I have a suggestion on using Healer’s Kit to heal your party members. Instead of the healer buying all the kits and carrying them all, have each party member buy their own and carry it on them in an easily accessible way. Then, if you need to spend a use healing them, you use THEIR healing kit. This is how the military are trained to use first aid kits. You use your buddy’s kit to patch them up, and vice versa. That way, 1) each member is responsible for maintaining their own supply, and 2) the healer will still have their kit well stocked in an emergency where someone else hasn’t kept their’s stocked. This also means that everyone has a kit handy in the event that the healer can’t make it over to that character, and they can at least be stabilized.
I was just gonna say that. It makes so much more sense as well. Inventory doesn’t make too much sense in DND but it seems pretty awkward to have 5 medkits hanging from your belt. Also, if you go down, the healer would be doing you a favor to bring you back up, so it should be on you to provide them the medkit.
As a Combat Medic for the Army I want to thank you for making this build. That being said as a medic I understand how much time it takes to stabilize a patient and using my aid back to give them some sort of treatment. I would rule that if a rogue uses their fast hands to stabilize a down ally, I would allow that to take a bonus action, but if they wanted to try to heal them that would require an action.
Somewhere between “misplaced effort to apply realism” and “anything goes because it’s a game” is probably where you want to land. Some players enjoy low magic games with higher stakes. Every game will exist on the sliding scale between realism and anything goes. You don’t have to limit yourself to the default setting.
Rooster has the right of it by RAW, as Colby himself mentioned during the video. It's the feat, not the item, that allows a character to heal a creature.
All I'm saying is I would treat it like RaW for this instance, since I can justify it in my head based off of my personal experience. It certainly isn't realistic since it takes longer than 6 seconds to stabilize or heal someone, but I'm willing to suspend my disbelief.
The idea of a field medic holding the backline with a shortbow, and then when an ally goes down, slinging the bow and pulling a shield off your back and running in, shield high to baseball slide down next to your ally, protecting their fallen body with your shield held strong in one arm, and the other hand frantically delving into your hip pack to pull out a kit or potion and administering your comrade while arrows fly by and ping off of your shield, is sooooo fxxking cool, i gotta play this. Not to mention the roll away and backstab/sneak attack to the enemy who downed your friend.
@@quendi5557 I've played one and it's pretty bad. It's not like some of the worst rogue or barbarian subclasses where it's *literally* like not having a subclass, but the benefits are marginal. Slightly boosted healing and damage, being able to produce a random potion once a day of...marginal benefit, healing word, and eventually getting free castings of lesser restoration isn't nothing, but the artificer relies more on their subclass for power than many other classes, being a half caster that can't fight martially. Marginal benefits just aren't enough for artis
The "Healer" feat is unbelievably underrated in D&D 5e. Just theorycraft how many spell slots you save by powering your healing with healer's kits instead of spell slots. Or take my direct attestation of playing a Healer Feat Cleric in Undermountain at the moment - currently at level 10, I'm healing 15-20 hp per application, while having my bonus action available to also hit the same person with a healing word if they need it. I can actually combat heal a person up to effective hit points rather than just combat bouncing them. And as long as I am nearby allies (and as a tabaxi, I can get "nearby" from 60 feet away at need) I can bring anyone back up to 1 hp for free with just an action, forever, without spell slots.
yeah, I have used healer in some really in optimised ways but it's a feat that I really like. I like to put it a characters to give them something to be used in an emergancy.
Rogue with action surge sounds really good for one reason. You can get sneak attack on your turn, and then use your second action to get another sneak attack immediately after your turn (using the ready action).
Wait. I dont think this works. If I understand correctly, a new turn starts just as you get to do your Action. Which means in each turn, your Reaction follows after your Action. If you held your action and get sneak attack followed by a sneak attack on the next turn, that will work. But the other way doesn't. Unless you have an oddly specific subclass like Scout, there should be NO WAY to get two sneak attacks in one turn.
@@yiklongtay6029 never says get 2 sneak attacks in one turn. You take the ready action and use it when you want after your turn. Also your reaction doesn't follow your action. You get to use it whenever there's a tiger for it, such as the trigger you set for your ready action.
I like how you optimize for a particular goal instead of “to make the best version” - best is so subjective and often just means good at just killing people - focusing on a character idea like: how can I maximize healing without casting spells? - thanks for the video
I've done this as a side benefit for my rogue/barbarian. They have the healer feat, a custom subclass with some bit of druid casting, and are about to pick up the chef feat with their next level to give some temp hp for pre-emptive healing. They are a tribal warrior focused on being in tune with spirits of nature.
I had a player who got a magic spice bag and ask if he could use it as a bonus action to throw some "pocket sand" to blind the ennemies. It was a super small dex save (DC10), targeted one creature, but it was giving him the option of helping his allies and himself through the Quick hand ability. I feel like this build take a similar approach of thinking outside the box to make Quick Hand uselful to the party, contrary of the use it normally sees. Again thank you for the nice builds you bring each week!
i think if you wanted to make this a little bit less homebrew and a bit more useful, simply allow him to craft/buy the inhaled/contact poisons in the DMG.
Fantastic! I love the builds that deviate from the classic multi-classes. The ability to make your own character thematically and then optimize within those constraints is probably my favorite part of character building. Great job!
This reminds me of a build I came up with, though mine was a straight Mercy Monk with the Healer and Chef feats who fancied themselves a wandering physician who often took on adventuring work as a fast way to earn money because he had a tendency to give his doctoring skills away for free to any injured or sick people he came across.
been playing with the thief medic for the last 4 years in a group (not my character). Honestly even in later levels the heal is very strong. It consistently heals for 15-18 hp. And yeah, we always ruled that you can use it as a bonus action. If you couldn't, imo the whole concept would break and the feat would be worthless. Since you can heal like that with an action and a bonus action. There have been moments where this has saved the group from TPK in a couple of turns. When we ventured out at lvl1 this medic and a paladin were the only healing types in the group and the thef healed like 4-5 times more than the paladin. even tho the paladin didnt shy away from using its spellslots to do so. 2 spell slots vs infinite amount of healers kits and refresh at short rest and 6 people group. So during the day this thief could heal people potentialy 12-18-24 times. Depends on how often the DM lets you rest :)
Very entertaining, though one suspects you put all the "dead weight"(tm) subclasses in one build so you don't have to revisit those subclasses for a loooonnnggggg time. 😛
I had built something similar to this, but with a charisma based Human Battlemaster. The feat at level 1 was Inspiring Leader. That gives everyone 4 extra temp hit points at level 1. Then you get a fighting style, which you pick Superior Technique: Rally. This you use to top up temp hit points at level 1. You also get Second Wind for yourself. At level 3, pick Battlemaster for more uses for Rally, and any other good manoeuvres that fit your character. At level 4, you take the healer feat. Note that with a Battlemaster Fighter Healer in this way, you get back all of your abilities, except action surge, at a short rest (which is huge in a dungeon, or any environment where long rests are impossible). What is also great about this is you can use a healing kit to revive a downed character, or heal one, then use Rally as a bonus action to immediately give them some temporary hit points on the same turn.
LEVEL 6 "HEALING REPORT" Party of 5, First rest + 2 short rests 210 hp of healing to party with healer's kits, assuming all characters take at least 1 hit. +6d4+6 healing with potions.
Whether it's stabilization or healing, you're still using a healer's kit to do it, and a healer's kit is an object. If it didn't mention a healer's kit at all, then I would say that it wasn't Using an Object.
I'm currently in a campaign where a curse on one of the characters prevents him from receiving magical healing. In this kind of case, the combat medic would really shine.
I think I would go echo knight instead of banneret. Less straight up healing once a short rest but much better mobility all the time. It also allows you to have your echo in melee and take some hits. If it gets killed you just pop it back up as a bonus action the next round. Thinking preventing my companions from getting hit is healing via avoidance. And this is an unlimited resource.
this has been one of my favorite episodes in a while, well done. Thief rogue was my first long term character, and fast hands with a diverse environment is one of the most creative abilities out there.
I thought of a similar idea but with two levels of rogue for expertise and cunning action, and the rest would be a Way of Mercy monk. I don’t know if ki counts as magical, but I didn’t want to be a spell casting healer. Also you get unarmored defense and movement by the time your character is level four. Adding your wisdom modifier to your AC makes you a lot more tanky with the ability score you need for healing and your response time can be faster with extra movement, especially combined with cunning action. You don’t need Intelligence any more, so your highest scores can be Wisdom and Dexterity which leaves more room for your Constitution. I don’t know if you’ll see this but please let me know what you think if you get a moment, love your videos
As a DM, I believe that the rogue skill allowing the use of an object as a bonus action overrides the “action” verbiage for the healers kit. My two cents
Great to see an underpowered combination build being optimized for team-focused play. This kind of character could be the linchpin of an adventuring party in a low-magic setting, especially if they are ambushed and the action economy swings in the wrong direction.
Another idea for this build is to take a warlock dip, so you can make elixirs on short rests. And since your elixirs last until the end of your next long rest, if you spent a sleepless night on brewing elixirs for the big battle…
Colby - As one of the people who begged you to do an Alchemist build, I just want to say thank you! I think I personally would have done more Alchemist given the bonus to healing at level 5 and the bonus to elixirs at level 9. I think then you could probably just stick to two classes (Rogue and Artificer). Another option I have seen is to make a Mercy Monk who uses Healer and Chef to be a non-magical healer. I am more inclined to mix PDK with Glamour Bard and Inspiring Leader to focus on temp hp, healing when necessary, and battlefield positioning.
