I feel like a lot of people forget that the barbarian is alphabetically before the bard because of the sheer fact of word length. I don't know, it kind of bothers me sometimes
@@jonfavretto9848 I am well aware of the alphabet. I'm saying the length of the words is why people tend to put bard before barbarian. Because the word bard is shorter people's automatic reaction is to say it first. Alphabetically barbarian should be first, but because of the way human brains work most/many people feel impulsed to put bard first.
I've played a barbarian once in a one shot. The DM warned us he thought it'd be a TPK. And he handed us all pre-made characters to pick from (they were characters from a PC's backstory in the main campaign.) I just did not go down. It was incredible. And the DM changed a little bit of the story as a result; these NPCs lived. It was glorious.
It is brought up, thqt the barbarian is #2, and as a solo combatant, the barbarian is the best, but for making the team tankier, i aura of protection and the lv 10 aura making people immune to fear, and there are plenty of ways to make tanky paladins, especially against spells and other saving throw based effects.
@@lukasart3951 true, but this is a video about tank/defender role, barbarian, outside of bear totem since it is all encompassing, is great at it, and i understand why people like it for that role. I agree too with monty and kelly, paladin makes the party and not just themselves more resilient to damage and saving throw effects, something both fighter and barbarian typically struggle with if they are not con saves Edit: both also don't struggle with tank fallacy either which is why they are the top tier defenders
This reminds me of my last campaign: DM: "Congratulations, our campaign's two Paladins and one Fighter are gone. You're now our Front line combatant!!" Me, playing a Rogue who needs to protect a Cleric and a Wizard until we all retcon our characters to be more durable: "This...could...get...rough..."
I had a Tempest Cleric that was the tank for our party. The rest of the party were a Rogue, Wizard, and Sorcerer (none of whom had played before this campaign).
@@Starsaber222 This was my first campaign...at least the DM -- as ridden with self-doubt as she was -- knew how to build encounters with stock and homebrew characters!
I've front-lined very efficiently with a Cleric. If you "intend" to do it with a Rogue, Swashbuckler would be pretty sweet. Obviously none of you planned for that so you weren't built accordingly.
@@animorte9790 This exactly...I hadn't planned on seeing three fellow players -- our front-liners -- depart the campaign. Thankfully our DM let the Cleric take some War Domain levels in order to take the pressure off my Rogue!
As mentioned at the beginning of the video, you can indeed build an outlier class to fulfill the role you need, but it does come at costs. For example, a Tortle Bladesinger Wizard can take Tough and, with the right spell selection, can fight at the front lines right up there with the Barbarian, but don’t lean to far into it or else you’ll lose out on what the Wizard is designed to excel at.
@@benjaminwalker9369 To be fair, what was mentioned is that Bladesingers are a balancing act. If you build one too focused on the frontlines, then you'll lose out on the damage spells can do.
I think a big part of the reason Barbarians tend not to prioritize AC is because of Reckless Attack. Even more specifically because of the number of online creators who go around saying things like “since enemies have advantage against you anyway, there’s not a lot of point in boosting your AC.” Which is flawed logic and math, but I think a lot people buy into it.
@@unvoicedapollo3318 in fact, while the higher you stack your AC, the more effective each point becomes. At higher ACs, each point is more valuable to you than not would be to someone who doesn’t grant advantage.
I think more important is the fact that if you are in rage you have to either attack or take damage every round or your rage ends. So if you use your action for something else, like dash, you have to get hit, otherwise you wasted a rage.
@@punkrockviking you don’t have to do damage to maintain rage. You just have to make an attack or take damage. If you attack and miss you don’t lose your rage.
My experience with a Paladin definitely backs this up. They kind of have almost no faults as a front liner. Yeah, they might not be able to soak quite as much damage as a Barbarian, but you really appreciate it when they just let you shrug off that Hold Person or let your sorcerer fire Hypnotic Pattern into the front line with low risk. Their self healing also means they can stretch their health pretty long and help other allies. They also don't trade on power or versatility much to maintain their defenses since they don't need to constantly spend slots or whatever on shield or whatnot, although they can still take that and become even more tanky. Threatening to dish out nuclear damage on demand, even on opportunity attacks, also makes enemies have to respect your range and makes it more risky to try and sprint past you than other tanky classes.
@@yueffstueff6542 The aura in general is ridiculous. If you go more into spellcasting with like a Sorcerer Paladin build you can double down on concentration with like Warcaster and basically never fail too.
@@christopherjones7656 With support and backup to cover its weaknesses Barbarian is definitely the toughest of the lot. Paladin is a great supportive frontliner for a more melee focused party. I actually wanted to play that type of paladin but most of my group likes to play either ranged or squishy melee like Monk and Rogue. If you have to pick just one I'd go for Paladin usually, but with a duo I'd definitely take a Barbarian when focusing on defense. Fighters more varied options and higher burst damage is quite appealing for a more offensive formation though.
Gotta agree here - having DM-ed 5 sessions for lvl 20 parties, the difference between the parties that had a paladin and the one that didn’t was *massive*.
I have to disagree with Monty claiming the artificer not having defenses beyond AC. They have absorb elements AND flash of genius to shore up saving throws. Battlesmiths specifically if building to defend are immovable objects.
Exactly! Add to that the aspect of the frontliner role that requires them to protect their allies from attack. Artificers do that better than probably any other class.
Agreed on all points. It's the d8 hit die that kind of keeps it from reaching an S tier, but at the least it would be an A. Now if the Artificer got a d10 like a Paladin, easy S tier for me.
Speaking of Chris and Colby, next time you do a collab, please invite them to do an Untold Tale. I would just love to see those two in Drakkenheim. Please. Just please
Level 1-5 I was incredibly comfortable tanking as a barbarian (bear totem of course) due to huge hit points, decent AC, good dex save, the half-orc tenacity, and I was an obvious threat. The paladin was a solid off-tank the whole while, but at level six they pulled so far ahead of me because of their auras. To be fair, their aura also made me a better tank!
I am starting to realy really love paladin 6/7+barbarian 3, probably zealot - great thematically. Sure you cant concentrate on spells and your AC suffers as you need to dump dex in favor of charisma and cant use heavy armor anymore... but considering what you get in exchange, I really really love this combo. the damage is absolutely bonkers, tankiness aswell
I play in a party that started with an Arcane Trickster, a Wizard and my Hexblade Warlock. I had never played a hexblade so I wasn't aware of how much the class pushes you to the frontline. But because there were no other 'Tanks' in the party until recently, my character ended up having to BE the Frontline, not just survive it or be the Beatdown. As a character I had made her to be scared of death however, so this translated to a very interesting Roleplay result too. My character had to be very brave, for her party. With abilities/spells like Armor of Agathas, Mirror Image, Tomb of Levistus, and an AC of 21 while Dual weilding, she can take or negate a lot of damage. But it had to be very intentionally done and unlike Paladins or Clerics she has no way to help the other players if the damage gets through. So I gotta agee that Hexblades can be a really good front line, but not S tier persay.
I'm in a similar situation for my party. We have a Arcane Trickster, a Bard, a Blood Hunter, and my Hexblade, with my character being the only one built for melee. We're still relatively low level, but I ended up taking Fiendish Vigor for him, and that combined with S&B, scale, and the shield spell, it allows me a lot of durability in HP and AC that I can easily refresh between encounters. As someone that usually plays more frontline focused classes like Paladin, Fighter, and Barbarian, it definitely requires more deliberate building choices to make it work, but I enjoy the challenge and I find it surprisingly effective in the close quarter dungeons we usually find ourselves in. I'd give it a high B, similar to what Clerics got.
I'm also running a hexblade warlock as a Frontline in my current campaign. I use shadow blade and blur/darkness as my primary methods of attack, and run a shield with the shield master feat. At 5th level I'm running thirsting blade for the extra attack, with devils sight and agonizing blast. I've grown to love using darkness and shadowblade together. You give yourself advantage in every attack, and enemies disadvantage against you using that combo, just at the cost of your allies seeing and helping you which makes it somewhat situational
I once played an extremely niche sorcerer build with the draconic bloodline to create a semi-frontliner when every other party member was squishy af. With some tanky feats and the right spells, youd be surprised how tough you can make a sorcerer. But I agree sorcerer is D Tier
I think with A tier being defined as, 'selecting the correct subclass, and building the character the right way could make them S tier' definitely puts Cleric and Druid into A tier simply because the twilight cleric and moon druid exist.
@@hal3667 Exactly a moon druid at level two has the same hp than a fighter of the same level, that rolled max hp and has the tough feat and has a +5 in con (34 hp in total), by turning into a bear. And the druid also has their base hp to account for AND they can go into bear form twice a short rest. But if the druid really just wanted hp they can turn into a giant hyena which has 45 hp, assuming they have like 14 in their base form, and turn into the hyena twice they have 104 hp at LEVEL TWO
@@ShortySeconds2Mars As a tank, it will leave you with a good AC, and gives a resistance to fire and nonmagical weapon attacks depending on the level you plan on playing through. But outside of interposing yourself in front of your allies, you don't really have any options to help protect your party (unless you wanted to forego some of your AC bonus and give it to an ally instead). Putting that aside, a good AC is nice, it will help avoid a good amount of attacks, but occasionally you'll find yourself fighting against enemies who impose saves to hurt you instead. Which in that case your AC won't matter. But unless you have a DM who likes sending casters your way alot it isn't too often that happens. I would put the forge cleric specifically as a solid 'B' option. Though it wouldn't be too hard to convince me to say it was an 'A'.
Druids have a second subclass that can frontline! Spore :) Gets temp hp, raises a spore zombie for another thing to take aggro, has a bit of close quarters control. Very interesting and solid option imo
"Barbarians just won't die!" So true. I played a Bear Toten for my last campaign, and no matter what stupid reckless idea I had he walked away after the battle alive. xD
The only time I’ve come close to dying with my bear totem barbarian was when the rest of the party failed me-they left me to deal with multiple heavy enemies by myself because there was action in another room. The enemies dropped me from like 72 HP to 6 within a few rounds. Suffice to say I had a talk with my DM and the party about being supportive of each other. We got it all sorted and I’ve had a much better experience since. And my character didn’t die! 🎉
I just finished a year long campaign had a player playing a "bearbarian" I had her rolling death saves maybe 4-5 times in 50 Sessions hahaha I miss my "little" beast
It was so sweet that Kelly mentioned Wilhelm's struggle with the hydra... when the swashbuckler really gets a taste of what it's like to be on the front line. :)
I feel like rating subclasses that are made for fighting on the front line would be more useful than rating classes as a whole. I don't think people need to watch a video to know that a genie warlock or an evocation wizard aren't good front liners, but they may be curious about how the Blade Singer or the Hexblade might rate against the more traditional front liners.
I mean, yes, but that would me a MUCH messier and more convoluted list, multiplying the process by HOURS just by the number of subclasses. After all, they do like to also go into detail as to WHY they give such ranks. I think that is why they give special mentions to the ones that stand out in an otherwise lower-ranked class.
@@MagusDouken they could have just left out all the subclasses that aren't meant for the front line. Druids, wizards, and warlock only have 1 melee subclass, bards have 2, so it wouldn't have increased it by that much. Or, they could have just picked a single subclass for each class that they think might be the best one for the job and it would have been even less work.
I was about to make this exact comment, it's a nice idea, but I'd love to see the specific subclasses in a list of their own. The list is a little invalidated by categorizing the classes as a whole as it's more often the subclass that determines the role your character plays in the party, not necessarily the class.
While I agree I think this video is for new players who can't tell you the features of a genie warlock. You had this to a new player so they can focus in on what they want generally. Sure a bladesinger may be what the really wanted exactly, but it saves a lot of time.
@@chrism6315 I'm definitely with you in saying that this video is probably steered more towards beginners to d&d and I do feel like a good portrayal of the classes is on display here, however a concern may arise if a new player sees the overall list and thinks to themselves, 'I don't want to play a druid because I want to play a frontline character'. Usually they'd be correct, but this completely disregards how good the moon druid is in this example and a player might miss out on an experience playing the druid because of that rational.
I may have just missed this, but a huge tool in the Paladin kit is the Find Steed ability. Not only can that grant a paladin another (fragile) body, but Find Greater Steed has flying mounts. With XGtE, Paladins, have built-in permanent flying.
My DM allows my Ancients Paladin to summon a Giant Owl with Find Steed, or a Panther, a Black Bear, an Axe Beak (all CR 1/2 or lower). It has come in handy to have a flying mount, although the fact that some of the options are medium creatures is a bit iffy for riding
@@nicholascordero6600 My DM lets my Goliath paladin summon a valkyrie into the form of a giant snake to ride into battle, with proficiencies in four skills, darkvision, a scent based tracking feat, and a climbing and swimming speed. Problem is her max health is less than half my paladin’s, but then he gave us a masterwork saddle that imposes disadvantage on all attacks directed specifically at the snake while she’s being ridden.
