What makes me sad is that, like you said in the end, Surprise Attack has gotten so powerful it pushes you to ignore everything else about the bugbear. I’m glad you’re not going same direction as everyone else.
Not a hard thing to happen when many DMs didn't even use Surprise mechanics. Went from being a non-feature/niche rogue build to "you get free damage, you get free damage, everybody gets free damage!"
Elf is just as good with elven accuracy. And elven accuracy lasts round to round not just round 1. And a straight phantom rogue will out damage it by round 2 or 3. So broken? no.
My concern isn't even how it plays at high levels, but at lower levels. Those 2d6 at lower levels could really be a big deal in the party because enemy hp are so low.
@@macfine oh no, the level 2 monk, this unbalance must be corrected. Also from my own math the sorcerer thing makes scorching ray go from bad to 'its fairly good i guess but still not crazy'
@@macfine Sorc 3 has up to 5 attacks (twin firebolt) assuming 65% hit rate it's only a measly 43.5ish dmg. Perfectly fair and balanced. Only mostly sarcastic there. It does take about half your daily resources to pull that off. ( IF you won on init )
Exactly. And in all honesty, if every one of the enemies on the field is faster than your bugbear, you're _really_ playing against type. My 2 cents about "brokenness"; what is the situation in which being a Bugbear breaks the game _more_ than being, say, a Harengon Gloomstalker/Assassin/Fighter/Kitchensink does? Or a similar Half-Orc? Vuman with Alert? Is that bit of extra damage really going to _break_ the game? Secondly - and I realize this is a hot take as "there's no wrong way to play" - I don't think anyone should ever actively _try_ to break the game, narratively or mechanically. If anyone does, *they are playing the game wrong.* If the build is bending over backwards in focusing on a single thing, am I supposed to be surprised if it does that thing really, really well? I thought that's the whole point of character creation.
@@TheRawrnstuff The issue is most people don't look at the WHOLE build. They tunnel vision on "240 damage in the first round" and forget the likely only once or twice per day bit, and the fact that said character's defense and utility may be low, etc. I think the most OP character I played was a bard 1/ hexblade warlock 2/ divine soul sorc 9 (we were 12 at the time). This guy's spell list is insane. Spells off 4 different lists, all CHA casted. High number of spells and cantrips, which is strong on a sorc. A lot of people would say "you slowed down getting stronger spells", but honestly the versatility is incredibly strong in actual play, especially if you're the only full caster in the party. Dude also had like a 20 AC I think and a lot of HP for a caster and could melee super well. A staff of power makes him totally nuts.
You want to make sure you're targetting the biggest enemy though, so you can eliminate the primary threat early. So beating all enemies still has a lot of value
Some things to point out: Most games of D&D don't even make it past level 12. Doing a ton of damage is fine and all but there is no guarantee that the damage is actually going to be effective damage. Third if damage was even remotely close to being the most broken thing in 5e, then fullcasters wouldn't be considered the most broken thing in 5e. Finally, , since most games of D&D don't make it past level 12, variant human comes online much faster, doing much higher damage consistently, and aren't built around a round 1 gimmick. Is bugbear strong? Absolutely. So is custom lineage, variant human, any species with flight, and majority of the MotM. It is just people see damage and go "Man that is broken!" but are totally fine with a wizard completely nullifying a fight with hypnotic pattern cause reasons.
I dont think it matters that it's not that busted at high level. Low levels are where it counts, and this race could outshine most other martials at low levels.
I am kind of tempted to make one for a game coming up, but I’m playing with 7 other PCs (that’s just how it is where I play) so A: we don’t really need one person to do all that damage and B: I’m don’t want to potentially be doing that much more damage than most other characters. It’s a little bit “me” for me!
Must been said, Gloomstalker fits the tradicional depiction of Bugbear: sneaky and brutal. I'm considering for a monk build, something like Gloomstalker 3/Shadow Monk X.