This is something I've wanted to try building, thank you for this! Definitely looking to take Inspiring Leader feat. Your soldiers are tired, the war hasn't gone well, but a rousing speech from the medic who has survived encounter after encounter is enough to get them through their MREs and back out onto the field! This is assuming human with a DM provided feat at level 1
My favourite D&D build is a nonmagical secondary healer. I went straight-up Dex/Con/Cha Battle Master with Healer, Inspiring Leader, and the Rally maneuver (underpowered but sometimes useful in a pinch). Then because it was a straight fighter I had plenty of ASIs left to spend on Xbow Expert and
I've built a Combat Medic character before, but instead of three sub-classes, I only used two: Rogue/Scout (though the type of Rogue doesn't matter unless your DM is VERY forgiving), and Fighter/Battlemaster. Background should be something that allows you access to proficiency with Herbalism Kit. I need good Dex and Cha for the build. A weapon with range is best, either a shortbow or longbow. Some people have told me that a Rogue able to use a bonus Use an Action is what I need, but that's for little things, not rolling up your sleeves and applying first aid, or at least that's how it's always played out for me with my DMs, and I can't fault them. However, the Rogue's Cunning Action is almost necessary for this build. Let's you move with a purpose. Battlemaster allows you access to several maneuvers which can be really useful for saving someone's bacon. The most important is Rally (friendly gains Superiority die + your Cha modifier temp HP), Pushing Attack, Maneuvering Attack, Goading Attack, and Bait and Switch. Having a ranged weapon means you can use most of these at range. Being a Human Variant with the Healer feat at level one is mandatory. Later on, learning the Inspiring Leadership feat allows you give out your player level + Cha mod Temp HP per rest. Having the Herbalism Kit allows you the option of making healing potions, and if you convince the DM, perhaps to renew you Healing Kits with herbal poultices and the like. Lately, I've been wondering how adding the Chef feat to the character would allow them more options, or even multiple chances, to bolster HP more without relying on magic usage.
Herbalism can produce healing potions as per the skill description in the PHB. You can take herbalism as a tool skill on any character they don't need to have the capacity for magical spells. It doesn't seem unreasonable that Doogie Howser Arti.D couldn't do something similar.
I created an eldritch knight with the healer kit at 1st level cuz our DM is cool haha. He got find familiar and he was an archer so he was always helping and healing or shooting archers, it was really nice. Not the best build but a good one!
Just wanted to say, I found your channel a week ago and I've watched about a dozen of your builds, and they've given me so many ideas! I currently have a battlemaster fighter and I'm definately going to buy a few nets next session
I was also thinking of a similar concept before I watched this video but the focus was on overall support and not just healling. You take the halfling to enable the bountifull luck feat reducing the chance of the party getting screwed over by critical failiures. Take the protection fighting style which is deemed weak by the overall D&D comunity but has the benefit of negating critical hits even if the attack still hits because the atacker would need to roll two 20s. The healling part comes from the Bannerete's Rallying cry but most importantly from the Inspiring Leader feat (which I call preemptive healling) which is very powerfull. The Bannerete also helps by weaponizing party members reactions. One of the reasons why sentinel is such a popular feat among fighters, barbarians and paladins is the possibility of using reactions to do damage. Since the inspiring surge triggers from action surge that means you'll be dog piling the enemy. This works specifically well with the rogue who can use sneak attack once per turn and not per round. Bulwark has so many restrictions that it's just a bad class feature but it could be a life saver if it gets triggered. Charisma efects could fling you into another dimension and wisdom could get you frightened or charmed. Another shot at those saves could be clutch. Then there's the healer and the chef feats. Between the two I'd prioritize healer because it's the only way this build has to get knocked out characters back up. Chef is interesting not only for the healling but also for the flavor (beeing a halfling ripoff that caries a frying pan around and loves food) but also for mobilizing bonus actions. Not every character has the ability to always do something as a bonus action and chef provides that. There's a lot of fine tunning to this build depending on the strenghs of your party. Maybe everyone is loaded on bonus actions so chef loses some of it's apeal. Maybe the party is pretty loaded on healling in wich case healer becomes almost irrelevant but inspiring leader maintains it's potency. You may also not want to commit to halfling just to revert those 1s in which case variant human is a valid option to speed up the build. You could also change the theme of the build from "no magic" to "no spell slots". That way you could use the race and feats married to a spellcasting class that uses magic for ofense and utility relying on the feats for healling.
I like this a lot. I was looking for a combat medic build a little while ago. He was supposed to be a DMNPC. The idea was supposed to be that he was supposed to be essentially a healer, but not one that would allow my players to be reckless and how much damage they were taking. He also wasn't really supposed to be a leader, in this case he was supposed to be the grizzled, long suffering medic, who used to be a sharpshooter, but he damaged his eye, and was tired of watching his friends die. We both came with similar ideas. Although I didn't go for fighter at all. I really like what you did with the PDK, that was very creative. I never would have thought of that. At most I considered taking three levels of echo knight, to make it easier to move around the battlefield, and distract the bad guys. I didn't end up doing that, for one thing the game didn't last that long. What I did end up doing, was taking one level of barbarian, with the intent of taking two more. The idea being that- again, he's a grizzled soldier. The kind that can march 25 miles, carrying his buddy over one shoulder, and his guts in the other arm. I did, however take more levels in rogue and more levels in artificer. Artificer I went exactly if you did: alchemist. Rogue, i instead went arcane trickster, for more spell slots. Lastly, I invented a new feat, called diligent physician. Basically, it let you expand a charge on a first aid kit to do a number of things. Like: -cure one levels of exhaustion - cure a disease, or illness. - make it so that a lost limb, eye, or other injury, no longer poses disadvantage on attack rolls until their next long rest Or - expend a spell slot for each individual affected by this, to give them a number of temporary hit points equal to 1d10 + your bonus to medicine Also, it gives you proficiency in medicine, if you don't already have it, expertise if you already have it, and a number of times equal to your proficiency bonus per long rest, you can add your intelligence modifier to your bonus to medicine, on top of any other bonuses
Based on how Fast Hands is worded and given you are using the object with that ability I would 100% allow that as a bonus action. To me its a synergy much in the same respect that Rage and Bladesong can work together.
at my table you can drink AND administer potions as a bonus action, so I'm nearly certain we'd be able to use the healers kit to heal as a bonus action Me as DM, administering potions would be an action. But a character who has a backstory/training in the use of a healers kit in this way would certainly be able to do so as a bonus action.
I love this build. My first 5E character, Grant DaNasty the Halfling Thief, took Healer at level 4 so I could combine it with my fast hands feature. It was great that my DM allowed it. I would ride our Moon Druid when she was in bear form and shoot people with a hand crossbow. Then, when they bad guys hit my bear, I would heal her ASAP and then talk smack with sayings like, "I can heal this bear all day - you are now dinner!" Of course I couldn't do that, I just used my high deception skill as generally the bad guys didn't know any better. Fun time. It gets better - I was a rogue. So I charged 30gp every time I healed someone in my party (except for my bear). I argued that the gods gave clerics healing for prayers, I had to spend my limited money for healers kits. Soon, the party started learning how to play their characters to minimize the damage they took. It was great. They key to making the healer feat useful in combat is to do it as soon as it is useful. Never wait till the PCs are low on health. So if I could heal a maximum of 14 health - then I did it as soon as the PC lost 14 health or more. This allowed the fighters to delay in using their 2nd wind, or the pally could use his Lay on Hands later in the battle. This meant that they could do more damage before having to mitigate damage. My DM ruled that anything as a bonus action could also be done as an action (as a DM I also have this same home rule). So I would heal two PCs in a round, which was (most of the time) worth not attacking. At higher levels that is debatable, though the math supports this unless there are a lot of magic items involved. Also - you can sneak heal or combine it with sleight of hand (not technically, but I allow it cause it's fun).
This build sounds like a Manga I read recently, The Wrong Way To Use Healing Magic. In the manga, a beaten Knight made a band of weirdos/mercenaries run into the battlefield and snatch wounded away to be healed in M.A.S.H. tents or patch up anyone who would be killed at high speed. The demons they fight against call them the Snatchers, for just before they claim the kill, the victim is Snatched Away in a flash of white. The main character of the manga learned from the knight to be like the other thief like medics. Then gained powers of Way of Mercy Monks, but more punchy by healing himself to pull the monster while others steal the wounded away from the fight. I love this, to steal the monsters dinner away or deny evil things the satisfaction of killing your friends by some high speed/doctor Jones acrobatics maneuver. Also with the Artificer, you could make tools to do more the classic healing items. Syringe daggers that can inject poison could also inject healing potions, or you could add that to darts/bolts for hand crossbows for long range heals. Also, I think you could choose the haringon for race and taking the Mobile feat to get in the fray to help faster. For nonmagical healing, I believe The Need For Speed is best.
In my (very) low magic campaign, Healer is the God feat, and I absolutely rule that Rogue Thieves can use Fast Hands to heal people as a bonus action. But, we have all kinds of other realism, too, like using the Healer Feat provokes attacks of opportunity on both you and the person being healed, so you really need to drag them to safety before you try to bandage someone.
I think the best way to build this character is to go straight to Rogue 3 for Fast Hands, or 4 if you still need Healer. Then 6 levels of Fighter, and go Battlemaster. Get Archery Fighting Style. Get the Rally Maneuver. Get Inspiring Leader. And potentially Crossbow Expert, and grab a Hand Crossbow, but I think Longbow would work just fine. To me, it totally fulfills the fantasy, without actually sacrificing too much combat potential. Rogue/Fighter is a classic multiclass, and it works here too. I allowed this interaction at my table, and I even homebrewed Second Story work to instead let the character move through allies squares without treating them as difficult terrain, and allowing them to move through enemies squares as if it were difficult terrain (would still have to disengage if they wanted to avoid an opportunity attack).