Yeah I play an Artillerist and work as the backup Frontline character. With an AC of 24 (26 with fortified position) normally and the Shield spell, I don't generally have to worry too much about going down. I also took the Tough feat due to finding myself in those positions. There's a Bear Totem Barbarian that's the main Frontline, but they go off on their own and I have to step up to protect the Warlock, Sorcerer, and Cleric.
Currently playing a tortle twilight cleric in a game with 3 rogues, a wizard, and barbarian. I seem to always end up with aggro from the DM because while the barbarian is the meat shield, my dude is the one who is causing more problems on the frontline.
That's kind of a wild party with 3 rogues but I guess I can't blame your DM lol. Prioritizing the cleric in general is usually a good idea regardless of subclass, but only if the enemy you're up against is intelligent enough to realize the cleric can heal party members. Metagaming a pack of wolves to rush past the barbarian and gang up on the cleric is a bit unfair in my opinion.
@@snazzyfeathers To be fair they're bad at roguing. One is a swashbuckler rogue the insists on being ranged with a flintlock pistol. One forgets sneak attack always. The other just doesn't pay attention. This group will TPK soon enough. Almost did last time we played.
One point of note I would have liked to hear discussed: Armor of Agathys. I don't think it's enough of a buff spell to bring the Warlock out of D rank in this job but it is such a unique spell (or class feature since it's Warlock exclusive) in that it actively encourages you to be on the front line and take hits. Maybe something for another day?
9:50 Regarding bards as front-liners, they are excellent at fulfilling the role so long as they’re not the one actually doing it. They’re best polymorphing an ally into a Giant Ape to have THEM be the front-liner.
Clerics in heavy armor with a shield can just pop Spirit Guardians, go to the front lines, and take the dodge action. That deals consistent AoE damage, disrupts movement, makes them harder to hit (which is tough to begin with), and gives them advantage on Dex saving throws. You also have your bonus action for a Healing Word or to use the Telekinetic feat (if you have it) to push enemies into your zone of control.
Cleric B is just absurd. Just beause clerics CAN do a lot of other stuff, too, doesn't mean that they aren't the monsters they are as frontline fighter.
love this idea for the video. massive disagree with the ranger ngl. i dont think they're the best frontliner but i think they're an underrated option - they're a B at minimum. they get medium armor and shields, plus the defense fighting style. at level 1, you could very easily get an 18 AC as ranger, which is on par with other tank classes like fighters and paladins and they have the same hit dice as them. they're gonna have a decent wisdom save. they get access to healing spells like cure wounds and healing spirit and have a bunch of other spell options that can help like absorb elements, aid, entangle, ensnaring strike and summon beast. and this is all subclass agnostic. gloomstalkers get bonuses to wisdom saves, drakewardens and beastmasters get another body on the front line, and monster slayers also can be more survivable against supernatural threats. again, not comparable to a paladin, but i think if the ranger was the only front liner, it would be just fine.
@Pelinal Whitestrake personally, I don't think the ranger is the best option for a front liner, but I do think they should be a high B. For the issue that you bring up, have the ranger up front and your ranged dealers in the back. Cast spike growth behind you (as the ranger) and have the ranged dealers stand further than that. That way the monsters that do get passed you will be slowed and take damage
@Pelinal Whitestrake rangers have multiple control spells like ensuring strike, snare, grasping vines... on their spell list that can control and force enemies to stay and hang out with you. They can bring multiple beast buddy bodies to add and compound to the opertunity attacks you would receive as you try to pass through them. And most enemies can't move through a hostile creatures space meaning you can better body block and form a choke point better than most. They are probably the most sticky of all the martials and by your own logic probably the best tank when it comes to forcing an enemy to confront the front lines first. Not to mention you can send your animal companions or summons to chase after strays while you can still stay and hold the front lines.
I agree. Yes, they are not Paladins, but very similar!! Plus they get some spells like Entangle (which is similar to Web, A SECOND LEVEL TOP SPELL), Zephyr Strike, Ensnaring Strike, Healing spirit, Silence, Summon Beast, Conjure Animals, Revivify. So underrated.
I remember playing a frontliner Sorcerer. I was a draconic Sorcerer who took tough, and I had the most hitpoints and could have the highest AC with shield. Slowing things with Ray of Frost and Gust of Wind. There was a Pally in the party too. They went down before me.
@@JediNiyte I can't say for how they did, but I would say how I would do: High Con, High Charisma, Average Dex, Tough, Dwarf (Hill for more HP). Shield, Haste or Tasha's Otherworldly Guise, Absorb Elements to cover things other than fire. Everything else directed at battlefield control and your psionics (or both). Hill Dwarf + Draconic Sorc's features mechanically make your HP work as if you were a d10 hitdie class, effectively removing their main weakness of low HP. Tough adds another layer to this. While Haste or TOG is up, and if your dex is like +2, you got 17 base AC, goes up to 22 when you use shield, even if naked :v. the most brick shithouse sorc to ever live, without even considering potential magical items that can buff your AC, give you elemental resists and the like. You may also pick a base class with armor proficiency, then you multiclass, so you can ditch dex all together OR be equipped with a shield + DS's natural AC. Cleric works extremely effective for that if you're one of the heavy armor ones, you just need to put wis as third higher ability score instead of dex, AND gives you even more sustenance through cure wounds, for 1 level (2 levels also is good for channel divinity).
one thing you didn't mention about AC stacking as an Artificer is that (from personal experience at least) there can be a tendency for DM's to have enemies ignore super high AC targets to mid-range or low AC targets, obviously this can't happen in every scenario and they're especially great if you place yourself in a position to block off your allies from the enemies but it feels really bad when you're so armored up that enemies don't bother trying to hit you
Yeah, “the tank fallacy” can be a problem, but Armorer actually accounts for that quite nicely. When using the guardian armor, your thunder gauntlets cause a creature you hit to have disadvantage on attacks against any creature other than you.
My Eldritch Knight with blur + mirror image combo = unkillable monster. First cast blur, use action surge to cast mirror image and you have blurred illusions of yourself that are so hard to hit and if they get hit, they take damage instead of you. I love it!
Although, I LOVE the Paladin as a Front Liner, and knew where they'd be ranked. When I'm a Druid, I feel indistructable. Not only do you have the wild shape, there are other spells that also grant you boons of nature, you can give yourself big heal, the support from summons, but from the get go as soon as I could cast it, it was Polymorph. You mentioned that if others can recieve it, you can give it to them, but it's the whole package. I also go B tier for them when it's not Moon, but mostly because of their lack of overall hp and armor, but at high level, all druids are near unkillable.
I wish Kelly would've elaborated more on summons and pets for the Frontline. When heavily outnumbered, there's not much the paladin can do, but moon druids have an army at their disposal.
@@daniele4568 I like where your coming from but as much as l love my summoned creatures, I have to admit that summoning and using summoned monsters is not what the "Tank" role is. If another class can summon them for you as support, credit goes to support. At least I think that's how it works, we can go bug them on the discord server :P Moooonty!!! Keeeelly!
Cavalier/Bear with Sentinel can reliably lock down two melee enemies at a time. Obviously, there are some limitations, but it can be quite good. As for Ancestral Guardian, I’m working on a multiclass with Clockwork Soul that uses upcast Armour of Agathys that I think will do a great job of locking down one enemy while still putting out a ton of damage.
3:01 (Prediction) Can't wait for them to say Paladin is the best Front Liner. 25:29 Yep, saw it coming. That aura just makes you great at all of your saving throws on top of your heavy armor giving you top tier AC, to say nothing of how you can get the enemies attention by being able to threaten any back-liner with smites, so the enemy front liners want to keep on you. That said, Ranger is definitely capable of being a solid B. They have access to healing spells. Druidic warrior means they can get Shillelagh and make them less M.A.D., their D10 hit die, and many subclass abilities which can boost their damage without having to use concentration spells (basic Hunter, Horizon Walker [since you aren't casting spells every round] come chiefly to mind), and I could easily see them squeaking into the 'A' category. Regardless, they are, again, solid 'B's.
I mostly agree with Monty, but I gotta join Kelly on the Ranger ranking. My Ranger/Monk is a great front-liner, and I guarantee you very little of that is coming from the Monk half.
STRanger hunter Gith with medium armor and a shield has an AC that starts at 16+2=18 and this can be further buffed with the shield spell and a fighting style, add to that the lvl 7 multi attack defense, shield master for evation equivalence, absorb elements, aid and spellcasting to buff hp (with fey touched we can pilfer bless) and we should really be able to stay on the frontline about as well as any other class!
yeah let's keep this up. I like the concept of this video and would love to see the journey involved. the content you guys and everyone behind the scenes provide have been exceptionally helpful for me as a DM and player.
This is an excellent video! I would put Warlock at a C though; Hexblade is obviously part of that, but for me the differentiating question between C and D is "could you step up to the frontline in an emergency and hold out for a couple rounds." I played a Tome Pact Fiend Warlock in a very caster-heavy party where the closest thing we had to a true frontliner was a Life Cleric. Ordinarily I would be hanging back spamming Eldritch blast, but on occasions where a group of enemies needed to be blocked off, a squshier ally got surrounded, or we needed to set up Sneak Attack for the rogue, having studded leather (eventually upgraded to Elven Chain), decent hit points, and especially Armor of Agathys meant I could step up, use Shilelagh and Green Flame blade to deal solid damage, and then even yank an ally out of harm's way with Thunder Step if things got too heavy. Granted, I did pick up shield proficiency at one point, which helped a lot.
I can see them as high D low C. A lot of their subclasses have temp HP features, with the right invocations and spells they can probably swing it for a while with most of their subclasses.
I'm playing a half-elf Hexblade Warlock in a game and enjoying it immensely, probably my favorite character I've played and roleplayed so far. My current AC is only 16, but with Shadow of Moil and Armor of Agathys, it's difficult for anything to down me directly. And with Elven Accuracy, I get to crit more often than I should. I am planning to go with the GWM/PLM/Sentinel build after I got bored with sword and shield (my DM is letting me switch one of my feats with another or an ASI) and I'm looking forward to building my perfect HexScythe (reskinned glaive).
Isn't there a limiter that says that your hexblade weapon has to be a one- handed weapon or a weapon with the versatile property in order to use Charisma for the attack and damage rolls? I'm probably misremembering it, and if I am...it's time to start scheming. Mwahahaha
Why would you say that Artificers have a resilience gap, lacking certain saving throws? You could say that about any class. But Artificers get Flash of Genius, they can take the Armor of magical Strength infusion, and they have spells like Absorb Elements, Protection from Poison, Protection from Energy, etc.
Well, some classes have static saving throw bonuses like Paladin's aura and Artificer's Int save is one of the worst to naturally have. Flash of Genius is a solid saving throw defense, but fairly limited in supply if you want to do other things with it. While armorers can have a lot of solid defensive spells, their slots to use on said spells isn't that high so if they have to use it often because their natural resilience is deficient without the spells they will run out fast.
Magic initiate + a dip into wizard gets you shield. So if you're rolling an armorer with plate and shield+ enhanced defense and shield spell giving you a 26AC at level 3, you're almost untouchable. Not to mention the Thunder Gauntlet doing Thunder damage and giving disadvantage on hit. Chefs kiss
@@TheEmperorGulcasa Yes and No. With a 21 nat AC most shit isnt even coming close to triggering shield, making only the highest atk rolls threaten your spell slots. Combined with the fact that your damage dealing spells should be booming blade or GFB, both cantrips, you should always have a spell slot for shield.
Sad to see Monty still dissing Artificers... Nice, well thought out discussion - can't argue with any of your results. I always enjoy your back-and-forth method of talking about all things D&D.
i agree totally with Paladin being S. and i love this series, i want you to make videos for all roles, even outside combat ... PLEASE! BTW: i would never ever regret to be the frontliner with a forge domain dwarven cleric :P spirit guardians, and spiritual weapon. taking dodge as main action and even being able to use those "hit dice" during combat... is INSANE..
I designed a Half-elf (high elf varient) that used Booming Blade with Forge cleric. Tack on Spirit Guardians and Spiritual Weapon, and you get a spear wielder that explodes in people's faces. XD
You guys are incredible! Fascinating back and forth discussion about what it means to be a frontline character. One of the best videos on this channel and very helpful.