I like the idea of a Beast barbarian using the claws option for this. Barbarian kind of has most of what is needed here: Reckless Attack gives the chance to hit, claws give additional attacks and Feral instinct gives advantage on initiative. Now feral instincts alone might not be enough here but I think the Alert feat could reasonably get a high enough initiative to make the build work. Seems like a viable chassis if nothing else
@@blackpeoplestorytime802 as I read the martial arts feature from monk the bonus action attack is only an unarmed strike, rather than a claw attack (or other weapon attack for that matter). Regardless I can't believe I didn't think about that, brilliant
@@blackpeoplestorytime802 Pretty cool but you won't benefit from Bugbear Surprise Attack, as it costs a Bonus Action to Rage for the claws and once your next turn comes around, everyone has had a turn in combat. Good for keeping up 4 attacks per turn after the first though👍
@@blackpeoplestorytime802 The claws are a simple weapon from beast barbarian not an unarmed strike. So monk martial arts wouldn't work with the claws but the dual wielder feat would.
Chronurgy Wizard about to be crazy with Jim's Magic Missile/Scorching Ray. Add the Alert feat and you're perfect. First turn Nova, then whatever you want later since you're a Wizard.
@@theshadowbadger the rerolling initiative is the main thing that chronurgy adds. If you are using Jim's Magic Missile, it allows you to potentially reroll a 1 that you roll (I don't think he'll be using Jim's Magic Missile for this reason).
Why not war magic. They have bonus to initiative. Also why not dip 2 levels of fighter so you can pop two of your highest level spell slots with action surge in one turn. And after this first turn, you can go to front line using a booming/green-flame blade so you also utilize your long limbed racial
I really like this format of: video 1, theorises about a mechanical interact, the first the following video is talking us through a specific build that utilises it. I don't always like hearing an entire build mapped out from lvl 1 to 20 (as d4 dnd optimised does) becuase I usually get the gist of it about half way through and the rest is unneeded for me personally. But this style is great, I get all the theory crafting and mechanics explained, and then if I'm really interested I can watch the next follow up video. Keep it up! Love your stuff, any chance of a video about how best to utilise create water, control water, shape water, wall of water etc. I love the idea of a hydromancer, but there is nothing in the game that's hard coded to support it. Thanks again
I would like to second a hydromancer build! I’ve tried to play it in the past but it hurt pretty bad since at the time my DM was adversarial and didn’t play along much. Anything you can do to help me see it different and use it more reliably would be nice!
Bugbear has jumped to my favorite race by far, just from the new Sneaky. You can be the monster in someones closet! Chase after those pesky little Kobolds when they trun and run off! Its so cool, and the controversy over suprise is kinda conflicting because on one hand its sad people are banning them but on the other hand people are talking about Bugbears!!
I don't see why. This trait only takes place during first round of combat. Since it calls out per combat in the trait and dnd basic rules defines combat as a "cycle of rounds and turns. " so RAW and RAI both support only first round of combat. And if you get surprise round against you, you don't get this trait at all. Yeah it's a huge dps increase round one but there are ways as a dm to mitigate the impact.
TBH, for that specific build, I'm not even convinced Bugbear is a better racial choice than Elf with Elven Accuracy. The round 1 bonus from surprise attack when you're already using sharpshooter, heavy crossbow, and hunter's mark is about 25%. By comparison, going from advantage to elven accuracy advantage results in about 20% more hits. 25% is more than 20%, sure, but you can also benefit from Elven Accuracy after round 1, any time you gain advantage--from party members giving you advantage with their spells, to Gloomstalker giving you advantage. Builds that already deal 25+ damage on hit don't benefit that much from bugbear. It's the builds that have low damage on their attacks that get a larger improvement from picking bugbear. (Bugbear Monk literally doubles the damage from a round 1 Flurry of Blows, for example). Not that Bugbear Monk breaks the game, but I think it might get the sticker for "class that is most improved by Bugbear"--even takes advantage of long limbed.
My experience playing a Wood Elf Arcane Archer Assassin is that Elven Accuracy doesn't make a huge difference. Now for a Rogue with a single attack and huge Sneak Attack damage, Elven Accuracy should make a huge difference (though I haven't played this so I'm just speculating).