Love this idea! I've been working on basically the same character concept recently (minus the PBK - didn't think of that, nice touch!), and I've had a couple extra thoughts for anyone who might want to give the combat medic a go: For race, if you don't mind waiting until lvl 4 for the healer feat, I really like the idea of a halfling medic. In particular, halfling nimbleness allows you to move *through* the space of any creature sized medium or higher. Combined with a bonus action Disengage as a rogue, this would allow you to weave through the battlefield through the legs of hordes of enemies to get to a downed ally - feels very on brand for a medic who throws caution to the wind to get to their patient. There's something a little badass about a halfling running through the legs of a bunch of orcs with their bergen of medical supplies on their back! Feels very "Lt Speirs", for anyone who's watched Band of Brothers. Second thought: if you're getting a fighting style, maybe consider Interception from the optional fighting styles. It allows you as a reaction to use your shield/weapon reduce the damage of a creature within 5ft of you by 1d10 + proficiency when they're hit by an attack. This also feels very combat medic-y since you're shielding your patient while you work on them, plus it gives you a use for your reaction and hopefully prevents the person you've brought up going straight back down before they get to their turn. Lastly, if you want something more defense-oriented (at the expense of the healing you get from rallying cry) you might like to take the Cavalier as your fighter subclass - lvl 3 imposing disadvantage on attacks against your allies, lvl 7 giving them 1d8 bonus AC + resistance as a reaction, there's a lot to like here. Might be good if you want to roleplay a pacifist healer while still being a useful party member in combat! Note that if you take this, you probably don't want interception as a fighting style, since there's a lot of overlap with this subclass' features.
I've actually played a really similar build idea!! I really loved the character and the way that they function was a really good change of pace! I did go halfling and the halfling luck sharing feat which ended up being incredibly strong! I was a homebrew class, but it had battle maneuvers that were healing based. If I had to go something by the book your way seems like it could have fit well! Glad to see you give a take on the character concept.
I absolutely love the idea of this character. I have always found myself bored with healing classes but I could genuinely find myself having a blast with this character, especially in a smaller group or low magic style game.
Interesting. It would be a struggle for sure but very thematic. I think one thing you didn't bring up much is use an object as a bonus action. Stacking up on potions is a great idea since you can reliable use them without wasting an action. This is why I love the Thief because what you put in your pack is now readily accessible for you.
A better "damage report" would be how many allies can you heal/stabilize in one round - if they're next to each other or if there's need to use movement The rogue and fighter dips would actually really matter here too
I've built a major support rogue build recently, not made for combat at all, healer feat, chef feat, and medic feat, going Thief rogue, also have prof in herbalist kit and cooks utensils, all about supporting the party
You can use an object as a bonus action. A healers kit is an object. That’s like the idiots who ask Crawford all the time if you can cast X spell on yourself because it’s says “A creature within 60 feet of yourself.” The whole idea is that a thief can apply a poison as a bonus action to their weapons which is why I always thought it was weird that they get it and not the Assassin.
First thing is that the Healers Kit does pop up for things beyond stabilization in a lot of things for dealing with different types of crap in various adventure books. I've basically played this type of thing as one of my backup AL characters as a plague doctor type. I believe that using the Healer feats options had a statement that it works with some of the WotC advice posts. The real fun with it is that Fast Hands would let you use it on multiple people, or stabilize and then heal up someone if you want.
I like the Alchemist. I just with the the elixir scaled when you use a higher spell slot. As for taking the Chef feat you can heal the extra 1d8 but when any one spends a hit dice they can as per Xanathar's you can cook a meal and everyone gains 1 hp per hit die spent. That is like everyone has one extra in their CON mod.
I've been trying around with trying to build a character similar to this for awhile, love your take on it. I've had the thought that the best way to do this would be a way of mercy monk and just flavor their hand of healing and hand of harm as them using medicines and poisons to heal or harm, shying away from the magic and considering ki points to be more akin to action points. But I really like this build
The campaign I am running now is a 5e/7th Sea mashup with a one god church. The church strictly controls healing magic, and is, ostensibly, one of the enemies of the PCs. So alchemy, herbalism, and medicine skill are all very important and the rules for using them have been expanded greatly. I have experimented with various healing subclasses and found that a Medic based on Thief Rogue seems to work best. The main features are bonuses to recovery during rests, and a pool of healing dice based on sneak attack dice.
Love this build Colby! I say it every time one of these videos comes around, but I love to see you push yourself on optimizing against a difficult concept. It came up on an earlier video; but I would love to see your optimized take on a character with the largest number of no-save spells and abilities you can muster. Things like Green Flame Blade, Armor of Agathys, Sleep, Color Spray, etc. A build for those of us who have terrible rolls or people looking to learn the game rolling the fewest dice possible to have your abilities take hold. As always, I look forward to see more concept-constrained optimization and y'all's additional content!
I've seen them all! I like the thornlock plenty and the cheese grater even more haha Honestly, it's what inspired me to take Artificer Initiate as my free feat at lvl one (that my DM is kind enough to give us) for my Bladesinger/Eldritch Knight. Having the Thorn Whip mixed in with extra attack has made him an absolute monster at battlefield control. And I was inspired by the movement mechanics discussed in your and Bilbron's videos.
Really nice build here. Also fighter is the master class so I definitely approve of 11 whole levels of that goodness. As usual thanks for your time and effort.
This really needs to find a way to take advantage of the good berry spell - like a handful if mini potions. There's a halfling subrace that gets it free Halfling also gets partial cover behind allies, helping with that ac when they're doing healing
I love this build so much! You could even switch it up from the healing side with banneret out and going conjuration wizard for minor conjuration ability to grab healing kits, poisons, bombs, etc. Conjure a tangler grenade then fast hands makes for a nice mini web
What's crazy about this is i'm literally making this character but only going alchemist artificer and arcane rogue and taking magical feats for more spellcasting.
This build is interesting. When I wanted to do something like this, I just made a custom fighter subclass based on allowing party members to spend their hit dice during combat for healing.
I’ve been playing a character like this for a while but I made him take his own equivalent of his Hippocratic oath of non violence so he just uses his action and his bonus to heal or to use his cunning action to dash about and heal other people
Disclaimer: I do understand the build restrictions that were in play for the video. That said just throwing this out there, but if you are okay adding spell based healing into the mix a one-level dip into either life or grave cleric would be pretty good. Grave gets spare the dying at range as a bonus action and if you spell heal someone who is at 0hp you auto roll max. Life rolls extra when they do heals. Already have the wisdom score for it, too.
Did anyone else think of Full Metal Alchemist Edward when the Artificer subclass was announced? A slightly different take than an Indy steampunk. Electricity in old Leyden jars and microphones/radios use crystals. It's very grey area of magic/science. Alchemy was a good choice for the concept. Just needs a construct buddy and you have Alphonse the brother. took ROTC at the U and got the butter bar. I was also a medic/lab tech. kinda close to what my RL character would be.
One of my characters Arara does a similar thing, though less focused on healing specifically and more just general combat assistance/command. She's allergic to magic (that means no magic classes at all, in her case). If I get to play as her, if the DM would allow it, I would put a homebrew handicap that would make sense with her allergy - vulnerability to spell damage and resistance to spell healing, but also a constant non-magical effect the same as the Detect Magic spell (since it'd make sense that she'd feel it). Totally not meant to be a power character, lol. Her Thief subclassing comes from a non-criminal aspect - that of watchmaking. Figure it requires similar skills, explains the subclass. Small manipulation all the way - that also explaining her skill in surgery. Also a Banneret! And, also subclassed into the Tasha's sidekick class Warrior to stack the uses of that heal boost ability. AND, subclassed into the sidekick class Expert as well! Because it's very assist-y. AND... grabs a couple of battlemaster manoeuvres with a fighting style and a feat (the suboptimal Commander's Strike being particularly flavourful). Sneakily enough since she can begin with one of those sidekick classes, I plan on updating the build to use a statblock rather than a race. Rubblebelt Stalker begins with a multiattack that does three attacks. Specifies a shortsword but hey, no reason why she shouldn't be using a shortsword huh? And fits well enough with her background, being an 'uplifted' (but still chaotic-aligned) tribal. Does leave her with only the one saving throw proficiency and some unideal hit dice (especially for a melee scrapper). Ah well, glass cannon frontline party healer it is! :) Additionally built up lots of background for her. A wild elf, somewhat civilized by the tribe attaching a permanent camp to the side of a friendly wood elf city, to mutual benefit. Her watchmaking job as a young lass led her to be very good at paying attention to precise timing and attention to detail - especially of multiple mechanisms set off in a chain. From there, increasingly interested in physical activity via a discovered talent for contortionism, becomes an escape artist for the local entertainments. Then when the novelty of it dries up (as the place doesn't get a lot of tourist traffic), a cheerleader. Then when war loomed and a defense bolstering push was instigated, a drill sergeant. War came, and a combat medic. And finally as wars dwindled and peace returned, missing the excitement of battle, an adventurer-commander. Relentlessly (and annoyingly) chipper but equally able to be scary, haplessly full of herself but at the same time as completely self-sacrificing to protect others. Bit dim, except in terms of tactical strategy. She has to be able to visualize it in order to be able to then think it through. Yes, completely inspired by Britney in that Daria paintball episode. :)
In my version of this character, I went with the Doctor/Lawyer/Beggarman/Thief concept (while yours is more of the Tinker/Tailor/Soldier/ Spy, but not quite). It was for a city campaign. For the lawyer part I'd taken persuasion, deception and history (ever rules lawyered the city guard? Woo! Hoo!!) and because of the decent charisma picked up inspiring leader at 4th (although, mobility might have been better (for me anyway)). With fast hands I had a lot of fun pickpocketing in combat, often going for useful things like spell component pouches or magic items. I'd had plans to multi-class battle master for disarm and riposte, but the campaign ended before I could get there.
This is a little similar to a character build I’ve been working on. But one difference is I’m not restricting myself to not healing with magic. My idea is: Start with Artificer, he’s either the son or apprentice to an Alchemist, and go till lv 3. Use my infusions for replicate magic item and do Magic Tattoo. Using those for healing spells. Then Cleric till 3. But I’m torn between Life and Peace for my domain. The healing spell boost from Life is great, but the Channel Divinity to run around healing is appealing too. Anyway, then some Druid after that going for Circle of Stars and getting the healing boost from that. But I like some of your ideas.