Your stories about the barbarian are the exact reason they are S tier for front liners. Plus they can deal massive amounts of damage. I have a level 17 zealot barbarian. Yes, flying enemies are a challenge until I found a Cape of Mountebank to teleport to them. Until then, our wizard would cast Fly on him and that weakness went away. As for movement, at level 6 they get an additional 10 feet of movement. That put me at 40 feet. With the Instinctive Pounce feature, when I rage I get to move up to half my movement as part of the bonus action. So that first turn I get 60 feet of movement. He's at 277 HP, plus there's very little that can actually kill him. You need to get him to drop his rage which can only be done by him choosing to or being unconscious. You would need sleep, PWK, or disintegrate to actually kill him while he's raging. He hits hard, doesn't take that much damage and if you pick the right feats you can mitigate the saving throws. I know you weren't bringing them down at all, but if you're looking at a tank, you're picking a barbarian. Paladins are equally as good.
@@fabiovarra3698 Beserker is immune to a lot of mind control, but even still the Barbarian front-line is so far in front of your allies that a lot of mind control isn't that bad. Fear is the biggest problem most of the time, which is why Aura of Courage single-handedly makes Paladin the best frontliner over all (even though in every party I've played it they are usually the first character to go down in combat).
I think your solutions to the weaknesses show why Barbarians are NOT S and are instead and A. The dudes seem to be basing this on the classes and subclasses as they come and not adding in magic items or support from others like having fly from the party wizard. Barbarians are phenomenal on the front line, but they just can’t compete with the Paladin and it’s all encompassing wall of defense.
@@Siennarchist Damage isn't a problem to a Zelot barbarian of that level, till he's raging he would not die, even if he get threed failed death saving throw or go -1000 hp.
S - Fighter A - Barbarian, Paladin B- Artificer, Cleric C- Bard, Druid, Monk, Ranger D-Rogue, Sorcerer, Warlock (could be C with right Hexblade), Wizard I know the guys swapped Fighter and Paladin from my list and I see why, especially since pure Paladin’s only feasible build is frontline while you can do ranged Fighter (by RAW). Just seen the Fighter subclasses do some crazy frontline stuff.
I don't have much actual experience in the game, with only a few characters getting any play. But I have to say I love my barbarian. Little halfling leaping into battle, ready to take on anything
Love this kind of video! Hope you keep doing them for other popular roles in the game. As someone who is playing a semi-frontliner Hexblade/Bladesinger multiclass- I definitely agree that it's more about surviving the frontline than BEING the frontline. There are a lot of times where I have my defensive measures and it's so much easier using eldritch blasts from a distance. That being said, having an effective 22 AC with disadvantage to being hit (blur) has been quite nice for the moments I've been up close and personal with the boss, and Armor of Agathys does a lot to help take and deal damage. But as you two mentioned in the video- these are survival tricks and I usually rely on our party's barbarian to take the aggro while I try to get the boss out of the way as fast as possible. I love the theory vs practicality when discussing these roles and it helps me recap/learn a lot about the game when I don't get to play as often as I'd like. I'm obsessed with the idea of playing a dodge-tank but can't help but notice how the idea that AC can only help so much is true.
I’m surprised ranger didn’t get two Bs or one A. Half plate and shield with def style can give you 20 AC and access to healing on a D10 hit die as a base class. So on par with a fighter in that regard Plus some subclasses grant access to teleporting and extra AC
Honestly, I was most surprised by the difference between Fighter and the other martials. Barbarian and Paladin are designed to be front-liners that's why their features are limited to melee attacks - they are your melee front line. However, all the other martials are about the same: Fighter d10 AC 18-20, vulnerable to elemental damage, vulnerable to saving throws, a little bit of healing. Ranger d10 AC 17-19, Absorb Elements to deal with elemental damage, ok saving throws, significant healing Rogue d8 AC ~17, Evasion to deal with elemental damage, vulnerable to saving throws, and Uncanny Dodge for 10-30 extra damage mitigation per combat, no healing, SAD so can make Con their #2 stat making them quite beefy. Monk d8 AC 18-20, Evasion to deal with elemental damage, Deflect Missiles and Stun to reduce incoming damage, no healing. If you MC your Rogue (or take a feat) to get Shield proficiency they can easily have comparable survivability to a Fighter. Ranger it depends on the build, they can choose Con over Wis as their #2 stat and thus have MORE survivability than a Fighter.
I love Rangers, currently playing an Eladrin Swarmkeeper, played a few Gloomstalkers. But, I agree with a lot of what they said and would give them a B- for the frontline. They don't gain the same ASI's as Fighters, don't excel with heavy armor or weapons, their spells lean more towards control/utility compared to Paladins. It's not that they can't be on the frontline, but they really don't excel there like they do as skirmishers. The one time I tried going to the front instead of hit and running, I got punished for it, severely.
@@brewdaly1873 A good Skirmisher should be able to survive a round or two on the frontline without issue. That's why the skirmishers have good defensive abilities.
@@brewdaly1873Heavy armour only gets you a +1 AC compared to light armour. STR+Heavy armour does not really make you an better AC tank than DEX+Light armour - it is a grand myth amongst the D&D world and I don't know where it came from. A melee hunter ranger can achieve similar AC & DPR to a melee fighter the only thing ranger is lacking is burst damage.
I was in a game where I was a Kensei Monk & the others were a Rogue, a celestial Warlock, & a Wizard. I spent a lot of time as a front liner. How did it go? Let's just say the DM considered banning the Dodge Action.
I've done that with various characters -- an abjuration wizard, a nature cleric, etc. However, there is one big problem with it... the enemies can simply ignore and walk around you. Unless you are fighting in a nice 5' hallway in most fights it is easy to just get around you. My nature cleric has PAM and sometimes she would take the dodge, move back (providing a disadvantage attack), the monster would close (AoE attack from PAM), and repeat. However, you need space and it typically one worked for a round or two before creatures moved on to easier targets. Still, it can be fun showing up at a random table and realizing you don't have a tank and some bard or abjuration wizard gets to feel what actually tanking a pair of hill giants feels like. That said, if you are missing a tank, you often have extra casters and can uses summoning, area control, ranged, etc. to reduce some of the need.
Great video, I really enjoyed it! I like your comment at the end about the exceptions to the rule. I'm currently playing a Pact of the Tome, Fiend Warlock; the rest of the party are a rogue, a cleric, and a bard. We've been fighting a lot of groups of enemies, and I've found myself planted toe to toe with enemies and staying there. (So much so that at level 3 I took Primal Savagery when I got my Book of Shadows, and took Shadow Blade as one of my spell picks.) I had every intention of being a ranged damage-dealer, and I still do, but... having some tools to go toe to toe is definitely proving to be a necessity in our group dynamic.
I am wondering if the progression of the frontline is the same across all the classes or are some more powered at lower levels, and less so at the mid and higher levels??
Frontline cleric build i used: Forge Domain, Loxodon, Flail and Shield no armor. Max con and wisdom, at 20 con with natural armor, and a shield your AC is 19 at level 4. Using your ability to put +1 on any one of your equipment, put it on your shield for a Flat 20 AC.
Playing a support Cleric1/Sorcerer X, and I've proven to be a very effective frontliner. Armor of Agathys, Aid, Shield of Faith, plus plate and a shield have been huge!
My ranger is the party's front liner in one game. He's doing pretty well. I'm playing a fey wanderer. First time I've ever tried playing a strength based ranger. Although the rest of the party is another ranger, a bladesinger wizard, a sorcerer, and a warlock.
Same with me. I am playing Minotaur Hunter, started with 17/8/16/8/15/8, took Heavily Armored at lvl 4, have defensive FS. My HPs are higher than Paladin's (he has 16 in CHA, 15 in CON), my AC is the same (he also has defensive FS), I have Absorb Elements, Multiattack Defense, I am in fact the primary frontliner, even with Paladin in the party.
I think if you give Bard a C then you also have to give that to Wizards and Sorcerers. Bards do get a d8 hit die, but wizards and sorcerers both get absorb elements, shield, mage armor, blur, mirror image amongst other spells. If you build for it you can take a hit or at least avoid some. At least as well as a bard can!
@@agilemind6241 yeah I was surprised they rated bard's better than the others since their spell list has way fewer front line type spells. At least warlocks get armor of agathys but bards don't have much of anything.
Also, they forget about the abjuration wizard which has a ward that protects their health by twice their wizard level + mod. Which also protects their concentration if the damage doesn't carry past the ward, and to make it even more ridiculous pick war caster and you may never drop concentration.
@@gandalftheantlion good point and while they made exceptions for one build that might be good, there's the abjuration and the bladesinger so you have two good subclasses for it.
Hi DDs. Great video. I voted 'Cleric' on your poll and here's why: (1) With the right subclass, a cleric can have AC as high as any martial class (Forge can even get to 21) (2) After a cleric casts its concentration spell (e.g. Bless, Spirit Guardians...) they can just dodge every turn so they are harder to hit than a martial with the same AC that has to attack each turn in order to be effective (3) With just a 1-level dip into sorcerer, wizard or hexblade they can get the Shield spell, making them even harder to hit So you end up with a character that casts a big concentration spell, then goes to man the frontlines. That character has an AC of 21 that can be upgraded to 26 with a shield spell, and is attacked at disadvantage because it's always dodging while that concentration spell is doing good work buffing allies, hindering monsters or deal AOE damage. That's S tier frontliner in my book. BTW the same reasoning is true for a Wizard/Sorcerer/Warlock that dips a level into cleric for the heavy armor, so maybe that's why some people gave Wizard top ranking...
I voted for wuzard, purely due to a very specific abjuration wizard tank build I saw that was practically immortal. As a base class though? Not particularly good.
on ranger you may want to look into hunter; you can get multi-attack (against hordes) at level 3, disadvantage on op attacks against you *or* a bump to AC once you get hit the first time at level 7, link spin attack at level 11, and spells like guardian of nature at late tier 3.
1:50 "That is often jokingly referred to as the tank" I mean, I guess jokingly could be used to describe it considering they aren't literally an M4 Sherman but it's quite a common phrase for the role of taking the most damage to save the rest of the party in many genres of gaming to the point its just the term, not really a joking phrase. But whatever, semantics.
My best front liners have been a College of Swords Bard, a Hexblade Warlock, and a Bladesinger Wizard, but yeah overall I can agree with your placement. I have also had success with a battle master fighter, but that was on the laurels of sentinel polearm master. Powerful tank, boring to play.
I play one of our group's front-line characters, an Inquisitive Rogue. Being able to use Insightful Fighting to force the ability to apply sneak attack damage with a bonus action, or use the flanking rules in conjunction with the Battle Master Fighter lets me pour on the damage. I can also use Cunning Action to let me move in, attack, then disengage with any remaining movement. Being a high-dexterity character and getting my hands on some pretty nice armor and items early on has me with an AC of 21. And recently hitting 5th level means if I do get hit I can use Uncanny Dodge to use a reaction to cut the damage in half.
I think the only issue I had was that there was a little too much of a focus on how much Hitpoints the character has, specifically between being a d10 and being a d8 hit die. Yes technically the cleric or artificer will have less hp than the paladin/fighter but on average that is a difference of 1 hit point per level Besides that minor disagreement I'd say this was pretty straightforward and there was no question in my mind that Paladin, Fighter, and Barbar where going to be reasonably high
I think you guys really missed the mark on artificers. The battle smith gets the steel defender, which means you have TWO frontliners & can impose disadvantage to attacks against other targets. Currently playing one in a campaign right now. My warforged battle smith character is really just two side-by-side robots with shields, and it is an absolute blast. Having a shield wall that uses the dodge action & deflect reaction every turn...it's just such incredible protection for the teammates on the back line. The battle smith is *at least* on par with paladins for frontline abilities. The paladins have the saving throws, but the battle smith comes with two frontliners. Real toss-up.
But you're looking at just one subclass. Try putting an alchemist, or even an artillerist, on the front lines and see how they do. That's why artificer was B instead of A.
@@bigdream_dreambig I can't imagine why I'd try doing that, that's just silly. My point is that battle smith is so good as a frontliner, that I'd argue that one subclass should take the entire S-tier over the entire paladin class.
@@Bergreen88 My point is that they didn't "miss the mark on artificers," as you assert. They're evaluating how much of a natural fit the class _as_ _a_ _whole_ is for each role. You saying that one particular subclass is especially good is completely irrelevant to their stated purpose.
@@bigdream_dreambig A-tier: "A class where some specific subclasses or builds may push them to the power level of an S-tier ranking." So by their own metrics this class falls into A-tier. Yet Monty gave it a B. That's what I'd call missing the mark. Obviously you're welcome to disagree, but I maintain my point regardless.