@@Dennis-vh8tz Elven Accuracy is not a massive bonus, you are right, but for this specific build I think it might be *enough* of a bonus. Against Treantmonk's example AC Elven Accuracy hit rate: 83.4% Regular advantage hit rate: 69.8% That's not an enormous difference, but it's enough--landing about 20% more hits when advantage is up. (There's also the factor of crits, but I think crits should be about equal for these two builds--elven accuracy crits a little bit more often, but bugbear crits adds a few more dice. Bugbear probably gets slightly more out of crits on the first turn actually, but it's going to be a very small difference). The X-factor that I didn't cover is that because the Bugbear will miss more often during the burst turn, this means they get to use precision attack more often during the big burst turn. But the flip side of that is that the Elven Accuracy archer gets to save superiority dice and use precision attack additional times throughout the fight. So that does load yet more damage onto the burst turn for the bugbear, and more damage throughout the rest of the fight for the elven accuracy archer.
Tough you should really keep in mind that despite it being a half feat elven accuracy is still a feat, while the bugbear just GETS it's damage boosting feature, for free and at lvl 1, then they still have all their ability increases to work with Also should add that sharpshooter is complemented by elven accuracy while surprise attack makes it worse (the more damage you deal w your attack by default the worse sharpshooter is, maybe on a bugbear on round 1 it just isn't worth it especially at high lvls
@@mirkofraccastoro7573 Yeah, I largely agree with all of that. All I will note is that the specific build presented gets started pretty slowly compared to other builds out there (Not a variant human or custom lineage, so they don't start with crossbow expert at level 1). So...I really wouldn't expect it to break the game at low levels, but yes, it's going to suffer less at low levels than an elven accuracy build will. "the more damage you deal w your attack by default the worse sharpshooter is, maybe on a bugbear on round 1 it just isn't worth it especially at high lvls" I mean...not when you're hitting when you roll a 12 and you have advantage--70% chance to hit after advantage. On the highest damage hit (gloomstalker attack that adds an extra d8) we're talking 24.8 average damage with sharpshooter, and 23.2 average damage without sharpshooter. Against an enemy with 2 more AC, though, (hitting when you roll a 14) yeah, should switch to non-sharpshooter when you're rolling the hit with the gloomstalker extra d8. (And against an enemy with 3 more AC, should switch to non-sharpshooter for most attacks). Unless of course you don't mind spending a lot of battlemaster maneuver dice on precision attack--can still use sharpshooter with those.
@@mirkofraccastoro7573 I also have doubts about combining surprise attack with the the sharpshooter than the -5/+10 (at least without advantage), but it's useful on subsequent turns, and there's more to sharpshooter. The lack of cover penalties makes it easier for a Bugbear to hit on round one, and the lack of disadvantage at long range rarely comes up with a longbow, but could see more use with a hand crossbow.
So excited! Bugbears have long been a favorite of mine. Though the horrible (imo) wording of the long limbed feature is such a let down for an otherwise fantastic feature.
I just know this is going to be a great video! I'd be interested to see an updated Paladin build video if that's in the works. Also, do you think you'd change anything from your God Mage sorcerer? If I had to make one suggestion going forward for your builds, it'd be to suggest anything you'd do different if you were using old versions of the races
It's amazingly powerful. Taking down enemies in the first round of combat increases survivability considerably. However, how many multiphase combats have you seen, where the first wave is just cannon fodder? Probably enough to be annoying. But certainly all the combat encounters leading up to major combats will be easier and you will have more resources heading into the last combat.
I mean the piece of software running in my mind when you were crunching the numbers and all was "EIGHTEENTH LEVEL CHARACTER". And it was an Eighteenth level character expending a lot of their resources to boot. Action surge, superiority dice, hunter's mark. When I think about the things an eighteenth level Wizard can do - and how many spells at that point that they have that just wins fights; I have a hard time screaming from the rooftops "nerf bugbears!" Build's a one-trick pony. Win initiative (probably) and do a lot of damage on round 1. Everything about the character is invested into that single goal and sure, the numbers aren't bad, but I don't find myself convinced they're rigged either. Let the martials shine a little, I say.