As a DM myself, I would allow the fast hands to work on the healer kits/packs/potions. They are objects and after hearing a interesting build that is outside the norm I would like to see how far it goes so long as I don't get any red flags. I am the type that does get into the rules a lot, but also like to add in flavor to the game and reward players for adding in their own flavor to the game as well.
me, as soon as he mentioned second wind: oh no he's going purple dragon knight isn't he He: goes purple dragon knight me: ohhhhhhh my god i mean honestly i love the build i'm just playing into the reputation
I love the effort you put into this. I would have used a Mercy Monk and skipped the Artificer. WOC cheaped out when they used spell casting to build the core features of the artificer… But they did so it is spell casting…
You say, "sometimes giving yourself artificial restrictions via a character concept I think can really help you get super invested into your character..." I'd also hope that acknowledgement can be given to an at least optional sticking to the traditional restrictions of D&D races to that a foundation might be fostered for roleplay investment in cases where customisation creates divergences from norms.
whoa. banneret. hhaha. weird lost my initial comment so i'll just continue here. liked seeing the fighter dip and the usage of action surge here just speaks how action surge can just fit into any build.
I love idea of this episode, and other kind of "conceptual" characters. As much as i'm fascinated by optimization and theoretical number crunching, when i'm creating character for real play usually put flavor over numbers. Thats type of self restrictions in character creation usually leads to interesting stories. BTW for dpr purposes check out ranged battlesmith. Spellstoring item can be used by your Steel Defender, which means sharpshooter, crossbow expert, haste and adventage (from for example faerie fire) all together :)
you can get that concept (offloading a level 1 concen accuracy booster spell like bless) online as early as level 2. haste though will indeed need spell storing item though i feel that's a very suboptimal use when your objective is dmg for one of the best abilities in the game. for example, i can deal 30d8 + 20d6 with spell storing item without using my own action economy at level 12+.
@@TheRobversion1 Yes, on the love love you can use farie fire and still deal quite good dmg. Thanks to 'reapeating weapon' and Steel Defender, which is quite good use of bonus action you can delay taking crossbow exper, so you can start with sharpshooter. Of course there are better options of using spellstoring item than your Steel Defender concentrating on faerie fire, but i think, it's quite efficient, you give adventage not only to yourself, but to whole party and also haste not only buffs your dpr, but movement and survivability. Of course there are some shenanigans, which you can play with right party composition, also there is animate object, which can replace haste, so probably there are better options, but this one is self dependet and sustainable and like It. BTW, which spells would you pack in spellstroring item to make it most efficient? And also on which spell would you concentrate by yourself?
@@pawefeszler9543 i didn't get "on the love love." in terms of haste, this is the one i prefer offloading as it would be detrimental if it's on you and your concentration gets broken. i would indeed prefer animate objects but that comes on too late for an artificer imo. no one really plays tier 4. also i wouldn't offload concentration on the steel defender. they are likely to get hit. well at least not until higher levels when it's a bit tougher like level 10 or 14. for earlier levels i'd offload concentration on the homunculus (which is ranged and can fly) and your familiar (pick a flying familiar). to illustrate infusions known and active wise (level 10-8 known, 4 active): repeating shot create homunculus spellwrought tattoo: find familiar (known only) spellwrought tattoo: bless (tattoo on familiar) spellwrought tattoo: faerie fire, fog cloud or any other 1st level advantage generator (tattoo on homunculus) remaining 3 infusions known can be spellwrought tattoo: situational spells like rituals or goodberry. so in what i stated above you could go: action: cast a spell/attack bonus action: command homunculus to cast the tattoo'd spell and fly free action: command familiar to cast bless and fly the tactics i had in mind were also self-dependent (i never factor party members in when it comes to combos or optimization). as far as what spell i'd concentrate on myself, that would depend if i multiclassed into another spellcasting class with spells i'd like. on the artificer spell list, there aren't alot and tbh i'd rather just save my action for attacking as most of the concentration options are generally defensive (like blur, expeditious retreat) or control (like levitate, web). if needed though then i'd probably pick a control spell. as for which spells i'd use with spell storing item, that would also depend on the artificer subclass. simply for offensive purposes, assuming +5 int and not factoring artificer subclass spells: i like catapult. here's the combo. artificer 11, caster class 2 (1 if you can rest trick or have items that restore level 3+ spell slots) rest trick/use level 3 and 4 spell slots to create 10 tiny servants. give all of them an acid flask to carry (this can be different if you have alot of gold like inhaled/contact poisons). standing orders to cast the spell in the spell storing item at your target upon you uttering the command word then to pass the spell storing item to the next tiny servant). so give the spell storing item to one of them. once in combat, indicate your target as the bbeg. each tiny servant will cast catapult with the acid flask. that's 3d8 + 2d6 if the bbeg fails their save. you have 10 tiny servants and 10 uses in the spell storing item so that's a potential 30d8 + 2d6 without touching your action economy. if let's say i was an alchemist and i wanted to focus on sustained dmg and some area denial over the burst dmg of the catapult. i'd store flaming sphere. then the tiny servants can then be commanded to cast a wall of 10 flaming spheres around the bbeg, use their bonus actions to ram the flaming spheres into the bbeg for 20d6 dmg then trap the bbeg inside (while also handling the concentration for those 10 flaming spheres). if the bbeg can't get out the wall of flaming spheres (they occupy a space so the bbeg cant pass through without teleporting) at the end of the bbeg's turn they will take another 20d6. so as you can see with this combo there are many ways you can go for absurd dmg + control/debuff if you want to (depending on subclass spells). if facing an army? spell store 10 shatters. you want assured no save dmg? spell store 10 magic missiles. then once the spell storing item is empty, you can use your bonus action the next turn to command your 10 tiny servants to go attack something.
Fun drinking game. Watch these videos and take a shot every time you hear "there's a feat we need" I feel like all the optimization builds are "take this feat and make it proc as often as possible"
Speaking of Knight ROTC, I would be curious how you would build an Front-line Commander or Teacher of a Knight school type character. Possibly one that would give inspiring Speeches before battle, Give commands to students/allies to attack in battle, buff their allies, and/or give allies knowledge to protect themselves from harm. Or perhaps, more of the Tactician of a battlefield.
I had in mind this character concept for a while, but didn't know how to make it work. Interesting build. I would have chosen Battlemaster as the fighter archetype. The maneuvers would be helpful in protecting and inspiring allies.
Your channel inspired me to break dnd a bit more than I usually did in the past and finally start multiclassing I'm currently playing a one man army generalist twilight cleric and fey wanderer he can heal he can deal damage he can explore and is even competant at talking I would have never thought of this build if not for your channel thank you for that.
As an alternative option, instead of sharpshooter feat you can take medium armor master, letting you thief in medium armor with the 16 dex and freeing up a couple asi for resilient or possibly +2 CHA and inspiring leader. You’re not a dps anyway, you’re the field officer whose job is to translate orders into a victory everyone walks away from.
![SAFEPLANET - ดาวเคราะห์ [ THE PLANET ]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/4X1XL3I_k3c/mqdefault.jpg)
I have a suggestion on using Healer’s Kit to heal your party members. Instead of the healer buying all the kits and carrying them all, have each party member buy their own and carry it on them in an easily accessible way. Then, if you need to spend a use healing them, you use THEIR healing kit. This is how the military are trained to use first aid kits. You use your buddy’s kit to patch them up, and vice versa. That way, 1) each member is responsible for maintaining their own supply, and 2) the healer will still have their kit well stocked in an emergency where someone else hasn’t kept their’s stocked. This also means that everyone has a kit handy in the event that the healer can’t make it over to that character, and they can at least be stabilized.
I was just gonna say that. It makes so much more sense as well. Inventory doesn’t make too much sense in DND but it seems pretty awkward to have 5 medkits hanging from your belt. Also, if you go down, the healer would be doing you a favor to bring you back up, so it should be on you to provide them the medkit.
As a Combat Medic for the Army I want to thank you for making this build. That being said as a medic I understand how much time it takes to stabilize a patient and using my aid back to give them some sort of treatment. I would rule that if a rogue uses their fast hands to stabilize a down ally, I would allow that to take a bonus action, but if they wanted to try to heal them that would require an action.
100% makes sense :). Also, thank you for your service!
Trying to apply real life logic to dnd mechanics is a misplaced effort
Somewhere between “misplaced effort to apply realism” and “anything goes because it’s a game” is probably where you want to land. Some players enjoy low magic games with higher stakes. Every game will exist on the sliding scale between realism and anything goes. You don’t have to limit yourself to the default setting.
Rooster has the right of it by RAW, as Colby himself mentioned during the video. It's the feat, not the item, that allows a character to heal a creature.
All I'm saying is I would treat it like RaW for this instance, since I can justify it in my head based off of my personal experience. It certainly isn't realistic since it takes longer than 6 seconds to stabilize or heal someone, but I'm willing to suspend my disbelief.
The idea of a field medic holding the backline with a shortbow, and then when an ally goes down, slinging the bow and pulling a shield off your back and running in, shield high to baseball slide down next to your ally, protecting their fallen body with your shield held strong in one arm, and the other hand frantically delving into your hip pack to pull out a kit or potion and administering your comrade while arrows fly by and ping off of your shield, is sooooo fxxking cool, i gotta play this. Not to mention the roll away and backstab/sneak attack to the enemy who downed your friend.
Or you could just cast healing word... But hey, when the TPK happens, I'm sure not bringing anybody with basic spells won't be the cause.
The field medic is just there to stabilize and maintain. You still need to take them to M.A.S.H
This build should really help the thief, alchemist and purple dragon knight in improving their self-steam.