I like this concept and I think they do a good job with explaining their rankings. Though I think they should break down the scoring using a 3-5 Key things a class must do in that role, and then base the overall on how they did. So with front line I might do 1) Can project others in the party 2) Can endure sustained attacks 3) Can threaten and disrupt enemy movement
Moon druid is overrated for the front line. They are hard to kill, but that is about all they bring to that role. They do mediocre damage, and they can't use any special abilities that would make them a priority target. The enemy is just gonna skip you and kill the wizard instead. Controversial opinion: direct combat is one of the least compelling uses for wild shape.
17:54 I would say that also the spores druid should be getting attention, the way they can use the wildshape to get temp hp, which generally is more than what a CR 6 could be getting, make him a bit tanker than the rest, and later on he doesn't get criticaled by anything, nor can get some negative effects. Well you can become an elemental, yes, have good hp, can cast spells etc... With spores you can both conjure and control a bunch of zombies which are hard to kill generally. OK the spores has 1 and a half trash ability that you use once in a millennia, the second buff to this thing makes it actually interesting.
Yes, but it is also worth noting that it takes an action rather than a bonus action. So it is a significantly higher tax on the action economy than moon Druid wild shapes.
@@maybevoldemort8995 well they last for 10 minutes, so you can possibly set them up if you know you're gonna fight, so it is not as big of a problem as many think, also you have uses for your bonus action as a druid, but I'm not saying you're wrong, nor that spores is better than moon druid, but just that it should get a bit more mention than what he is getting (none) cause he can pack and whitstand a punch
@@The_mekboy_you_deserve I agree and I do love the spore Druid, but if there's a Paladin or a Barbarian in your party the Spore druid really doesn't make that big of an impact. It's easy to burn through the temp hp with AOE spells and attacks, and once it's gone you have to expend another wild shape to get them back. I think the Spores Druid could stand in as a Frontline if it comes down to it, but it's not screaming "hit me instead" like a Moon Druid turning into an elemental or some other terrifying creature.
You also need to be front lining to inflict your AOE spore thing. And however lame the zombies are, it's great flavor and they do make good throwaway shields
@@padmewan do not even consider the trash spore thing, it's useful only when you can detach it from you, there are way better reaction you can take, but this might come up once when you do not need anything else, literally, but when you detach it, every creature that moves there takes damage, although in a smaller area, but it's a free action. The range is 30ft. So you need to be particularly close to your enemies, and you can put it in a zombob you resurrect.
Great video, thanks! I am playing Dain Frostbeard the dwarf cleric from the lost mines of phandelver. I so agree with you on the cleric being able to stand there on the frontline, but not being able to be thé frontliner. I have to buff my friends, do some healing, try and do some magic to hinder the enemies, i have no time to be axe and board. And my friend Salazar the fighter is better at it. So i jump in front of our wizard and warlock when enemies pass Salazar, but i quite often hesitate to pass Salazar to the front.
My current party composition is Artificer Armorer (AC 21), Twilight Cleric (AC 18), Defender Paladin (AC 21), Ancestral Guardian Barbarian (AC 21) and Arcane Trickster Rogue (AC 18). It is unstoppable well oiled machine at level 6 tearing through OotA campaign. Even I am hyped to see what else they can do. And when it is not about battle but about surviving in Underdark they do as much as possible to survive. And that aura from paladin to boost all of their saves just do the trick helping all of them to survive.
@@julien1er why? They can survive only because of him and their ridiculous AC from level 3. Their food all gone after bag of holding was overloaded just after new player joined the group. But he has goodberries for extreme situations. And both holy men can cast moon beam. As I said it is a very strong party. I don't have to pull my punches and even give them custom legendary items. And still death always one step behind them
I have to agree across the board for this. I honestly think any pact of the blade warlock can push A tier with the right selection of spells, invocations, and feats - a blade-lock rocking darkness, devil's sight, and polearm mastery is frightfully good - but the basic framework of the class is "stand back and blast stuff."
This is so true it just that warlocks don’t really get good combat invocation unless it’s eldritch blast. Just image if fiendish vigor or armor of shadows scaled based on tier level
It very much depends on the tier of play. Warlocks have terrible AC, so once you reach Tier 3 even if the enemies have disadvantage (which isn't the case for a LOT of enemies vs Darkness) they're still going to be hitting you regularly.
29:43 this is the whole purpose of the Horde Breaker (HB) ability for Hunter Rangers. Most people misinterpret HB as a cruddy option for archer rangers - "why pick this when I could just take colossus slayer?" - but it's built from the ground up with melee rangers in mind, specifically dual-wielders, and you'd be astonished how much better that ability suddenly becomes. A 5th level Ranger with 4 attacks per turn from HB with its dexterity modifier added to every hit means even if you roll a 1 for damage on every attack, you're still doing a *minimum* of 20 damage - on 4 1's. Let that sink in for a moment. And that's not even factoring in spells like Hunter's Mark or Summon Beast that you can add in if you feel like it. It doesn't make the Ranger a tank but it does make it a fantastic slasher, shredding enemies on the frontline like it's nobody's business. Add in favoured enemy and you're cooking with gas
Great video guys! I DM a game with a Paladin and play in one with a Barbarian and my experience has always been that the Paladin does it a just a little bit better.
I never have play this game, but the video is very interesting, i like the dinamic of the analysis, in other words, is very good structured!!! You have my like!!!
Agree bard is a C. I do it anyway. Have a fantastic set of bonded items that sure help the build. Early fight, my bard will be up in the front lines flailing about with gusto. Healing word or mass healing word (magic secrets pick up) are used as a bonus action if party members need healing. Bonus action spell banishing smite (other lvl 10 MS pick up) is a nuke option if no one needs healing. Sure, mid fight and later the bard can back off and fill more of a utility roll. But there have been lots of times tiny sips of bonus action party healing amidst full DPS pressure are all it takes to melt an enemy. Super versatile and fun play style to me.
I agree about the point in the Druid section about battlefield control, support, etc being distinct from the tank/front liner role in that it isnt really the conversation thats being had, but I will say that a good battlefield control or support effect is virtually indistinguishable from proper tanking in terms of making the party extremely survivable
my brother played an armorer artificer in a level 8 one shot in which I told the party of 3 it was going to be all combat. once he got blur up with his base 22 ac giving everyone disadvantage to hit him, plus using thunder gauntlets to give creatures disadvantage to hit anyone but him, he became a walking fortress. factoring in flash of genius to help shore up some weaknesses as far as his or anyone's saving throws go, he was one tough S.O.B. to take down.
Bladesinger Wizard tip: Take the Resilient (Constitution) feat. Combined with the bonus from bladesong you can easily get a +9 to concentration checks, meaning you auto-succeed on all concentratiion checks below 22 damage. And even above that you still have great chances with that +9!
I'm having fun playing as a Rune Knight Hill Dwarf. Took the Tough feat at level 4 and I have a defensive fighting style so I got a 19 AC with 48hp at lvl 4 rn. The runes and giants might provides me with utility and also damage that I would want if I were to play a damage dealer fighter. Been tanking like 4 enemies ever since our 2nd dnd session and honestly been enjoying it
In my current campaign I'm playing a Oath of Vengeance Paladin, and with all my items my ac 24 and goes up to 28 with a potion of haste and shield of faith spell. Its amazing.
This was very fun. I hope we get to see the complete series. I got to say that I like the Idea of a tank character that's a small race. Makes it more memorable.
I totally agree with Monty for the druids. Also most summoning spells rely on concentration, yes you would have double the bodies, but if you're on the front line you're exposed to all the concentration checks of the case... yes you might be a bear, but it's still very risky. Overall nice job you guys and thanks for 1) the entertainment, 2) allowing me to talk about this stuff in the comment session.
I love the video and by the ranking rules used by the dungeons dudes they are absolutely correct in their rankings, but for those who want a more powerplay view, here are some things that i think: I would say that, on a specific view (by using multiclasses and a specific subclass), i thing the best frontliner you can biuld is a Sorcerer 1 | Twilight X, as you get acess to shield, absorb elements (and, maybe, silvery barbs with clockwork soul) for defensive spells, wisdom saves (and cons with resilient), you get spirit guardians to deal loads of damage and slow down creatures inside the area of the spell, you get acess to that insane channel divinity to help you and your allies take the damage, and you are a caster which can just concentrate on one spell and take the dodge action, and can even protect allies or self with sanctuary spell. Although it is not a full on 'tank', it is the greatest frontline to me, so powerful, so many tools, buffs with aid, buffs with channel divinity, deals loads of damage, stop enemies fron advancing, very high AC with armor and shield (both equip and spell), and lots more. Of course, a druid biuld can do even better for the frontliners (with summons and sheperd), but i don't think that the druid itself is the best frontliner!
I really like the idea for this video. Ranking classes and subclasses based on how they fit into roles, rather than simply the classes themselves.
I’ve been hoping for something along these lines for a long time from them
Its also better than ranking them based purely on damage, as anyone who has played knows that high damage numbers are a team effort.
agreed
Way more objective imo, agreed 👍🏽
Absolutely! I love the class rankings too, but this is a fantastic change up!
“Let’s go in alphabetical order”
*talks about bard before barbarian…*
Just picking!! Love y’all’s content!!
I feel like a lot of people forget that the barbarian is alphabetically before the bard because of the sheer fact of word length. I don't know, it kind of bothers me sometimes
I think they’re going by Canadian Alphabet.
@@Varizen87 that's the one with lots of "Eh"s 😁
@@Fury2580 no it’s because b comes before d. Barb, bard
@@jonfavretto9848 I am well aware of the alphabet. I'm saying the length of the words is why people tend to put bard before barbarian. Because the word bard is shorter people's automatic reaction is to say it first. Alphabetically barbarian should be first, but because of the way human brains work most/many people feel impulsed to put bard first.
Best frontliner= whichever poor NPC companion I made that my party leaves to die.😭
R.I.P Chadington the bulk
You will never be forgotten
Undead comeback is always a possibility.
@@TheHorribleCreature 😂 indeed that would be quite the reunion if he was out for revenge
Braaaains!
Next up is Chadicus, the older brother of Bradicus
@@trappyboi8678 Chadicus, who was in love with Chadiya the Duchess of Gainsville
I've played a barbarian once in a one shot. The DM warned us he thought it'd be a TPK. And he handed us all pre-made characters to pick from (they were characters from a PC's backstory in the main campaign.) I just did not go down. It was incredible. And the DM changed a little bit of the story as a result; these NPCs lived. It was glorious.
bear barb the OG from the playtest kit is unstoppable, especially if you have a healy cleric...
Yeah barbarians are S tier
It is brought up, thqt the barbarian is #2, and as a solo combatant, the barbarian is the best, but for making the team tankier, i aura of protection and the lv 10 aura making people immune to fear, and there are plenty of ways to make tanky paladins, especially against spells and other saving throw based effects.
Obviously spell casters are going to be able to do a whole lot more at high level. But sometimes a barbarian is the right tool for the job.
@@lukasart3951 true, but this is a video about tank/defender role, barbarian, outside of bear totem since it is all encompassing, is great at it, and i understand why people like it for that role. I agree too with monty and kelly, paladin makes the party and not just themselves more resilient to damage and saving throw effects, something both fighter and barbarian typically struggle with if they are not con saves
Edit: both also don't struggle with tank fallacy either which is why they are the top tier defenders
This reminds me of my last campaign:
DM: "Congratulations, our campaign's two Paladins and one Fighter are gone. You're now our Front line combatant!!"
Me, playing a Rogue who needs to protect a Cleric and a Wizard until we all retcon our characters to be more durable: "This...could...get...rough..."
I had a Tempest Cleric that was the tank for our party. The rest of the party were a Rogue, Wizard, and Sorcerer (none of whom had played before this campaign).
@@Starsaber222 This was my first campaign...at least the DM -- as ridden with self-doubt as she was -- knew how to build encounters with stock and homebrew characters!
Played a dwarf forge cleric 8/fighter 2 with a party of sorc/warlock, theif, wizard and bard.
I've front-lined very efficiently with a Cleric. If you "intend" to do it with a Rogue, Swashbuckler would be pretty sweet.
Obviously none of you planned for that so you weren't built accordingly.
@@animorte9790 This exactly...I hadn't planned on seeing three fellow players -- our front-liners -- depart the campaign. Thankfully our DM let the Cleric take some War Domain levels in order to take the pressure off my Rogue!
As mentioned at the beginning of the video, you can indeed build an outlier class to fulfill the role you need, but it does come at costs.
For example, a Tortle Bladesinger Wizard can take Tough and, with the right spell selection, can fight at the front lines right up there with the Barbarian, but don’t lean to far into it or else you’ll lose out on what the Wizard is designed to excel at.