Better question is why you would want to play a gloomy Bugbear assassin? Because it does alot of damage? I've seen this build thrown around so often, it's so boring. If you want to be like everyone else, fine. But no way I'm going to sacrifice my creativity for some numbers. When it comes to gloomstalkers I like mixing them with twilight cleric. Gloomstalker 8 + Twilight Cleric 12 combined with Pallid elf. Sharpshooter, Elven Accuracy, Skulker and Piercer are the feats that come to mind. I guess you could call the build "Sound Of Silence" because hello darkness my old friend. What it sacrifices in damage it makes up for in utlility. Anyways a cleric casting spirit guardians tends to out damage most martials anyways. I have this idea for a bubbly Pallid elf that worships the moon and stars, and trys to be a guiding light for those around them when things seem bleak. I think people often forget that DND is a ttRPG and not a video game. If numbers are the only thing that matter, maybe play EVE online or Dwarf Fortress. Let yourself make characters that aren't the most optimal, and instead make characters that are 'optimal enough.' But this is all my opinion. you do you.
Am I correct that if they are "surprised" (fail to perceive you when initiative is rolled) then they still get "a turn" it's just that if they have the "surprised" condition they simply don't do anything. So stealth doesn't really matter, it's JUST winning initiative.
If I was going this route, I would go Echo Knight for the Unleashed Incarnation for round 1 attacks rather than Battlemaster. I do realize that the chance to hit would be lower without the Battlemaster dice, but the potential damage for two extra attacks (assuming an Action surge) seems like it might be worth it for me.
If we're mostly melee then Beast barbarian is my choice for rage damage and claw attack. Reckless attack also means we don't need to be an assassin rogue so we can get features that are useful on turn 2+
So, lately we see items in the unearthed arcana make it into the game and the latest UA has giant options that increase reach. Bob World Builder even made a "45 feet reach" Bugbear, though he was mosty not serious. But imagine a mele attack from accross almost the entire field of battle.
Ranged seems to make the most sense. Unless you are battling one big bad guy, you don’t need to beat every other opponent on initiative. You just need to beat the one(s) you attack. So ranged gives you a larger pool of targets. It also allows you to spread out that massive damage to not waste it (assuming you beat multiple targets on initiative).
Honestly my first thought when it came out was a sort of Sorlock build that focused on Scorching Ray and eldritch blast, without really doing any math, Each scorching ray is 2d6, so assuming it hits, the added 2d6 is like casting a free scorching ray for on top of the original one and thats what made it appealing
As you say, the revised Surprise Attack adds some extra damage, which is always nice, but compared to other options, I don't find it too special or interesting. Any level 20 Assassin/Battlemaster/Gloomstalker built with a bit of knowledge will do well in that first round, given that these subclasses have blatant synergy and are pretty potent by themselves. Comparing Surprise Attack to something like a fly speed, or maybe the old YTPB poison immunity, and it doesn't come close for me. Honestly the expanded Sneaky feature with the spooky anti-squeeze is the most evocative feature of the new Bugbear. I might take the new Bugbear and make a Beast Barbarian, so the extra attack from the Claws gets pumped up, offsetting the lack of GWM, then from level 6 go with the Spider Climb and clamber around, sneaking through windows and squeezing down chimneys.
I know this video has 2 years but i´m playing as a bugbear in Bladur´s Gate 3 (using a mod, of course) and it´s kinda overpower, but still very fun to play with. I wish i still had a group of d&d players so i could try it on pen and paper!
I always consider DMG in later rounds gets a depreciation. Just like how we calculate the present value of future cash flows. DnD is a turn based game, so any DMG dealt early has a significantly larger effect than those later, as those DMG might kill a creature and thus deletes it's turn. That's one of reasons why gloomstalkers are more than "two attacks per combat" at most .
Regardless, it'll be mazing if the new UA Barbarian didn't get changed. With Polearm Master, Great Weapon Master, and Sentinel, long arms would still be a good choice
The new Giant barbarian seems like a good fit for bugbear makes use of the sneaky feature to fit into small spaces regardless of size, you get adv on init, 5ft more reach on top of longlimbed, and thrown two handers if you can't quite reach an enemy.
I still like the Rune Knight Bugbear with Halberd, Just locking down big swaths of the battlefield. Maybe throw a couple of levels of Barb in there for Reckless Attacks, and take the Alert Feat to go first. Position Up in front and just punish all the enemies for trying to move past you.
What are you talking about? Githyanki got a huge buff with their Shield spell being castable with any spell slots you have! They make for immortal Paladins, and unhittable swords-bards / clerics.
I think PAM quarterstaff gloomstalker/fighter with druidic warrior and dueling fighting styles could be a lot of fun, you still get good initiative and you can use the long limbed trait and echo knight a lot more effectively. Don't think it's as good as the ranged version, but it's cool and uses every bugbear feature.