Aw c'mon, thief and PDK aren't so bad they're on the level of alchemist 😂
Wait he actually just took all those subclasses, right, nevermind lmao
You mean it'll help them have some
@@ovbrook3057 I think that alchemist is pretty decent honestly.
@@quendi5557 I've played one and it's pretty bad. It's not like some of the worst rogue or barbarian subclasses where it's *literally* like not having a subclass, but the benefits are marginal. Slightly boosted healing and damage, being able to produce a random potion once a day of...marginal benefit, healing word, and eventually getting free castings of lesser restoration isn't nothing, but the artificer relies more on their subclass for power than many other classes, being a half caster that can't fight martially. Marginal benefits just aren't enough for artis
The "Healer" feat is unbelievably underrated in D&D 5e. Just theorycraft how many spell slots you save by powering your healing with healer's kits instead of spell slots. Or take my direct attestation of playing a Healer Feat Cleric in Undermountain at the moment - currently at level 10, I'm healing 15-20 hp per application, while having my bonus action available to also hit the same person with a healing word if they need it. I can actually combat heal a person up to effective hit points rather than just combat bouncing them. And as long as I am nearby allies (and as a tabaxi, I can get "nearby" from 60 feet away at need) I can bring anyone back up to 1 hp for free with just an action, forever, without spell slots.
yeah, I have used healer in some really in optimised ways but it's a feat that I really like. I like to put it a characters to give them something to be used in an emergancy.
Level 1:(see above) [rogue 1, race & feat]
Level 2:(see above) [rogue 2]
Level 3:(@15:51) [rogue 3 & sub-class]
Level 4:(@21:42) [artificer 1]
Level 5:(@25:35) [artificer 2]
Level 6:(@27:00) [artificer 3 & sub-class]
Level 7:(see above) [fighter 1 & fighting-style]
Level 8:(@37:30) [fighter 2]
Level 9:(@38:46) [fighter 3 & sub-class]
Level 10:(see above) [fighter 4 & ASI]
Level 11:(@46:10) [fighter 5]
Level 12:(@46:44) [fighter 6]
Level 13:(@46:57) [fighter 7]
Level 14:(see above) [fighter 8 & ASI]
Level 15:(@49:26) [fighter 9]
Level 16:(@49:55) [fighter 10]
Level 17:(@50:48) [fighter 11]
Thank you man
Rogue with action surge sounds really good for one reason. You can get sneak attack on your turn, and then use your second action to get another sneak attack immediately after your turn (using the ready action).
sneaky, I like it
Wait. I dont think this works. If I understand correctly, a new turn starts just as you get to do your Action. Which means in each turn, your Reaction follows after your Action. If you held your action and get sneak attack followed by a sneak attack on the next turn, that will work. But the other way doesn't. Unless you have an oddly specific subclass like Scout, there should be NO WAY to get two sneak attacks in one turn.
@@yiklongtay6029 never says get 2 sneak attacks in one turn. You take the ready action and use it when you want after your turn.
Also your reaction doesn't follow your action. You get to use it whenever there's a tiger for it, such as the trigger you set for your ready action.
I like how you optimize for a particular goal instead of “to make the best version” - best is so subjective and often just means good at just killing people - focusing on a character idea like: how can I maximize healing without casting spells? - thanks for the video
I've done this as a side benefit for my rogue/barbarian. They have the healer feat, a custom subclass with some bit of druid casting, and are about to pick up the chef feat with their next level to give some temp hp for pre-emptive healing. They are a tribal warrior focused on being in tune with spirits of nature.
Me trying to patch up a team mate:
He tries to cast healing word on himself
Me: “Dont talk! Save your strength! Do it for Martha!”
Why did you say that name?!
I had a player who got a magic spice bag and ask if he could use it as a bonus action to throw some "pocket sand" to blind the ennemies. It was a super small dex save (DC10), targeted one creature, but it was giving him the option of helping his allies and himself through the Quick hand ability.
I feel like this build take a similar approach of thinking outside the box to make Quick Hand uselful to the party, contrary of the use it normally sees.
Again thank you for the nice builds you bring each week!
i think if you wanted to make this a little bit less homebrew and a bit more useful, simply allow him to craft/buy the inhaled/contact poisons in the DMG.
Fantastic! I love the builds that deviate from the classic multi-classes. The ability to make your own character thematically and then optimize within those constraints is probably my favorite part of character building. Great job!
When you started describing the build, I knew thief and alchemist would be on there. Purple Dragon Knight was a surprise.
This reminds me of a build I came up with, though mine was a straight Mercy Monk with the Healer and Chef feats who fancied themselves a wandering physician who often took on adventuring work as a fast way to earn money because he had a tendency to give his doctoring skills away for free to any injured or sick people he came across.
been playing with the thief medic for the last 4 years in a group (not my character). Honestly even in later levels the heal is very strong. It consistently heals for 15-18 hp. And yeah, we always ruled that you can use it as a bonus action. If you couldn't, imo the whole concept would break and the feat would be worthless. Since you can heal like that with an action and a bonus action. There have been moments where this has saved the group from TPK in a couple of turns. When we ventured out at lvl1 this medic and a paladin were the only healing types in the group and the thef healed like 4-5 times more than the paladin. even tho the paladin didnt shy away from using its spellslots to do so. 2 spell slots vs infinite amount of healers kits and refresh at short rest and 6 people group. So during the day this thief could heal people potentialy 12-18-24 times. Depends on how often the DM lets you rest :)
Very entertaining, though one suspects you put all the "dead weight"(tm) subclasses in one build so you don't have to revisit those subclasses for a loooonnnggggg time. 😛
I would never do such a thing! 😬
This is so neat seeing these typically underwhelming subclasses gel into a really cool build!
I had built something similar to this, but with a charisma based Human Battlemaster. The feat at level 1 was Inspiring Leader. That gives everyone 4 extra temp hit points at level 1. Then you get a fighting style, which you pick Superior Technique: Rally. This you use to top up temp hit points at level 1. You also get Second Wind for yourself. At level 3, pick Battlemaster for more uses for Rally, and any other good manoeuvres that fit your character. At level 4, you take the healer feat.
Note that with a Battlemaster Fighter Healer in this way, you get back all of your abilities, except action surge, at a short rest (which is huge in a dungeon, or any environment where long rests are impossible). What is also great about this is you can use a healing kit to revive a downed character, or heal one, then use Rally as a bonus action to immediately give them some temporary hit points on the same turn.
action surge comes back on a short rest too
Great build for small parties especially, like 3 characters. Being able to be effective in three roles is super helpful.
LEVEL 6 "HEALING REPORT"
Party of 5, First rest + 2 short rests
210 hp of healing to party with healer's kits, assuming all characters take at least 1 hit.
+6d4+6 healing with potions.
Whether it's stabilization or healing, you're still using a healer's kit to do it, and a healer's kit is an object. If it didn't mention a healer's kit at all, then I would say that it wasn't Using an Object.
I'm currently in a campaign where a curse on one of the characters prevents him from receiving magical healing. In this kind of case, the combat medic would really shine.
I think I would go echo knight instead of banneret. Less straight up healing once a short rest but much better mobility all the time. It also allows you to have your echo in melee and take some hits. If it gets killed you just pop it back up as a bonus action the next round. Thinking preventing my companions from getting hit is healing via avoidance. And this is an unlimited resource.
this has been one of my favorite episodes in a while, well done. Thief rogue was my first long term character, and fast hands with a diverse environment is one of the most creative abilities out there.
Thanks! Glad you enjoyed :)
As a combat medic I'd like to say that this build is legit.
I thought of a similar idea but with two levels of rogue for expertise and cunning action, and the rest would be a Way of Mercy monk. I don’t know if ki counts as magical, but I didn’t want to be a spell casting healer.
Also you get unarmored defense and movement by the time your character is level four. Adding your wisdom modifier to your AC makes you a lot more tanky with the ability score you need for healing and your response time can be faster with extra movement, especially combined with cunning action.
You don’t need Intelligence any more, so your highest scores can be Wisdom and Dexterity which leaves more room for your Constitution.
I don’t know if you’ll see this but please let me know what you think if you get a moment, love your videos
As a DM, I believe that the rogue skill allowing the use of an object as a bonus action overrides the “action” verbiage for the healers kit. My two cents
"ROTC" stands for "Reserve Officer Training Corps". In any case the purp drag knight connection does fit.
Great to see an underpowered combination build being optimized for team-focused play.
This kind of character could be the linchpin of an adventuring party in a low-magic setting, especially if they are ambushed and the action economy swings in the wrong direction.
I tried to do something like this as a thought experiment and just couldn't figure it out- Thanks Colby! Love your big ol brain~
Another idea for this build is to take a warlock dip, so you can make elixirs on short rests. And since your elixirs last until the end of your next long rest, if you spent a sleepless night on brewing elixirs for the big battle…
Colby - As one of the people who begged you to do an Alchemist build, I just want to say thank you!
I think I personally would have done more Alchemist given the bonus to healing at level 5 and the bonus to elixirs at level 9. I think then you could probably just stick to two classes (Rogue and Artificer).
Another option I have seen is to make a Mercy Monk who uses Healer and Chef to be a non-magical healer.
I am more inclined to mix PDK with Glamour Bard and Inspiring Leader to focus on temp hp, healing when necessary, and battlefield positioning.
the bonus to healing is unfortunately only with artificer spellcasting, not the healer feat
As an EMT... the 'healing' takes longer, stabilization is quick as hell, Bonus Action worthy. For the bandaging up and stuff? That's 100% an action.