Not at all, bladesingers on the front line is stupid good and still wizardy
@@benjaminwalker9369 To be fair, what was mentioned is that Bladesingers are a balancing act. If you build one too focused on the frontlines, then you'll lose out on the damage spells can do.
Abjuration hobgoblin!
I think a big part of the reason Barbarians tend not to prioritize AC is because of Reckless Attack. Even more specifically because of the number of online creators who go around saying things like “since enemies have advantage against you anyway, there’s not a lot of point in boosting your AC.” Which is flawed logic and math, but I think a lot people buy into it.
Exactly...just because they have advantage doesn't mean a high ac is useless
@@unvoicedapollo3318 in fact, while the higher you stack your AC, the more effective each point becomes. At higher ACs, each point is more valuable to you than not would be to someone who doesn’t grant advantage.
I think more important is the fact that if you are in rage you have to either attack or take damage every round or your rage ends. So if you use your action for something else, like dash, you have to get hit, otherwise you wasted a rage.
@@punkrockviking you don’t have to do damage to maintain rage. You just have to make an attack or take damage. If you attack and miss you don’t lose your rage.
@@theresnoracelikegnome I just saw that when I double checked the ability. Edited original comment.
My experience with a Paladin definitely backs this up. They kind of have almost no faults as a front liner. Yeah, they might not be able to soak quite as much damage as a Barbarian, but you really appreciate it when they just let you shrug off that Hold Person or let your sorcerer fire Hypnotic Pattern into the front line with low risk. Their self healing also means they can stretch their health pretty long and help other allies. They also don't trade on power or versatility much to maintain their defenses since they don't need to constantly spend slots or whatever on shield or whatnot, although they can still take that and become even more tanky. Threatening to dish out nuclear damage on demand, even on opportunity attacks, also makes enemies have to respect your range and makes it more risky to try and sprint past you than other tanky classes.
@@yueffstueff6542 The aura in general is ridiculous. If you go more into spellcasting with like a Sorcerer Paladin build you can double down on concentration with like Warcaster and basically never fail too.
The best front liner is a barbarian standing next to a paladin.
@@christopherjones7656 With support and backup to cover its weaknesses Barbarian is definitely the toughest of the lot. Paladin is a great supportive frontliner for a more melee focused party. I actually wanted to play that type of paladin but most of my group likes to play either ranged or squishy melee like Monk and Rogue. If you have to pick just one I'd go for Paladin usually, but with a duo I'd definitely take a Barbarian when focusing on defense. Fighters more varied options and higher burst damage is quite appealing for a more offensive formation though.
I see, a fellow hypnotic pattern enjoyer
Gotta agree here - having DM-ed 5 sessions for lvl 20 parties, the difference between the parties that had a paladin and the one that didn’t was *massive*.
I have to disagree with Monty claiming the artificer not having defenses beyond AC. They have absorb elements AND flash of genius to shore up saving throws. Battlesmiths specifically if building to defend are immovable objects.
Exactly! Add to that the aspect of the frontliner role that requires them to protect their allies from attack. Artificers do that better than probably any other class.
They also get Shield… And steel defender gives a enemy disadvantage once per turn
Agreed on all points. It's the d8 hit die that kind of keeps it from reaching an S tier, but at the least it would be an A. Now if the Artificer got a d10 like a Paladin, easy S tier for me.
Don't forget shield of faith giving a plus 2 to ac
All Artificers make a phenomenal front liner beyond the Alchemist, which lets them down. Should be an easy A.
The barbarian: is surrounded by every creature
the party: he'll be fine (internally freaking out)
the barbarian: i could use a little warm up today
Bard at back starts playing “Danger Zone”
Speaking of Chris and Colby, next time you do a collab, please invite them to do an Untold Tale. I would just love to see those two in Drakkenheim. Please. Just please
That would be incredible
YES PLEASE! Great idea.
100%
Yes yes yes!
@@Progen77 .o
Level 1-5 I was incredibly comfortable tanking as a barbarian (bear totem of course) due to huge hit points, decent AC, good dex save, the half-orc tenacity, and I was an obvious threat. The paladin was a solid off-tank the whole while, but at level six they pulled so far ahead of me because of their auras. To be fair, their aura also made me a better tank!
They call us Tiananmen the way we roll tanks
I am starting to realy really love paladin 6/7+barbarian 3, probably zealot - great thematically. Sure you cant concentrate on spells and your AC suffers as you need to dump dex in favor of charisma and cant use heavy armor anymore... but considering what you get in exchange, I really really love this combo. the damage is absolutely bonkers, tankiness aswell
I play in a party that started with an Arcane Trickster, a Wizard and my Hexblade Warlock. I had never played a hexblade so I wasn't aware of how much the class pushes you to the frontline. But because there were no other 'Tanks' in the party until recently, my character ended up having to BE the Frontline, not just survive it or be the Beatdown. As a character I had made her to be scared of death however, so this translated to a very interesting Roleplay result too. My character had to be very brave, for her party. With abilities/spells like Armor of Agathas, Mirror Image, Tomb of Levistus, and an AC of 21 while Dual weilding, she can take or negate a lot of damage. But it had to be very intentionally done and unlike Paladins or Clerics she has no way to help the other players if the damage gets through. So I gotta agee that Hexblades can be a really good front line, but not S tier persay.
I'm in a similar situation for my party. We have a Arcane Trickster, a Bard, a Blood Hunter, and my Hexblade, with my character being the only one built for melee. We're still relatively low level, but I ended up taking Fiendish Vigor for him, and that combined with S&B, scale, and the shield spell, it allows me a lot of durability in HP and AC that I can easily refresh between encounters. As someone that usually plays more frontline focused classes like Paladin, Fighter, and Barbarian, it definitely requires more deliberate building choices to make it work, but I enjoy the challenge and I find it surprisingly effective in the close quarter dungeons we usually find ourselves in. I'd give it a high B, similar to what Clerics got.
I'm also running a hexblade warlock as a Frontline in my current campaign. I use shadow blade and blur/darkness as my primary methods of attack, and run a shield with the shield master feat. At 5th level I'm running thirsting blade for the extra attack, with devils sight and agonizing blast. I've grown to love using darkness and shadowblade together. You give yourself advantage in every attack, and enemies disadvantage against you using that combo, just at the cost of your allies seeing and helping you which makes it somewhat situational
I once played an extremely niche sorcerer build with the draconic bloodline to create a semi-frontliner when every other party member was squishy af. With some tanky feats and the right spells, youd be surprised how tough you can make a sorcerer. But I agree sorcerer is D Tier
I think with A tier being defined as, 'selecting the correct subclass, and building the character the right way could make them S tier' definitely puts Cleric and Druid into A tier simply because the twilight cleric and moon druid exist.
Druid is also just pretty good at tanking early levels as wild shape gives free extra health pools
@@hal3667 Exactly a moon druid at level two has the same hp than a fighter of the same level, that rolled max hp and has the tough feat and has a +5 in con (34 hp in total), by turning into a bear. And the druid also has their base hp to account for AND they can go into bear form twice a short rest. But if the druid really just wanted hp they can turn into a giant hyena which has 45 hp, assuming they have like 14 in their base form, and turn into the hyena twice they have 104 hp at LEVEL TWO
@@charliescheirmann2926 don't forget that moon druids also heal while wild shaped by spending spell slots, giving them even greater HP pools.
thoughts on forge cleric?
@@ShortySeconds2Mars As a tank, it will leave you with a good AC, and gives a resistance to fire and nonmagical weapon attacks depending on the level you plan on playing through. But outside of interposing yourself in front of your allies, you don't really have any options to help protect your party (unless you wanted to forego some of your AC bonus and give it to an ally instead).
Putting that aside, a good AC is nice, it will help avoid a good amount of attacks, but occasionally you'll find yourself fighting against enemies who impose saves to hurt you instead. Which in that case your AC won't matter. But unless you have a DM who likes sending casters your way alot it isn't too often that happens.
I would put the forge cleric specifically as a solid 'B' option. Though it wouldn't be too hard to convince me to say it was an 'A'.
Druids have a second subclass that can frontline! Spore :)
Gets temp hp, raises a spore zombie for another thing to take aggro, has a bit of close quarters control. Very interesting and solid option imo
Yeah but subclasses don't count.
similar situation to the warlock's Undead
"Barbarians just won't die!"
So true. I played a Bear Toten for my last campaign, and no matter what stupid reckless idea I had he walked away after the battle alive. xD
I'm playing one now and my DM keeps forgetting that I take half damage from pretty much everything, not just piercing, slashing and bludgeoning.
The only time I’ve come close to dying with my bear totem barbarian was when the rest of the party failed me-they left me to deal with multiple heavy enemies by myself because there was action in another room. The enemies dropped me from like 72 HP to 6 within a few rounds. Suffice to say I had a talk with my DM and the party about being supportive of each other. We got it all sorted and I’ve had a much better experience since. And my character didn’t die! 🎉
@@catemiller2161 Got to love those resistances. You suffered over 120 hp damage, more than enough to down half a party, and still survived. ^^
I just finished a year long campaign had a player playing a "bearbarian" I had her rolling death saves maybe 4-5 times in 50 Sessions hahaha I miss my "little" beast
But somehow...Paladins...are S Tier...
Conquest Pally has that ice armor spell, combine that with a mount, and their ability to duplicate effects for said mount, and things get chilly.
Armor of Agathys in a Conq Pally is terrifying. "I can hurt you even when to dare touch me!"
It's especially good when you take a bunch of levels in Sorcerer for more spell slots and the ability to cast Armor of Agathys as a bonus action.
It was so sweet that Kelly mentioned Wilhelm's struggle with the hydra... when the swashbuckler really gets a taste of what it's like to be on the front line. :)
I feel like rating subclasses that are made for fighting on the front line would be more useful than rating classes as a whole. I don't think people need to watch a video to know that a genie warlock or an evocation wizard aren't good front liners, but they may be curious about how the Blade Singer or the Hexblade might rate against the more traditional front liners.
I mean, yes, but that would me a MUCH messier and more convoluted list, multiplying the process by HOURS just by the number of subclasses. After all, they do like to also go into detail as to WHY they give such ranks. I think that is why they give special mentions to the ones that stand out in an otherwise lower-ranked class.
@@MagusDouken they could have just left out all the subclasses that aren't meant for the front line. Druids, wizards, and warlock only have 1 melee subclass, bards have 2, so it wouldn't have increased it by that much.
Or, they could have just picked a single subclass for each class that they think might be the best one for the job and it would have been even less work.
I was about to make this exact comment, it's a nice idea, but I'd love to see the specific subclasses in a list of their own. The list is a little invalidated by categorizing the classes as a whole as it's more often the subclass that determines the role your character plays in the party, not necessarily the class.
While I agree I think this video is for new players who can't tell you the features of a genie warlock. You had this to a new player so they can focus in on what they want generally. Sure a bladesinger may be what the really wanted exactly, but it saves a lot of time.
@@chrism6315 I'm definitely with you in saying that this video is probably steered more towards beginners to d&d and I do feel like a good portrayal of the classes is on display here, however a concern may arise if a new player sees the overall list and thinks to themselves, 'I don't want to play a druid because I want to play a frontline character'. Usually they'd be correct, but this completely disregards how good the moon druid is in this example and a player might miss out on an experience playing the druid because of that rational.
I may have just missed this, but a huge tool in the Paladin kit is the Find Steed ability. Not only can that grant a paladin another (fragile) body, but Find Greater Steed has flying mounts.
With XGtE, Paladins, have built-in permanent flying.
Indeed, and even the regular steed helps out hugely with a paladin's mobility.
My DM allows my Ancients Paladin to summon a Giant Owl with Find Steed, or a Panther, a Black Bear, an Axe Beak (all CR 1/2 or lower). It has come in handy to have a flying mount, although the fact that some of the options are medium creatures is a bit iffy for riding
And even if the Paladin dies the mount remains
@@jw__11 my dm let my paladin summon a 12' tall chow chow as my steed
@@nicholascordero6600 My DM lets my Goliath paladin summon a valkyrie into the form of a giant snake to ride into battle, with proficiencies in four skills, darkvision, a scent based tracking feat, and a climbing and swimming speed. Problem is her max health is less than half my paladin’s, but then he gave us a masterwork saddle that imposes disadvantage on all attacks directed specifically at the snake while she’s being ridden.
Abjuration Wizard is surprisingly sturdy so I was a bit surprised it wasn't mentioned at all during the last section.
I play an Artillerist Artificer that excels at being a front-liner. That temporary hit point refreshing every single round is amazing.
That's pretty cool. I'm guessing you're spending your infusions on defense then?
@@LarsaXL One of them currently, yes. Enhanced Armor on a shield.