You need strength for a quarterstaff, but you need dex to get really high initiative. As you need wisdom as well with Gloomstalker you need your stats spread too thin to have good Dex, Con, Wis AND Strength. Bugbear can choose +1 in 3 different stats, and with point buy can get 3 stats to 15.
@@Treblaine With druidic warrior, you can get shillelagh to attack with wisdom, so with point buy you go 16 wis 16 con 14 dex and put the rest where you want. Cast shillelagh before combat so it doesn't take a BA, maximizing the number of PAM attacks you can make on the first round
@@inky7993 The best place to put those last 2 points is into Dex and bump it up to 16 to increase you initiative which EVERYTHING depends on. It doesn't really matter if you have a -1 or a +0 on Str, Int or Cha. It DOES matter if you have. +6 rather than +5 initiative. The only problem with both Dex and Wis having a +3 is there's really no point in Druidic Warrior for Shillelagh. You could pick Archery fighting style instead and get +2 on attack rolls AND range. Also, you're not getting the feat until Gloomstalker 4 but at ranger 2 you need to pick a fighting style and at level 3 most of the alpha strike stuff comes online but you can't take the ASI yet to get PAM. I encourage people to consider how a build is when getting there, not just at one particular level where it all comes together. However, as a DM, druidic warrior is a very cool class option and to stop it competing with the obviously superior Archery FS I'll let any Ranger have Druidic Warrior for free at Ranger 1 because Level 1 ranger feels nowhere near magical enough.
An interesting thing is that "surprise attack" does not mention anything about first turn of combat. Which means that every time that enemies receive reinforcements, surprise attack may trigger if they enter after the bugbear in the initiative. This happens quite often in our table with enemies hiding during the whole first turn, guards that hear our noises, an alarm bringing enemies, etc.
Pretty sure that entering a combat that's ongoing automatically doesn't qualify you as suprised. In previous editions it definitely did, and the base definition of combat specifies you cannot determine new suprised combatants after you start taking turns as it's the same combat, but larger.
Surprise has nothing to do with this mechanic. The 2d6 is added if the target “hadn’t taken a turn yet.” Surprise would blow this open wider with the assassin feature but it wasn’t an assumption of the damage calculations in the video or this poster’s comment.
The added 2d6 per attack just feel really strong. My prediction for your next video will be a war magic wizard. Picking up Hex with Fey-Touched and with the level 10 feature, while you maintain Hex with a higher slot out of combat you gain a +2 to saves and AC. With the initiative boost from level 2 winning Initiative should be doable. From there use Scorching Ray if you win Initiative and if you maintained Hex from an encounter before add another d6 necrotic damage on the hit. So 5d6 damage per hit. How you would get advantage with this though? :/ Maybe 3 levels of Assassin Rouge. At this time my idea is only half-baked at best ^^ I'm already excited for your next video. :)
I feel like any spellcaster build for Bugbear is going to want access to Quickened Spell metamagic. Getting BA Scorching Rays on that nova round is just too good to pass up imo
@@forte_dx1813 Step one would be not playing a wizard for that sort of build :P Sorlock was what I was referencing. Wizard doesn't provide a good action as you said, nor the access to a BA that provides tons of extra attacks. Initiative boosts from the wizard subclasses are admitedly nice, but you can get Gift of Alacrity via Fey Touched, or maybe just a dip into something that boost initiative, that's not exclusive to wizard at least.
I also believe that Bugbear might be a good choice for War Magic Wizard. Tanky reaction to AC/Saves, Melee cantrips for the 2nd rounds of combat, +Int to Initiative, a couple of first level spells. For only a two level dip. Expeditious Retreat, dash about in melee, with disadvantage to hit you. Battlemaster Fighter with that halberd for 10ft reach. GWM, PaM, Sentinel (maybe) for locking down the battlefield.
I think the bugbear race isn’t broken in the gloomstalker/assassin/battle master build, but overkill. Doing 180 vs 240 damage on the first turn is a big difference, but creatures that don’t die from that initial volley, regardless of the GS/Assassin/BM bugbear damage, are still significantly threatening to the party. A good smite, a big wizard spell, or a raging Barbarian critical as a partner PC can make up for the loss of 60 damage in the first turn should you choose a different race for the crazy damage ranger build. I’d be interested to see a quickened or twinspell sorcerer casting scorching ray or chaos bolt and using this 2d6 damage bugbear feature.