This is something I've wanted to try building, thank you for this! Definitely looking to take Inspiring Leader feat. Your soldiers are tired, the war hasn't gone well, but a rousing speech from the medic who has survived encounter after encounter is enough to get them through their MREs and back out onto the field! This is assuming human with a DM provided feat at level 1
My favourite D&D build is a nonmagical secondary healer. I went straight-up Dex/Con/Cha Battle Master with Healer, Inspiring Leader, and the Rally maneuver (underpowered but sometimes useful in a pinch). Then because it was a straight fighter I had plenty of ASIs left to spend on Xbow Expert and
Other general competence. Really like your fast hands idea though, reluctant to multiclass and lose that hypothetical 4th attack but might be worth it
I've built a Combat Medic character before, but instead of three sub-classes, I only used two: Rogue/Scout (though the type of Rogue doesn't matter unless your DM is VERY forgiving), and Fighter/Battlemaster. Background should be something that allows you access to proficiency with Herbalism Kit. I need good Dex and Cha for the build. A weapon with range is best, either a shortbow or longbow.
Some people have told me that a Rogue able to use a bonus Use an Action is what I need, but that's for little things, not rolling up your sleeves and applying first aid, or at least that's how it's always played out for me with my DMs, and I can't fault them. However, the Rogue's Cunning Action is almost necessary for this build. Let's you move with a purpose.
Battlemaster allows you access to several maneuvers which can be really useful for saving someone's bacon. The most important is Rally (friendly gains Superiority die + your Cha modifier temp HP), Pushing Attack, Maneuvering Attack, Goading Attack, and Bait and Switch. Having a ranged weapon means you can use most of these at range.
Being a Human Variant with the Healer feat at level one is mandatory. Later on, learning the Inspiring Leadership feat allows you give out your player level + Cha mod Temp HP per rest.
Having the Herbalism Kit allows you the option of making healing potions, and if you convince the DM, perhaps to renew you Healing Kits with herbal poultices and the like.
Lately, I've been wondering how adding the Chef feat to the character would allow them more options, or even multiple chances, to bolster HP more without relying on magic usage.
This has nothing to do with dnd, but your voice is really relaxing damm.
Herbalism can produce healing potions as per the skill description in the PHB. You can take herbalism as a tool skill on any character they don't need to have the capacity for magical spells. It doesn't seem unreasonable that Doogie Howser Arti.D couldn't do something similar.
I created an eldritch knight with the healer kit at 1st level cuz our DM is cool haha. He got find familiar and he was an archer so he was always helping and healing or shooting archers, it was really nice. Not the best build but a good one!
Just wanted to say, I found your channel a week ago and I've watched about a dozen of your builds, and they've given me so many ideas! I currently have a battlemaster fighter and I'm definately going to buy a few nets next session
Horray! Welcome :)
I was also thinking of a similar concept before I watched this video but the focus was on overall support and not just healling. You take the halfling to enable the bountifull luck feat reducing the chance of the party getting screwed over by critical failiures. Take the protection fighting style which is deemed weak by the overall D&D comunity but has the benefit of negating critical hits even if the attack still hits because the atacker would need to roll two 20s. The healling part comes from the Bannerete's Rallying cry but most importantly from the Inspiring Leader feat (which I call preemptive healling) which is very powerfull. The Bannerete also helps by weaponizing party members reactions. One of the reasons why sentinel is such a popular feat among fighters, barbarians and paladins is the possibility of using reactions to do damage. Since the inspiring surge triggers from action surge that means you'll be dog piling the enemy. This works specifically well with the rogue who can use sneak attack once per turn and not per round. Bulwark has so many restrictions that it's just a bad class feature but it could be a life saver if it gets triggered. Charisma efects could fling you into another dimension and wisdom could get you frightened or charmed. Another shot at those saves could be clutch. Then there's the healer and the chef feats. Between the two I'd prioritize healer because it's the only way this build has to get knocked out characters back up. Chef is interesting not only for the healling but also for the flavor (beeing a halfling ripoff that caries a frying pan around and loves food) but also for mobilizing bonus actions. Not every character has the ability to always do something as a bonus action and chef provides that. There's a lot of fine tunning to this build depending on the strenghs of your party. Maybe everyone is loaded on bonus actions so chef loses some of it's apeal. Maybe the party is pretty loaded on healling in wich case healer becomes almost irrelevant but inspiring leader maintains it's potency. You may also not want to commit to halfling just to revert those 1s in which case variant human is a valid option to speed up the build. You could also change the theme of the build from "no magic" to "no spell slots". That way you could use the race and feats married to a spellcasting class that uses magic for ofense and utility relying on the feats for healling.
I like this a lot. I was looking for a combat medic build a little while ago. He was supposed to be a DMNPC. The idea was supposed to be that he was supposed to be essentially a healer, but not one that would allow my players to be reckless and how much damage they were taking. He also wasn't really supposed to be a leader, in this case he was supposed to be the grizzled, long suffering medic, who used to be a sharpshooter, but he damaged his eye, and was tired of watching his friends die.
We both came with similar ideas. Although I didn't go for fighter at all. I really like what you did with the PDK, that was very creative. I never would have thought of that. At most I considered taking three levels of echo knight, to make it easier to move around the battlefield, and distract the bad guys. I didn't end up doing that, for one thing the game didn't last that long. What I did end up doing, was taking one level of barbarian, with the intent of taking two more. The idea being that- again, he's a grizzled soldier. The kind that can march 25 miles, carrying his buddy over one shoulder, and his guts in the other arm.
I did, however take more levels in rogue and more levels in artificer. Artificer I went exactly if you did: alchemist. Rogue, i instead went arcane trickster, for more spell slots.
Lastly, I invented a new feat, called diligent physician. Basically, it let you expand a charge on a first aid kit to do a number of things. Like:
-cure one levels of exhaustion
- cure a disease, or illness.
- make it so that a lost limb, eye, or other injury, no longer poses disadvantage on attack rolls until their next long rest
Or
- expend a spell slot for each individual affected by this, to give them a number of temporary hit points equal to 1d10 + your bonus to medicine
Also, it gives you proficiency in medicine, if you don't already have it, expertise if you already have it, and a number of times equal to your proficiency bonus per long rest, you can add your intelligence modifier to your bonus to medicine, on top of any other bonuses
Based on how Fast Hands is worded and given you are using the object with that ability I would 100% allow that as a bonus action. To me its a synergy much in the same respect that Rage and Bladesong can work together.
at my table you can drink AND administer potions as a bonus action, so I'm nearly certain we'd be able to use the healers kit to heal as a bonus action
Me as DM, administering potions would be an action. But a character who has a backstory/training in the use of a healers kit in this way would certainly be able to do so as a bonus action.
I love this build. My first 5E character, Grant DaNasty the Halfling Thief, took Healer at level 4 so I could combine it with my fast hands feature. It was great that my DM allowed it. I would ride our Moon Druid when she was in bear form and shoot people with a hand crossbow. Then, when they bad guys hit my bear, I would heal her ASAP and then talk smack with sayings like, "I can heal this bear all day - you are now dinner!" Of course I couldn't do that, I just used my high deception skill as generally the bad guys didn't know any better. Fun time.
It gets better - I was a rogue. So I charged 30gp every time I healed someone in my party (except for my bear). I argued that the gods gave clerics healing for prayers, I had to spend my limited money for healers kits. Soon, the party started learning how to play their characters to minimize the damage they took. It was great.
They key to making the healer feat useful in combat is to do it as soon as it is useful. Never wait till the PCs are low on health. So if I could heal a maximum of 14 health - then I did it as soon as the PC lost 14 health or more. This allowed the fighters to delay in using their 2nd wind, or the pally could use his Lay on Hands later in the battle. This meant that they could do more damage before having to mitigate damage.
My DM ruled that anything as a bonus action could also be done as an action (as a DM I also have this same home rule). So I would heal two PCs in a round, which was (most of the time) worth not attacking. At higher levels that is debatable, though the math supports this unless there are a lot of magic items involved.
Also - you can sneak heal or combine it with sleight of hand (not technically, but I allow it cause it's fun).
The Combat medic makes me reminisce about some of the old 3.5 books... And now I'm brainstorming how I'd make a Dread Commando 😂
This build sounds like a Manga I read recently, The Wrong Way To Use Healing Magic.
In the manga, a beaten Knight made a band of weirdos/mercenaries run into the battlefield and snatch wounded away to be healed in M.A.S.H. tents or patch up anyone who would be killed at high speed. The demons they fight against call them the Snatchers, for just before they claim the kill, the victim is Snatched Away in a flash of white.
The main character of the manga learned from the knight to be like the other thief like medics. Then gained powers of Way of Mercy Monks, but more punchy by healing himself to pull the monster while others steal the wounded away from the fight.
I love this, to steal the monsters dinner away or deny evil things the satisfaction of killing your friends by some high speed/doctor Jones acrobatics maneuver. Also with the Artificer, you could make tools to do more the classic healing items. Syringe daggers that can inject poison could also inject healing potions, or you could add that to darts/bolts for hand crossbows for long range heals.
Also, I think you could choose the haringon for race and taking the Mobile feat to get in the fray to help faster. For nonmagical healing, I believe The Need For Speed is best.
In my (very) low magic campaign, Healer is the God feat, and I absolutely rule that Rogue Thieves can use Fast Hands to heal people as a bonus action. But, we have all kinds of other realism, too, like using the Healer Feat provokes attacks of opportunity on both you and the person being healed, so you really need to drag them to safety before you try to bandage someone.
5:00-5:25 is your channel’s niche articulated. I think only someone who has played would be able to understand and for that I thank you.
I think the best way to build this character is to go straight to Rogue 3 for Fast Hands, or 4 if you still need Healer. Then 6 levels of Fighter, and go Battlemaster. Get Archery Fighting Style. Get the Rally Maneuver. Get Inspiring Leader. And potentially Crossbow Expert, and grab a Hand Crossbow, but I think Longbow would work just fine. To me, it totally fulfills the fantasy, without actually sacrificing too much combat potential. Rogue/Fighter is a classic multiclass, and it works here too.
I allowed this interaction at my table, and I even homebrewed Second Story work to instead let the character move through allies squares without treating them as difficult terrain, and allowing them to move through enemies squares as if it were difficult terrain (would still have to disengage if they wanted to avoid an opportunity attack).