Yeah I play an Artillerist and work as the backup Frontline character. With an AC of 24 (26 with fortified position) normally and the Shield spell, I don't generally have to worry too much about going down. I also took the Tough feat due to finding myself in those positions. There's a Bear Totem Barbarian that's the main Frontline, but they go off on their own and I have to step up to protect the Warlock, Sorcerer, and Cleric.
@@aaronwhite1882 That's the ticket. Artillerist is a master at protecting allies, ergo fantastic front-liner
Currently playing a tortle twilight cleric in a game with 3 rogues, a wizard, and barbarian. I seem to always end up with aggro from the DM because while the barbarian is the meat shield, my dude is the one who is causing more problems on the frontline.
Twilight Cleric will always be a pain for any DM. It's a stellar class though.
I have two or three Tortles that I named after Renaissance artists. They are my Ninja Tortles. (Titian, Vincent, and I forget the other)
My DM likes to throw any type of "honorable combatant" or heavily armored foe in my Twilight Cleric's face too lol!
That's kind of a wild party with 3 rogues but I guess I can't blame your DM lol. Prioritizing the cleric in general is usually a good idea regardless of subclass, but only if the enemy you're up against is intelligent enough to realize the cleric can heal party members. Metagaming a pack of wolves to rush past the barbarian and gang up on the cleric is a bit unfair in my opinion.
@@snazzyfeathers To be fair they're bad at roguing. One is a swashbuckler rogue the insists on being ranged with a flintlock pistol. One forgets sneak attack always. The other just doesn't pay attention. This group will TPK soon enough. Almost did last time we played.
One point of note I would have liked to hear discussed: Armor of Agathys. I don't think it's enough of a buff spell to bring the Warlock out of D rank in this job but it is such a unique spell (or class feature since it's Warlock exclusive) in that it actively encourages you to be on the front line and take hits. Maybe something for another day?
God i love this spell
9:50
Regarding bards as front-liners, they are excellent at fulfilling the role so long as they’re not the one actually doing it. They’re best polymorphing an ally into a Giant Ape to have THEM be the front-liner.
Clerics in heavy armor with a shield can just pop Spirit Guardians, go to the front lines, and take the dodge action. That deals consistent AoE damage, disrupts movement, makes them harder to hit (which is tough to begin with), and gives them advantage on Dex saving throws. You also have your bonus action for a Healing Word or to use the Telekinetic feat (if you have it) to push enemies into your zone of control.
Cleric B is just absurd. Just beause clerics CAN do a lot of other stuff, too, doesn't mean that they aren't the monsters they are as frontline fighter.
Always excited for the dudes to upload
love this idea for the video. massive disagree with the ranger ngl. i dont think they're the best frontliner but i think they're an underrated option - they're a B at minimum. they get medium armor and shields, plus the defense fighting style. at level 1, you could very easily get an 18 AC as ranger, which is on par with other tank classes like fighters and paladins and they have the same hit dice as them. they're gonna have a decent wisdom save. they get access to healing spells like cure wounds and healing spirit and have a bunch of other spell options that can help like absorb elements, aid, entangle, ensnaring strike and summon beast. and this is all subclass agnostic. gloomstalkers get bonuses to wisdom saves, drakewardens and beastmasters get another body on the front line, and monster slayers also can be more survivable against supernatural threats. again, not comparable to a paladin, but i think if the ranger was the only front liner, it would be just fine.
x2
@Pelinal Whitestrake personally, I don't think the ranger is the best option for a front liner, but I do think they should be a high B. For the issue that you bring up, have the ranger up front and your ranged dealers in the back. Cast spike growth behind you (as the ranger) and have the ranged dealers stand further than that. That way the monsters that do get passed you will be slowed and take damage
@Pelinal Whitestrake rangers have multiple control spells like ensuring strike, snare, grasping vines... on their spell list that can control and force enemies to stay and hang out with you.
They can bring multiple beast buddy bodies to add and compound to the opertunity attacks you would receive as you try to pass through them.
And most enemies can't move through a hostile creatures space meaning you can better body block and form a choke point better than most.
They are probably the most sticky of all the martials and by your own logic probably the best tank when it comes to forcing an enemy to confront the front lines first.
Not to mention you can send your animal companions or summons to chase after strays while you can still stay and hold the front lines.
I agree. Yes, they are not Paladins, but very similar!! Plus they get some spells like Entangle (which is similar to Web, A SECOND LEVEL TOP SPELL), Zephyr Strike, Ensnaring Strike, Healing spirit, Silence, Summon Beast, Conjure Animals, Revivify. So underrated.
I remember playing a frontliner Sorcerer. I was a draconic Sorcerer who took tough, and I had the most hitpoints and could have the highest AC with shield. Slowing things with Ray of Frost and Gust of Wind. There was a Pally in the party too. They went down before me.
I assume you were Hill dwarf too, for the 2nd layer of Tough on top.
@@JediNiyte I can't say for how they did, but I would say how I would do: High Con, High Charisma, Average Dex, Tough, Dwarf (Hill for more HP). Shield, Haste or Tasha's Otherworldly Guise, Absorb Elements to cover things other than fire. Everything else directed at battlefield control and your psionics (or both).
Hill Dwarf + Draconic Sorc's features mechanically make your HP work as if you were a d10 hitdie class, effectively removing their main weakness of low HP. Tough adds another layer to this. While Haste or TOG is up, and if your dex is like +2, you got 17 base AC, goes up to 22 when you use shield, even if naked :v.
the most brick shithouse sorc to ever live, without even considering potential magical items that can buff your AC, give you elemental resists and the like. You may also pick a base class with armor proficiency, then you multiclass, so you can ditch dex all together OR be equipped with a shield + DS's natural AC. Cleric works extremely effective for that if you're one of the heavy armor ones, you just need to put wis as third higher ability score instead of dex, AND gives you even more sustenance through cure wounds, for 1 level (2 levels also is good for channel divinity).
one thing you didn't mention about AC stacking as an Artificer is that (from personal experience at least) there can be a tendency for DM's to have enemies ignore super high AC targets to mid-range or low AC targets, obviously this can't happen in every scenario and they're especially great if you place yourself in a position to block off your allies from the enemies but it feels really bad when you're so armored up that enemies don't bother trying to hit you
Yeah, “the tank fallacy” can be a problem, but Armorer actually accounts for that quite nicely. When using the guardian armor, your thunder gauntlets cause a creature you hit to have disadvantage on attacks against any creature other than you.
My Eldritch Knight with blur + mirror image combo = unkillable monster. First cast blur, use action surge to cast mirror image and you have blurred illusions of yourself that are so hard to hit and if they get hit, they take damage instead of you. I love it!
Although, I LOVE the Paladin as a Front Liner, and knew where they'd be ranked. When I'm a Druid, I feel indistructable. Not only do you have the wild shape, there are other spells that also grant you boons of nature, you can give yourself big heal, the support from summons, but from the get go as soon as I could cast it, it was Polymorph. You mentioned that if others can recieve it, you can give it to them, but it's the whole package. I also go B tier for them when it's not Moon, but mostly because of their lack of overall hp and armor, but at high level, all druids are near unkillable.
I wish Kelly would've elaborated more on summons and pets for the Frontline. When heavily outnumbered, there's not much the paladin can do, but moon druids have an army at their disposal.
@@daniele4568 I like where your coming from but as much as l love my summoned creatures, I have to admit that summoning and using summoned monsters is not what the "Tank" role is. If another class can summon them for you as support, credit goes to support. At least I think that's how it works, we can go bug them on the discord server :P Moooonty!!! Keeeelly!
I believe the best frontliner is a multiclass between barbarian and cavalier fighter. Ancestral guardian or bear totem tank extremely well.
Cavalier/Bear with Sentinel can reliably lock down two melee enemies at a time. Obviously, there are some limitations, but it can be quite good.
As for Ancestral Guardian, I’m working on a multiclass with Clockwork Soul that uses upcast Armour of Agathys that I think will do a great job of locking down one enemy while still putting out a ton of damage.
@@theresnoracelikegnome That would be super effective as a build.
3:01 (Prediction) Can't wait for them to say Paladin is the best Front Liner.
25:29 Yep, saw it coming. That aura just makes you great at all of your saving throws on top of your heavy armor giving you top tier AC, to say nothing of how you can get the enemies attention by being able to threaten any back-liner with smites, so the enemy front liners want to keep on you.
That said, Ranger is definitely capable of being a solid B. They have access to healing spells. Druidic warrior means they can get Shillelagh and make them less M.A.D., their D10 hit die, and many subclass abilities which can boost their damage without having to use concentration spells (basic Hunter, Horizon Walker [since you aren't casting spells every round] come chiefly to mind), and I could easily see them squeaking into the 'A' category. Regardless, they are, again, solid 'B's.
I mostly agree with Monty, but I gotta join Kelly on the Ranger ranking. My Ranger/Monk is a great front-liner, and I guarantee you very little of that is coming from the Monk half.
STRanger hunter Gith with medium armor and a shield has an AC that starts at 16+2=18 and this can be further buffed with the shield spell and a fighting style, add to that the lvl 7 multi attack defense, shield master for evation equivalence, absorb elements, aid and spellcasting to buff hp (with fey touched we can pilfer bless) and we should really be able to stay on the frontline about as well as any other class!
yeah let's keep this up. I like the concept of this video and would love to see the journey involved. the content you guys and everyone behind the scenes provide have been exceptionally helpful for me as a DM and player.
I love that you guys dont use over-hyped thumbnails. Thank you for that!
This is an excellent video! I would put Warlock at a C though; Hexblade is obviously part of that, but for me the differentiating question between C and D is "could you step up to the frontline in an emergency and hold out for a couple rounds." I played a Tome Pact Fiend Warlock in a very caster-heavy party where the closest thing we had to a true frontliner was a Life Cleric. Ordinarily I would be hanging back spamming Eldritch blast, but on occasions where a group of enemies needed to be blocked off, a squshier ally got surrounded, or we needed to set up Sneak Attack for the rogue, having studded leather (eventually upgraded to Elven Chain), decent hit points, and especially Armor of Agathys meant I could step up, use Shilelagh and Green Flame blade to deal solid damage, and then even yank an ally out of harm's way with Thunder Step if things got too heavy. Granted, I did pick up shield proficiency at one point, which helped a lot.
I can see them as high D low C. A lot of their subclasses have temp HP features, with the right invocations and spells they can probably swing it for a while with most of their subclasses.
I'm playing a half-elf Hexblade Warlock in a game and enjoying it immensely, probably my favorite character I've played and roleplayed so far. My current AC is only 16, but with Shadow of Moil and Armor of Agathys, it's difficult for anything to down me directly. And with Elven Accuracy, I get to crit more often than I should. I am planning to go with the GWM/PLM/Sentinel build after I got bored with sword and shield (my DM is letting me switch one of my feats with another or an ASI) and I'm looking forward to building my perfect HexScythe (reskinned glaive).
I am planning a HexBlard for my next campaign, which should be fun.
Isn't there a limiter that says that your hexblade weapon has to be a one- handed weapon or a weapon with the versatile property in order to use Charisma for the attack and damage rolls? I'm probably misremembering it, and if I am...it's time to start scheming. Mwahahaha
@@iselreads2908 Yeah, that's what Hex Warrior says. However, Pact of the Blade lifts that limitation.
@@lovelessissimo Oooh very nice! I think these guys did a Hexbard video that I definitely want to try later down the line.
This whole ranking series you guys do have been so helpful for me as a new player
Why would you say that Artificers have a resilience gap, lacking certain saving throws? You could say that about any class. But Artificers get Flash of Genius, they can take the Armor of magical Strength infusion, and they have spells like Absorb Elements, Protection from Poison, Protection from Energy, etc.
You can also have the concentration infusion and tank while holding big spells
Well, some classes have static saving throw bonuses like Paladin's aura and Artificer's Int save is one of the worst to naturally have. Flash of Genius is a solid saving throw defense, but fairly limited in supply if you want to do other things with it. While armorers can have a lot of solid defensive spells, their slots to use on said spells isn't that high so if they have to use it often because their natural resilience is deficient without the spells they will run out fast.
Magic initiate + a dip into wizard gets you shield. So if you're rolling an armorer with plate and shield+ enhanced defense and shield spell giving you a 26AC at level 3, you're almost untouchable.
Not to mention the Thunder Gauntlet doing Thunder damage and giving disadvantage on hit.
Chefs kiss
@@TheTrueNateHustle You will also eat through spell slots very fast casting shield constantly to do that.
@@TheEmperorGulcasa Yes and No. With a 21 nat AC most shit isnt even coming close to triggering shield, making only the highest atk rolls threaten your spell slots. Combined with the fact that your damage dealing spells should be booming blade or GFB, both cantrips, you should always have a spell slot for shield.
