warlock for hex so the flurry of blows get better too...
I do love your channel. And... WE GOT THE SAME FAVORITE STUFF! Monks, Shadow blade, elves, elven accuracy, aaaaaaah, AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH
When we eventually get to 5.5, 6e, OneD&D, etc.
Might be worth switching up the system used to calculate Tier Scores.
Build Idea: Strength based Swordsbard with quarterstaff, Crusherfeat and Polearmmaster.
With Mobile Flourish and Crusher one can keep pushing enemys around the battlefield. With Tashas Custom Lineage one can start pushing at level 4 2 times a turn.
Idk if you’ve done it before, but I thought of a fun burst damage build using armorer artificer’s lightning launchers; they’re ranger weapons so you can apply stuff like sharpshooter but also can use sneak attack, which pairs well with the advantage stealth the infiltrator armor gives you, and since it’s lightening damage you could use tempest cleric’s channel divinity to max the damage. I think 3-5 levels in artificer for the armor and maybe extra attack, 2 cleric levels that would probably be best to add later in the build once you have a lot of damage to be worth maxing out, and then the rest in rogue, assassin being the best for burst damage if you can get surprise for free crits. It’s mad but being able to max crit sneak attack damage is pretty insane and probably worth taking some 13’s for multiclassing minimums.
i think he's done something similar, secret agent iirc
Thanks, I found it; episode 99, it’s titled the thunderball but it says secret agent in the thumbnail so your comment helped to find it.
@@aceofspades8474 wonderful!
Great video! I might have to homebrew some rules so I can run this as a black dragonborn
This is it. This is the build I'd want to play next. This is unbelievably cool! What suggestions do you have if you were to take this build to 20?
I live this too and am going to make it my backup character, one edit I would consider is making the race Shadar-Kai.
Run across water while wearing armor? NO!
Doff that armor, place it in a backpack and run across water with it in tow? You got it, buddy!
Ashigaru, profeasional soldier not being a samurai