Love this idea! I've been working on basically the same character concept recently (minus the PBK - didn't think of that, nice touch!), and I've had a couple extra thoughts for anyone who might want to give the combat medic a go:
For race, if you don't mind waiting until lvl 4 for the healer feat, I really like the idea of a halfling medic. In particular, halfling nimbleness allows you to move *through* the space of any creature sized medium or higher. Combined with a bonus action Disengage as a rogue, this would allow you to weave through the battlefield through the legs of hordes of enemies to get to a downed ally - feels very on brand for a medic who throws caution to the wind to get to their patient. There's something a little badass about a halfling running through the legs of a bunch of orcs with their bergen of medical supplies on their back! Feels very "Lt Speirs", for anyone who's watched Band of Brothers.
Second thought: if you're getting a fighting style, maybe consider Interception from the optional fighting styles. It allows you as a reaction to use your shield/weapon reduce the damage of a creature within 5ft of you by 1d10 + proficiency when they're hit by an attack. This also feels very combat medic-y since you're shielding your patient while you work on them, plus it gives you a use for your reaction and hopefully prevents the person you've brought up going straight back down before they get to their turn.
Lastly, if you want something more defense-oriented (at the expense of the healing you get from rallying cry) you might like to take the Cavalier as your fighter subclass - lvl 3 imposing disadvantage on attacks against your allies, lvl 7 giving them 1d8 bonus AC + resistance as a reaction, there's a lot to like here. Might be good if you want to roleplay a pacifist healer while still being a useful party member in combat! Note that if you take this, you probably don't want interception as a fighting style, since there's a lot of overlap with this subclass' features.
I've actually played a really similar build idea!! I really loved the character and the way that they function was a really good change of pace! I did go halfling and the halfling luck sharing feat which ended up being incredibly strong! I was a homebrew class, but it had battle maneuvers that were healing based. If I had to go something by the book your way seems like it could have fit well! Glad to see you give a take on the character concept.
I absolutely love the idea of this character. I have always found myself bored with healing classes but I could genuinely find myself having a blast with this character, especially in a smaller group or low magic style game.
I love how you made the unplayed subclasses worth playing
i really like the idea of using fairy as the race so you can hide in the pocket of someone (e,g, the tank) so you can heal them as they take damage.
Interesting. It would be a struggle for sure but very thematic. I think one thing you didn't bring up much is use an object as a bonus action. Stacking up on potions is a great idea since you can reliable use them without wasting an action. This is why I love the Thief because what you put in your pack is now readily accessible for you.
A better "damage report" would be how many allies can you heal/stabilize in one round - if they're next to each other or if there's need to use movement
The rogue and fighter dips would actually really matter here too
I've built a major support rogue build recently, not made for combat at all, healer feat, chef feat, and medic feat, going Thief rogue, also have prof in herbalist kit and cooks utensils, all about supporting the party
You can use an object as a bonus action. A healers kit is an object. That’s like the idiots who ask Crawford all the time if you can cast X spell on yourself because it’s says “A creature within 60 feet of yourself.”
The whole idea is that a thief can apply a poison as a bonus action to their weapons which is why I always thought it was weird that they get it and not the Assassin.
First thing is that the Healers Kit does pop up for things beyond stabilization in a lot of things for dealing with different types of crap in various adventure books.
I've basically played this type of thing as one of my backup AL characters as a plague doctor type.
I believe that using the Healer feats options had a statement that it works with some of the WotC advice posts. The real fun with it is that Fast Hands would let you use it on multiple people, or stabilize and then heal up someone if you want.
I like the Alchemist. I just with the the elixir scaled when you use a higher spell slot. As for taking the Chef feat you can heal the extra 1d8 but when any one spends a hit dice they can as per Xanathar's you can cook a meal and everyone gains 1 hp per hit die spent. That is like everyone has one extra in their CON mod.
I've been trying around with trying to build a character similar to this for awhile, love your take on it. I've had the thought that the best way to do this would be a way of mercy monk and just flavor their hand of healing and hand of harm as them using medicines and poisons to heal or harm, shying away from the magic and considering ki points to be more akin to action points. But I really like this build
Me reading the title of the video before watching it: So Cleric it is! :3
The campaign I am running now is a 5e/7th Sea mashup with a one god church. The church strictly controls healing magic, and is, ostensibly, one of the enemies of the PCs. So alchemy, herbalism, and medicine skill are all very important and the rules for using them have been expanded greatly. I have experimented with various healing subclasses and found that a Medic based on Thief Rogue seems to work best. The main features are bonuses to recovery during rests, and a pool of healing dice based on sneak attack dice.
Another really awesome video and build, and the plant is looking better than ever!
This is awesome! I am about to run a high intrigue/stealth/ espionage low magic back up campaign this build would fit perfectly!
Going to recommend this.
This build works great with our Kickstarter setting Khor! Thanks!
Love this build Colby! I say it every time one of these videos comes around, but I love to see you push yourself on optimizing against a difficult concept.
It came up on an earlier video; but I would love to see your optimized take on a character with the largest number of no-save spells and abilities you can muster. Things like Green Flame Blade, Armor of Agathys, Sleep, Color Spray, etc. A build for those of us who have terrible rolls or people looking to learn the game rolling the fewest dice possible to have your abilities take hold.
As always, I look forward to see more concept-constrained optimization and y'all's additional content!
Thanks! I'm guessing you've seen the Thornlock? That kinda fits the bill, though it is a little odd and requires some buy in from your DM :).
I've seen them all! I like the thornlock plenty and the cheese grater even more haha
Honestly, it's what inspired me to take Artificer Initiate as my free feat at lvl one (that my DM is kind enough to give us) for my Bladesinger/Eldritch Knight. Having the Thorn Whip mixed in with extra attack has made him an absolute monster at battlefield control. And I was inspired by the movement mechanics discussed in your and Bilbron's videos.
Love the story of this character! I feel like I could really get behind that kind of development!
Really nice build here. Also fighter is the master class so I definitely approve of 11 whole levels of that goodness. As usual thanks for your time and effort.
29:53 Just as a heads up, pestle is pronounced pessle; it's a silent T :)
This really needs to find a way to take advantage of the good berry spell - like a handful if mini potions. There's a halfling subrace that gets it free
Halfling also gets partial cover behind allies, helping with that ac when they're doing healing
I love this build so much! You could even switch it up from the healing side with banneret out and going conjuration wizard for minor conjuration ability to grab healing kits, poisons, bombs, etc.
Conjure a tangler grenade then fast hands makes for a nice mini web
conjuration wizards are very powerful at low levels. purple worm poison at level 2? that's alot of dmg.
What's crazy about this is i'm literally making this character but only going alchemist artificer and arcane rogue and taking magical feats for more spellcasting.
This build is interesting. When I wanted to do something like this, I just made a custom fighter subclass based on allowing party members to spend their hit dice during combat for healing.
Is this Khaladin if everything went as planned?
Jajajaja.. you made my day bro!
This is exactly what I was thinking 😂
:'( so many feels
I’ve been playing a character like this for a while but I made him take his own equivalent of his Hippocratic oath of non violence so he just uses his action and his bonus to heal or to use his cunning action to dash about and heal other people
Disclaimer: I do understand the build restrictions that were in play for the video.
That said just throwing this out there, but if you are okay adding spell based healing into the mix a one-level dip into either life or grave cleric would be pretty good.
Grave gets spare the dying at range as a bonus action and if you spell heal someone who is at 0hp you auto roll max.
Life rolls extra when they do heals.
Already have the wisdom score for it, too.
Did anyone else think of Full Metal Alchemist Edward when the Artificer subclass was announced? A slightly different take than an Indy steampunk. Electricity in old Leyden jars and microphones/radios use crystals. It's very grey area of magic/science. Alchemy was a good choice for the concept. Just needs a construct buddy and you have Alphonse the brother. took ROTC at the U and got the butter bar. I was also a medic/lab tech. kinda close to what my RL character would be.
One of my characters Arara does a similar thing, though less focused on healing specifically and more just general combat assistance/command. She's allergic to magic (that means no magic classes at all, in her case). If I get to play as her, if the DM would allow it, I would put a homebrew handicap that would make sense with her allergy - vulnerability to spell damage and resistance to spell healing, but also a constant non-magical effect the same as the Detect Magic spell (since it'd make sense that she'd feel it). Totally not meant to be a power character, lol. Her Thief subclassing comes from a non-criminal aspect - that of watchmaking. Figure it requires similar skills, explains the subclass. Small manipulation all the way - that also explaining her skill in surgery. Also a Banneret! And, also subclassed into the Tasha's sidekick class Warrior to stack the uses of that heal boost ability. AND, subclassed into the sidekick class Expert as well! Because it's very assist-y. AND... grabs a couple of battlemaster manoeuvres with a fighting style and a feat (the suboptimal Commander's Strike being particularly flavourful).
Sneakily enough since she can begin with one of those sidekick classes, I plan on updating the build to use a statblock rather than a race. Rubblebelt Stalker begins with a multiattack that does three attacks. Specifies a shortsword but hey, no reason why she shouldn't be using a shortsword huh? And fits well enough with her background, being an 'uplifted' (but still chaotic-aligned) tribal. Does leave her with only the one saving throw proficiency and some unideal hit dice (especially for a melee scrapper). Ah well, glass cannon frontline party healer it is! :)
Additionally built up lots of background for her. A wild elf, somewhat civilized by the tribe attaching a permanent camp to the side of a friendly wood elf city, to mutual benefit. Her watchmaking job as a young lass led her to be very good at paying attention to precise timing and attention to detail - especially of multiple mechanisms set off in a chain. From there, increasingly interested in physical activity via a discovered talent for contortionism, becomes an escape artist for the local entertainments. Then when the novelty of it dries up (as the place doesn't get a lot of tourist traffic), a cheerleader. Then when war loomed and a defense bolstering push was instigated, a drill sergeant. War came, and a combat medic. And finally as wars dwindled and peace returned, missing the excitement of battle, an adventurer-commander. Relentlessly (and annoyingly) chipper but equally able to be scary, haplessly full of herself but at the same time as completely self-sacrificing to protect others. Bit dim, except in terms of tactical strategy. She has to be able to visualize it in order to be able to then think it through.