Sad to see Monty still dissing Artificers... Nice, well thought out discussion - can't argue with any of your results. I always enjoy your back-and-forth method of talking about all things D&D.
i agree totally with Paladin being S. and i love this series, i want you to make videos for all roles, even outside combat ... PLEASE!
BTW: i would never ever regret to be the frontliner with a forge domain dwarven cleric :P spirit guardians, and spiritual weapon. taking dodge as main action and even being able to use those "hit dice" during combat... is INSANE..
I designed a Half-elf (high elf varient) that used Booming Blade with Forge cleric. Tack on Spirit Guardians and Spiritual Weapon, and you get a spear wielder that explodes in people's faces. XD
You guys are incredible! Fascinating back and forth discussion about what it means to be a frontline character. One of the best videos on this channel and very helpful.
Thank you so much!
Your stories about the barbarian are the exact reason they are S tier for front liners. Plus they can deal massive amounts of damage. I have a level 17 zealot barbarian. Yes, flying enemies are a challenge until I found a Cape of Mountebank to teleport to them. Until then, our wizard would cast Fly on him and that weakness went away. As for movement, at level 6 they get an additional 10 feet of movement. That put me at 40 feet. With the Instinctive Pounce feature, when I rage I get to move up to half my movement as part of the bonus action. So that first turn I get 60 feet of movement. He's at 277 HP, plus there's very little that can actually kill him. You need to get him to drop his rage which can only be done by him choosing to or being unconscious. You would need sleep, PWK, or disintegrate to actually kill him while he's raging. He hits hard, doesn't take that much damage and if you pick the right feats you can mitigate the saving throws. I know you weren't bringing them down at all, but if you're looking at a tank, you're picking a barbarian. Paladins are equally as good.
I think your only problem would be mind control ability and spell, and well, mind flayer.
@@fabiovarra3698 Beserker is immune to a lot of mind control, but even still the Barbarian front-line is so far in front of your allies that a lot of mind control isn't that bad. Fear is the biggest problem most of the time, which is why Aura of Courage single-handedly makes Paladin the best frontliner over all (even though in every party I've played it they are usually the first character to go down in combat).
Hows that wisdom save looking, bucko.
Also good luck facing any damage type that isnt bludgeoning, piercing, or slashing
I think your solutions to the weaknesses show why Barbarians are NOT S and are instead and A. The dudes seem to be basing this on the classes and subclasses as they come and not adding in magic items or support from others like having fly from the party wizard. Barbarians are phenomenal on the front line, but they just can’t compete with the Paladin and it’s all encompassing wall of defense.
@@Siennarchist Damage isn't a problem to a Zelot barbarian of that level, till he's raging he would not die, even if he get threed failed death saving throw or go -1000 hp.
S - Fighter
A - Barbarian, Paladin
B- Artificer, Cleric
C- Bard, Druid, Monk, Ranger
D-Rogue, Sorcerer, Warlock (could be C with right Hexblade), Wizard
I know the guys swapped Fighter and Paladin from my list and I see why, especially since pure Paladin’s only feasible build is frontline while you can do ranged Fighter (by RAW). Just seen the Fighter subclasses do some crazy frontline stuff.
I don't have much actual experience in the game, with only a few characters getting any play. But I have to say I love my barbarian. Little halfling leaping into battle, ready to take on anything
Love this kind of video! Hope you keep doing them for other popular roles in the game. As someone who is playing a semi-frontliner Hexblade/Bladesinger multiclass- I definitely agree that it's more about surviving the frontline than BEING the frontline. There are a lot of times where I have my defensive measures and it's so much easier using eldritch blasts from a distance. That being said, having an effective 22 AC with disadvantage to being hit (blur) has been quite nice for the moments I've been up close and personal with the boss, and Armor of Agathys does a lot to help take and deal damage. But as you two mentioned in the video- these are survival tricks and I usually rely on our party's barbarian to take the aggro while I try to get the boss out of the way as fast as possible. I love the theory vs practicality when discussing these roles and it helps me recap/learn a lot about the game when I don't get to play as often as I'd like. I'm obsessed with the idea of playing a dodge-tank but can't help but notice how the idea that AC can only help so much is true.
I’m surprised ranger didn’t get two Bs or one A.
Half plate and shield with def style can give you 20 AC and access to healing on a D10 hit die as a base class. So on par with a fighter in that regard
Plus some subclasses grant access to teleporting and extra AC
Honestly, I was most surprised by the difference between Fighter and the other martials. Barbarian and Paladin are designed to be front-liners that's why their features are limited to melee attacks - they are your melee front line. However, all the other martials are about the same:
Fighter d10 AC 18-20, vulnerable to elemental damage, vulnerable to saving throws, a little bit of healing.
Ranger d10 AC 17-19, Absorb Elements to deal with elemental damage, ok saving throws, significant healing
Rogue d8 AC ~17, Evasion to deal with elemental damage, vulnerable to saving throws, and Uncanny Dodge for 10-30 extra damage mitigation per combat, no healing, SAD so can make Con their #2 stat making them quite beefy.
Monk d8 AC 18-20, Evasion to deal with elemental damage, Deflect Missiles and Stun to reduce incoming damage, no healing.
If you MC your Rogue (or take a feat) to get Shield proficiency they can easily have comparable survivability to a Fighter. Ranger it depends on the build, they can choose Con over Wis as their #2 stat and thus have MORE survivability than a Fighter.
I love Rangers, currently playing an Eladrin Swarmkeeper, played a few Gloomstalkers. But, I agree with a lot of what they said and would give them a B- for the frontline. They don't gain the same ASI's as Fighters, don't excel with heavy armor or weapons, their spells lean more towards control/utility compared to Paladins. It's not that they can't be on the frontline, but they really don't excel there like they do as skirmishers. The one time I tried going to the front instead of hit and running, I got punished for it, severely.
@@brewdaly1873 A good Skirmisher should be able to survive a round or two on the frontline without issue. That's why the skirmishers have good defensive abilities.
@@brewdaly1873Heavy armour only gets you a +1 AC compared to light armour. STR+Heavy armour does not really make you an better AC tank than DEX+Light armour - it is a grand myth amongst the D&D world and I don't know where it came from. A melee hunter ranger can achieve similar AC & DPR to a melee fighter the only thing ranger is lacking is burst damage.
@@brewdaly1873 Why don't they excel with Heavy Armour?
Love the idea and concept behind this video. You guys do such a phenomenal job with your videos and I'm glad to be a supporter of your channel.
I was in a game where I was a Kensei Monk & the others were a Rogue, a celestial Warlock, & a Wizard. I spent a lot of time as a front liner.
How did it go? Let's just say the DM considered banning the Dodge Action.
I've done that with various characters -- an abjuration wizard, a nature cleric, etc. However, there is one big problem with it... the enemies can simply ignore and walk around you. Unless you are fighting in a nice 5' hallway in most fights it is easy to just get around you. My nature cleric has PAM and sometimes she would take the dodge, move back (providing a disadvantage attack), the monster would close (AoE attack from PAM), and repeat. However, you need space and it typically one worked for a round or two before creatures moved on to easier targets.
Still, it can be fun showing up at a random table and realizing you don't have a tank and some bard or abjuration wizard gets to feel what actually tanking a pair of hill giants feels like. That said, if you are missing a tank, you often have extra casters and can uses summoning, area control, ranged, etc. to reduce some of the need.
Great video, I really enjoyed it!
I like your comment at the end about the exceptions to the rule. I'm currently playing a Pact of the Tome, Fiend Warlock; the rest of the party are a rogue, a cleric, and a bard. We've been fighting a lot of groups of enemies, and I've found myself planted toe to toe with enemies and staying there. (So much so that at level 3 I took Primal Savagery when I got my Book of Shadows, and took Shadow Blade as one of my spell picks.) I had every intention of being a ranged damage-dealer, and I still do, but... having some tools to go toe to toe is definitely proving to be a necessity in our group dynamic.
I am wondering if the progression of the frontline is the same across all the classes or are some more powered at lower levels, and less so at the mid and higher levels??
Frontline cleric build i used: Forge Domain, Loxodon, Flail and Shield no armor. Max con and wisdom, at 20 con with natural armor, and a shield your AC is 19 at level 4. Using your ability to put +1 on any one of your equipment, put it on your shield for a Flat 20 AC.
Playing a support Cleric1/Sorcerer X, and I've proven to be a very effective frontliner. Armor of Agathys, Aid, Shield of Faith, plus plate and a shield have been huge!
How have you accessed Armor of Agathys?
@@bigdream_dreambig clockwork soul gets it
@@dylanlally9485 Really? Where? I've never played or built a Clockwork Sorcerer, but I don't see Armor of Agathys in the Clockwork Spells table.
@@bigdream_dreambig Look up the Clockwork Magic lvl 1 feature. That'll explain it.
@@Deslaurasaurus Ah, there it is! Swap-out for a level-1 abjuration spell. Thanks! 👍
My ranger is the party's front liner in one game. He's doing pretty well. I'm playing a fey wanderer. First time I've ever tried playing a strength based ranger. Although the rest of the party is another ranger, a bladesinger wizard, a sorcerer, and a warlock.
Same with me. I am playing Minotaur Hunter, started with 17/8/16/8/15/8, took Heavily Armored at lvl 4, have defensive FS. My HPs are higher than Paladin's (he has 16 in CHA, 15 in CON), my AC is the same (he also has defensive FS), I have Absorb Elements, Multiattack Defense, I am in fact the primary frontliner, even with Paladin in the party.
I think if you give Bard a C then you also have to give that to Wizards and Sorcerers. Bards do get a d8 hit die, but wizards and sorcerers both get absorb elements, shield, mage armor, blur, mirror image amongst other spells. If you build for it you can take a hit or at least avoid some. At least as well as a bard can!
Agreed! Bard and Warlock are by far the worst frontliners in the game.
@@agilemind6241 yeah I was surprised they rated bard's better than the others since their spell list has way fewer front line type spells. At least warlocks get armor of agathys but bards don't have much of anything.
Also, they forget about the abjuration wizard which has a ward that protects their health by twice their wizard level + mod. Which also protects their concentration if the damage doesn't carry past the ward, and to make it even more ridiculous pick war caster and you may never drop concentration.
@@gandalftheantlion good point and while they made exceptions for one build that might be good, there's the abjuration and the bladesinger so you have two good subclasses for it.
Hi DDs. Great video. I voted 'Cleric' on your poll and here's why:
(1) With the right subclass, a cleric can have AC as high as any martial class (Forge can even get to 21)
(2) After a cleric casts its concentration spell (e.g. Bless, Spirit Guardians...) they can just dodge every turn so they are harder to hit than a martial with the same AC that has to attack each turn in order to be effective
(3) With just a 1-level dip into sorcerer, wizard or hexblade they can get the Shield spell, making them even harder to hit
So you end up with a character that casts a big concentration spell, then goes to man the frontlines. That character has an AC of 21 that can be upgraded to 26 with a shield spell, and is attacked at disadvantage because it's always dodging while that concentration spell is doing good work buffing allies, hindering monsters or deal AOE damage. That's S tier frontliner in my book.
BTW the same reasoning is true for a Wizard/Sorcerer/Warlock that dips a level into cleric for the heavy armor, so maybe that's why some people gave Wizard top ranking...
Curious how you would rank the Shepard druid for front line with its ability to create a front wall of meatshields.
36:00 more like because of the hexblade, the fiend, the undead, and sometimes literally anyone else with blade burst
I voted for wuzard, purely due to a very specific abjuration wizard tank build I saw that was practically immortal. As a base class though? Not particularly good.
D4 deep dive? Or Treantmonk?
@@benjaminwalker9369 d4 deep dive
Great idea! Loved the breakdown as well dudes, thanks for the content. Looking forward to the next ones in the series!
I like a dex based fighter, the goblin is great. You can use stealth, can make dex saves and you only lose one point of AC
You also have to spend a lot less gold to get your AC up
on ranger you may want to look into hunter; you can get multi-attack (against hordes) at level 3, disadvantage on op attacks against you *or* a bump to AC once you get hit the first time at level 7, link spin attack at level 11, and spells like guardian of nature at late tier 3.
1:50 "That is often jokingly referred to as the tank"
I mean, I guess jokingly could be used to describe it considering they aren't literally an M4 Sherman but it's quite a common phrase for the role of taking the most damage to save the rest of the party in many genres of gaming to the point its just the term, not really a joking phrase. But whatever, semantics.
However you can be a quite-literal tank when going Centaur Artifcer Artillerist. Put your Cannon on your back and roam around the battlefield xD
Agreed
Echo knight with totem of the bear barbarian multi class is pretty fun as a front liner
My best front liners have been a College of Swords Bard, a Hexblade Warlock, and a Bladesinger Wizard, but yeah overall I can agree with your placement.
I have also had success with a battle master fighter, but that was on the laurels of sentinel polearm master. Powerful tank, boring to play.
If you can get fancy with a gish I can see those being excellent at frontlining.
I play one of our group's front-line characters, an Inquisitive Rogue.
Being able to use Insightful Fighting to force the ability to apply sneak attack damage with a bonus action, or use the flanking rules in conjunction with the Battle Master Fighter lets me pour on the damage.
I can also use Cunning Action to let me move in, attack, then disengage with any remaining movement.
Being a high-dexterity character and getting my hands on some pretty nice armor and items early on has me with an AC of 21.
And recently hitting 5th level means if I do get hit I can use Uncanny Dodge to use a reaction to cut the damage in half.
I think the only issue I had was that there was a little too much of a focus on how much Hitpoints the character has, specifically between being a d10 and being a d8 hit die. Yes technically the cleric or artificer will have less hp than the paladin/fighter but on average that is a difference of 1 hit point per level
Besides that minor disagreement I'd say this was pretty straightforward and there was no question in my mind that Paladin, Fighter, and Barbar where going to be reasonably high
Add to that the fact that two artificer subclasses can use INT to attack, so they can raise CON more to make up the difference.
Thank you so much for this series. It re-clarifies some things for experienced players as well as gives a great guide for newer players. Kudos!
come on fellas, there's a difference between "role" and "roll"
I appreciate that you explained what you meant by the rankings at the beginning...
I think you guys really missed the mark on artificers. The battle smith gets the steel defender, which means you have TWO frontliners & can impose disadvantage to attacks against other targets.
Currently playing one in a campaign right now. My warforged battle smith character is really just two side-by-side robots with shields, and it is an absolute blast. Having a shield wall that uses the dodge action & deflect reaction every turn...it's just such incredible protection for the teammates on the back line.
The battle smith is *at least* on par with paladins for frontline abilities. The paladins have the saving throws, but the battle smith comes with two frontliners. Real toss-up.
But you're looking at just one subclass. Try putting an alchemist, or even an artillerist, on the front lines and see how they do. That's why artificer was B instead of A.
@@bigdream_dreambig I can't imagine why I'd try doing that, that's just silly. My point is that battle smith is so good as a frontliner, that I'd argue that one subclass should take the entire S-tier over the entire paladin class.
@@Bergreen88 My point is that they didn't "miss the mark on artificers," as you assert. They're evaluating how much of a natural fit the class _as_ _a_ _whole_ is for each role. You saying that one particular subclass is especially good is completely irrelevant to their stated purpose.
@@bigdream_dreambig A-tier: "A class where some specific subclasses or builds may push them to the power level of an S-tier ranking." So by their own metrics this class falls into A-tier. Yet Monty gave it a B. That's what I'd call missing the mark. Obviously you're welcome to disagree, but I maintain my point regardless.
@@Bergreen88 I now understand your argument. Thank you.
I like this concept and I think they do a good job with explaining their rankings. Though I think they should break down the scoring using a 3-5 Key things a class must do in that role, and then base the overall on how they did.
So with front line I might do
1) Can project others in the party
2) Can endure sustained attacks
3) Can threaten and disrupt enemy movement
Moon druid is overrated for the front line. They are hard to kill, but that is about all they bring to that role. They do mediocre damage, and they can't use any special abilities that would make them a priority target. The enemy is just gonna skip you and kill the wizard instead. Controversial opinion: direct combat is one of the least compelling uses for wild shape.
17:54 I would say that also the spores druid should be getting attention, the way they can use the wildshape to get temp hp, which generally is more than what a CR 6 could be getting, make him a bit tanker than the rest, and later on he doesn't get criticaled by anything, nor can get some negative effects.
Well you can become an elemental, yes, have good hp, can cast spells etc...
With spores you can both conjure and control a bunch of zombies which are hard to kill generally.
OK the spores has 1 and a half trash ability that you use once in a millennia, the second buff to this thing makes it actually interesting.
Yes, but it is also worth noting that it takes an action rather than a bonus action. So it is a significantly higher tax on the action economy than moon Druid wild shapes.
@@maybevoldemort8995 well they last for 10 minutes, so you can possibly set them up if you know you're gonna fight, so it is not as big of a problem as many think, also you have uses for your bonus action as a druid, but I'm not saying you're wrong, nor that spores is better than moon druid, but just that it should get a bit more mention than what he is getting (none) cause he can pack and whitstand a punch
@@The_mekboy_you_deserve I agree and I do love the spore Druid, but if there's a Paladin or a Barbarian in your party the Spore druid really doesn't make that big of an impact. It's easy to burn through the temp hp with AOE spells and attacks, and once it's gone you have to expend another wild shape to get them back. I think the Spores Druid could stand in as a Frontline if it comes down to it, but it's not screaming "hit me instead" like a Moon Druid turning into an elemental or some other terrifying creature.
You also need to be front lining to inflict your AOE spore thing. And however lame the zombies are, it's great flavor and they do make good throwaway shields
@@padmewan do not even consider the trash spore thing, it's useful only when you can detach it from you, there are way better reaction you can take, but this might come up once when you do not need anything else, literally, but when you detach it, every creature that moves there takes damage, although in a smaller area, but it's a free action.
The range is 30ft. So you need to be particularly close to your enemies, and you can put it in a zombob you resurrect.
Great video, thanks!
I am playing Dain Frostbeard the dwarf cleric from the lost mines of phandelver.
I so agree with you on the cleric being able to stand there on the frontline, but not being able to be thé frontliner.
I have to buff my friends, do some healing, try and do some magic to hinder the enemies, i have no time to be axe and board.
And my friend Salazar the fighter is better at it.
So i jump in front of our wizard and warlock when enemies pass Salazar, but i quite often hesitate to pass Salazar to the front.
Excellent way of comparison all classes together
My current party composition is Artificer Armorer (AC 21), Twilight Cleric (AC 18), Defender Paladin (AC 21), Ancestral Guardian Barbarian (AC 21) and Arcane Trickster Rogue (AC 18). It is unstoppable well oiled machine at level 6 tearing through OotA campaign. Even I am hyped to see what else they can do. And when it is not about battle but about surviving in Underdark they do as much as possible to survive. And that aura from paladin to boost all of their saves just do the trick helping all of them to survive.
Jesus, you allowed Twilight cleric in an OotA campaign? Bold move
@@julien1er why? They can survive only because of him and their ridiculous AC from level 3. Their food all gone after bag of holding was overloaded just after new player joined the group. But he has goodberries for extreme situations. And both holy men can cast moon beam. As I said it is a very strong party. I don't have to pull my punches and even give them custom legendary items. And still death always one step behind them
I have to agree across the board for this. I honestly think any pact of the blade warlock can push A tier with the right selection of spells, invocations, and feats - a blade-lock rocking darkness, devil's sight, and polearm mastery is frightfully good - but the basic framework of the class is "stand back and blast stuff."
This is so true it just that warlocks don’t really get good combat invocation unless it’s eldritch blast. Just image if fiendish vigor or armor of shadows scaled based on tier level
It very much depends on the tier of play. Warlocks have terrible AC, so once you reach Tier 3 even if the enemies have disadvantage (which isn't the case for a LOT of enemies vs Darkness) they're still going to be hitting you regularly.
29:43 this is the whole purpose of the Horde Breaker (HB) ability for Hunter Rangers. Most people misinterpret HB as a cruddy option for archer rangers - "why pick this when I could just take colossus slayer?" - but it's built from the ground up with melee rangers in mind, specifically dual-wielders, and you'd be astonished how much better that ability suddenly becomes. A 5th level Ranger with 4 attacks per turn from HB with its dexterity modifier added to every hit means even if you roll a 1 for damage on every attack, you're still doing a *minimum* of 20 damage - on 4 1's. Let that sink in for a moment. And that's not even factoring in spells like Hunter's Mark or Summon Beast that you can add in if you feel like it. It doesn't make the Ranger a tank but it does make it a fantastic slasher, shredding enemies on the frontline like it's nobody's business. Add in favoured enemy and you're cooking with gas
Fantastic! What a great concept for a teir ranking series!
Great video guys! I DM a game with a Paladin and play in one with a Barbarian and my experience has always been that the Paladin does it a just a little bit better.
I never have play this game, but the video is very interesting, i like the dinamic of the analysis, in other words, is very good structured!!! You have my like!!!
Agree bard is a C. I do it anyway. Have a fantastic set of bonded items that sure help the build.
Early fight, my bard will be up in the front lines flailing about with gusto. Healing word or mass healing word (magic secrets pick up) are used as a bonus action if party members need healing. Bonus action spell banishing smite (other lvl 10 MS pick up) is a nuke option if no one needs healing.
Sure, mid fight and later the bard can back off and fill more of a utility roll. But there have been lots of times tiny sips of bonus action party healing amidst full DPS pressure are all it takes to melt an enemy. Super versatile and fun play style to me.
I agree about the point in the Druid section about battlefield control, support, etc being distinct from the tank/front liner role in that it isnt really the conversation thats being had, but I will say that a good battlefield control or support effect is virtually indistinguishable from proper tanking in terms of making the party extremely survivable
my brother played an armorer artificer in a level 8 one shot in which I told the party of 3 it was going to be all combat. once he got blur up with his base 22 ac giving everyone disadvantage to hit him, plus using thunder gauntlets to give creatures disadvantage to hit anyone but him, he became a walking fortress. factoring in flash of genius to help shore up some weaknesses as far as his or anyone's saving throws go, he was one tough S.O.B. to take down.
My current character is an Armorer with 2 level dip in War Wizard. Best tank I've played and he has an answer for everything the DM throws at him.
Great video. I'm playing a barbarian, going the Totem Path, when raging being resistent to all but psychic damage. It drives my DM nuts.
Great analysis, thanks! I'm about to join a campaign where I'll be the only frontliner so this was super helpful.
Bladesinger Wizard tip: Take the Resilient (Constitution) feat. Combined with the bonus from bladesong you can easily get a +9 to concentration checks, meaning you auto-succeed on all concentratiion checks below 22 damage. And even above that you still have great chances with that +9!
The amount of hours that I’ve sat and watched Monty and Kelly discuss dnd is getting to an alarming number. But I like it.
I'm having fun playing as a Rune Knight Hill Dwarf. Took the Tough feat at level 4 and I have a defensive fighting style so I got a 19 AC with 48hp at lvl 4 rn. The runes and giants might provides me with utility and also damage that I would want if I were to play a damage dealer fighter. Been tanking like 4 enemies ever since our 2nd dnd session and honestly been enjoying it
Really enjoyed this video, can't wait for the other party roles. Thanks my dudes
In my current campaign I'm playing a Oath of Vengeance Paladin, and with all my items my ac 24 and goes up to 28 with a potion of haste and shield of faith spell. Its amazing.
This was very fun. I hope we get to see the complete series.
I got to say that I like the Idea of a tank character that's a small race. Makes it more memorable.
Currently playing a Fairy Hex/Sword Bard, who keeps getting onto the front line. Having a blast with it
I totally agree with Monty for the druids. Also most summoning spells rely on concentration, yes you would have double the bodies, but if you're on the front line you're exposed to all the concentration checks of the case... yes you might be a bear, but it's still very risky. Overall nice job you guys and thanks for 1) the entertainment, 2) allowing me to talk about this stuff in the comment session.
I love the video and by the ranking rules used by the dungeons dudes they are absolutely correct in their rankings, but for those who want a more powerplay view, here are some things that i think:
I would say that, on a specific view (by using multiclasses and a specific subclass), i thing the best frontliner you can biuld is a Sorcerer 1 | Twilight X, as you get acess to shield, absorb elements (and, maybe, silvery barbs with clockwork soul) for defensive spells, wisdom saves (and cons with resilient), you get spirit guardians to deal loads of damage and slow down creatures inside the area of the spell, you get acess to that insane channel divinity to help you and your allies take the damage, and you are a caster which can just concentrate on one spell and take the dodge action, and can even protect allies or self with sanctuary spell. Although it is not a full on 'tank', it is the greatest frontline to me, so powerful, so many tools, buffs with aid, buffs with channel divinity, deals loads of damage, stop enemies fron advancing, very high AC with armor and shield (both equip and spell), and lots more.
Of course, a druid biuld can do even better for the frontliners (with summons and sheperd), but i don't think that the druid itself is the best frontliner!
Man I always love your guys comments and content lol