Yes, completely inspired by Britney in that Daria paintball episode. :)
In my version of this character, I went with the Doctor/Lawyer/Beggarman/Thief concept (while yours is more of the Tinker/Tailor/Soldier/ Spy, but not quite). It was for a city campaign. For the lawyer part I'd taken persuasion, deception and history (ever rules lawyered the city guard? Woo! Hoo!!) and because of the decent charisma picked up inspiring leader at 4th (although, mobility might have been better (for me anyway)). With fast hands I had a lot of fun pickpocketing in combat, often going for useful things like spell component pouches or magic items. I'd had plans to multi-class battle master for disarm and riposte, but the campaign ended before I could get there.
This is a little similar to a character build I’ve been working on. But one difference is I’m not restricting myself to not healing with magic. My idea is:
Start with Artificer, he’s either the son or apprentice to an Alchemist, and go till lv 3. Use my infusions for replicate magic item and do Magic Tattoo. Using those for healing spells. Then Cleric till 3. But I’m torn between Life and Peace for my domain. The healing spell boost from Life is great, but the Channel Divinity to run around healing is appealing too. Anyway, then some Druid after that going for Circle of Stars and getting the healing boost from that.
But I like some of your ideas.
As a DM myself, I would allow the fast hands to work on the healer kits/packs/potions. They are objects and after hearing a interesting build that is outside the norm I would like to see how far it goes so long as I don't get any red flags. I am the type that does get into the rules a lot, but also like to add in flavor to the game and reward players for adding in their own flavor to the game as well.
49:45 indomitable can also be used for your death saving throws if need be
A very interesting build! I'd love to have seen Mercy monk in this, but I suppose that's a more "magical healing" and I get it. Very cool vid.
me, as soon as he mentioned second wind: oh no he's going purple dragon knight isn't he
He: goes purple dragon knight
me: ohhhhhhh my god
i mean honestly i love the build i'm just playing into the reputation
I love the effort you put into this. I would have used a Mercy Monk and skipped the Artificer. WOC cheaped out when they used spell casting to build the core features of the artificer… But they did so it is spell casting…
You say, "sometimes giving yourself artificial restrictions via a character concept I think can really help you get super invested into your character..."
I'd also hope that acknowledgement can be given to an at least optional sticking to the traditional restrictions of D&D races to that a foundation might be fostered for roleplay investment in cases where customisation creates divergences from norms.
Great stuff! Leaning into the Indiana Jones feeling, you could pick Thorn Whip as one of your Artificer cantrips.
whoa. banneret. hhaha. weird lost my initial comment so i'll just continue here.
liked seeing the fighter dip and the usage of action surge here just speaks how action surge can just fit into any build.
I love idea of this episode, and other kind of "conceptual" characters. As much as i'm fascinated by optimization and theoretical number crunching, when i'm creating character for real play usually put flavor over numbers. Thats type of self restrictions in character creation usually leads to interesting stories.
BTW for dpr purposes check out ranged battlesmith. Spellstoring item can be used by your Steel Defender, which means sharpshooter, crossbow expert, haste and adventage (from for example faerie fire) all together :)
On the list!
you can get that concept (offloading a level 1 concen accuracy booster spell like bless) online as early as level 2. haste though will indeed need spell storing item though i feel that's a very suboptimal use when your objective is dmg for one of the best abilities in the game. for example, i can deal 30d8 + 20d6 with spell storing item without using my own action economy at level 12+.
@@TheRobversion1 Yes, on the love love you can use farie fire and still deal quite good dmg. Thanks to 'reapeating weapon' and Steel Defender, which is quite good use of bonus action you can delay taking crossbow exper, so you can start with sharpshooter. Of course there are better options of using spellstoring item than your Steel Defender concentrating on faerie fire, but i think, it's quite efficient, you give adventage not only to yourself, but to whole party and also haste not only buffs your dpr, but movement and survivability. Of course there are some shenanigans, which you can play with right party composition, also there is animate object, which can replace haste, so probably there are better options, but this one is self dependet and sustainable and like It. BTW, which spells would you pack in spellstroring item to make it most efficient? And also on which spell would you concentrate by yourself?
@@pawefeszler9543 i didn't get "on the love love."
in terms of haste, this is the one i prefer offloading as it would be detrimental if it's on you and your concentration gets broken. i would indeed prefer animate objects but that comes on too late for an artificer imo. no one really plays tier 4.
also i wouldn't offload concentration on the steel defender. they are likely to get hit. well at least not until higher levels when it's a bit tougher like level 10 or 14. for earlier levels i'd offload concentration on the homunculus (which is ranged and can fly) and your familiar (pick a flying familiar). to illustrate infusions known and active wise (level 10-8 known, 4 active):
repeating shot
create homunculus
spellwrought tattoo: find familiar (known only)
spellwrought tattoo: bless (tattoo on familiar)
spellwrought tattoo: faerie fire, fog cloud or any other 1st level advantage generator (tattoo on homunculus)
remaining 3 infusions known can be spellwrought tattoo: situational spells like rituals or goodberry. so in what i stated above you could go:
action: cast a spell/attack
bonus action: command homunculus to cast the tattoo'd spell and fly
free action: command familiar to cast bless and fly
the tactics i had in mind were also self-dependent (i never factor party members in when it comes to combos or optimization). as far as what spell i'd concentrate on myself, that would depend if i multiclassed into another spellcasting class with spells i'd like. on the artificer spell list, there aren't alot and tbh i'd rather just save my action for attacking as most of the concentration options are generally defensive (like blur, expeditious retreat) or control (like levitate, web). if needed though then i'd probably pick a control spell.
as for which spells i'd use with spell storing item, that would also depend on the artificer subclass. simply for offensive purposes, assuming +5 int and not factoring artificer subclass spells: i like catapult. here's the combo.
artificer 11, caster class 2 (1 if you can rest trick or have items that restore level 3+ spell slots)
rest trick/use level 3 and 4 spell slots to create 10 tiny servants. give all of them an acid flask to carry (this can be different if you have alot of gold like inhaled/contact poisons). standing orders to cast the spell in the spell storing item at your target upon you uttering the command word then to pass the spell storing item to the next tiny servant). so give the spell storing item to one of them.
once in combat, indicate your target as the bbeg. each tiny servant will cast catapult with the acid flask. that's 3d8 + 2d6 if the bbeg fails their save. you have 10 tiny servants and 10 uses in the spell storing item so that's a potential 30d8 + 2d6 without touching your action economy.
if let's say i was an alchemist and i wanted to focus on sustained dmg and some area denial over the burst dmg of the catapult. i'd store flaming sphere. then the tiny servants can then be commanded to cast a wall of 10 flaming spheres around the bbeg, use their bonus actions to ram the flaming spheres into the bbeg for 20d6 dmg then trap the bbeg inside (while also handling the concentration for those 10 flaming spheres). if the bbeg can't get out the wall of flaming spheres (they occupy a space so the bbeg cant pass through without teleporting) at the end of the bbeg's turn they will take another 20d6.
so as you can see with this combo there are many ways you can go for absurd dmg + control/debuff if you want to (depending on subclass spells). if facing an army? spell store 10 shatters. you want assured no save dmg? spell store 10 magic missiles. then once the spell storing item is empty, you can use your bonus action the next turn to command your 10 tiny servants to go attack something.
Fun drinking game. Watch these videos and take a shot every time you hear "there's a feat we need" I feel like all the optimization builds are "take this feat and make it proc as often as possible"
Speaking of Knight ROTC, I would be curious how you would build an Front-line Commander or Teacher of a Knight school type character. Possibly one that would give inspiring Speeches before battle, Give commands to students/allies to attack in battle, buff their allies, and/or give allies knowledge to protect themselves from harm. Or perhaps, more of the Tactician of a battlefield.
This makes me wish they made a warlord class for 5th edition d&d. One of the most fun class I played in 4 edition d&d
My first thought would be order cleric dip with battlemaster. Then maybe paladin if you take Inspiring leader feat, to make use of your cha.
@@adamkaris My thoughts depending on how what level your campaign is going to is a Order Cleric/Divination Wiz/Artificer Hybrid.
Actually a build for maximizing Order Domain Cleric's Voice of Authority and other buffs to maximize another character's damage as well.
Could you make a build that primarily uses teleports? Maybe a Horizon Walker or the Far Step spell. Thx
I had in mind this character concept for a while, but didn't know how to make it work. Interesting build.
I would have chosen Battlemaster as the fighter archetype. The maneuvers would be helpful in protecting and inspiring allies.
Your channel inspired me to break dnd a bit more than I usually did in the past and finally start multiclassing I'm currently playing a one man army generalist twilight cleric and fey wanderer he can heal he can deal damage he can explore and is even competant at talking I would have never thought of this build if not for your channel thank you for that.
Awesome!
I have an Eberron character almost exactly this but I stayed alchemist after my 3 lvl rogue dip. Served as a combat medic for Aundair in the last war.
Reserve Officer Training Corps. Healing feat is quite powerful, and often overlooked
"Hello Neighbour"
!?
Critlander trying to get in on that Mr Rogers action??
As an alternative option, instead of sharpshooter feat you can take medium armor master, letting you thief in medium armor with the 16 dex and freeing up a couple asi for resilient or possibly +2 CHA and inspiring leader. You’re not a dps anyway, you’re the field officer whose job is to translate orders into a victory everyone walks away from.
I’m picturing Sgt. Maj. Plumley in We Were Soldiers.