9:05 Don't you have a base of +11 to hit with 5 from dex bonus and 6 from PB at L18? Also +6 hitting 45% means assuming enemy AC is 15 when you're L18? That seems far too low of AC for L18 PCs. Assuming you meant base of +11 and 17AC for enemies, 17 AC still seems too low. I would assume you have +3 magic weapons and average AC of 20. So same chance to hit but adding the +3 to the damage from the probable magical weapon would further proportionally reduce the bugbear impact.
I don't think that 200+ damage once per combat over level 17 is not that special. How does this compare to a spellcaster using Shapechange to become an Ancient Red Dragon or a Balor?
Chris; nothing is broken, 5E players on average have less than 100 hours of total experience. Level up your game IQs. Legacy players have decades of experience and solutions since the 80s, 90s, and beyond. All you have to do is edit WotC's content.... dont get stuck in the 5E box.
After seeing Wintery Wyverns video on of the new giant barbarian this looks like the best race for it, the reach range becomes super far and with sentinel no one is going anywhere.
The effectiveness of sentinel is slightly diminshed because long limbed only works on your turn, but the giant barbarian extra reach is certainly big. I would rather take 3 or 4 levels in giant barbarian and take the rest in cavalier fighter for hold the line, where whever a creature moves 5 feet within your reach you can take an OOP. In addition, you make their speed 0 on a hit without needing sentinel. This build, with the greater reach granted, gives you unparralelled control over the battle field and can work with any race. Bugbear still benefits from it though as they can lock enemies down and still hit enemies behind them on their turn.
I think a Barbarian bugbear with some multi-class is great. Because Barbarian has advantage on initiative roll when they reach 7th-level. With the new Giant Barbarian, they will have a total of 15 ft reach and a ranged attack with heavy weapon (like a greatsword). Yeah, maybe Groomstalker can fit in there too. But it will definitely going in a different path than this build or a d4’s build.
@@SpiderWaffle I hate my legacy and what it represents. The darkness, violence, and debauchery that spurred my birth. Barbog the Bugbear didn't know what he was walking into.
Bugbears have been my favorite race since 2017 and I'm excited (though apprehensive) to see them getting more attention! I'm starting a new campaign with one soon and rolled some pretty nice stats, so if anyone has any recommendations for an Oath of Conquest + Undead Warlock Paladin Build, I'm all ears! Excellent video btw, and I'm really looking forward to the next video!
I can tell you as someone who has played a few of the old bugbears there are some DM's where you're never getting that 2d6 the whole campaign, so frankly it did need fixing. I think they went overboard but now it's A or S tier but not broken.
I haven’t had a chance to play it, yet, but when the new races were first leaked I made a Bugbear build that uses Scorching Ray. It can do pretty insane damage, but only once per day.
To be fair, the gloomstalker assassin fighters are using their action surge, a 1st level slot for hunter's mark, their action surge and tons of superiority dice all on that one turn of combat. They get most of that back on a short rest, but this still isn't going to happen all that often. When they aren't using resources, then the damage is a lot less.
I don't know about the Scorching Ray idea you had, but I thought of 3x Eldritch blasts on round 1, which costs 2 sorc points and an action surge (~200 damage). I wouldn't be surprised if its a similar same idea.
@@cp1cupcake it’s the same principle, but with more attacks. At max level, you could Action Surge, put down Hexblade’s Curse and cast Scorching Ray twice(at 9th and 8th level). Total average damage against AC13 is 388; against AC20 it’s 255. If you can get a chance to cast Spirit Shroud before combat starts, it’s 668 and 442. And that’s assuming you have no magic item for a hit bonus.
Going over it at such an advanced level , obscures the real issue. It drops off over time comparatively. It's at the lower level doing multiple attack rolls it shines. Monk 2 three attacks. Sorc 3 , scorching ray, plus a cantrip as a BA .
Chris, to be honest most tables in my area either roll for stats and/or start with an extra feat (as a boon from the DM). I would argue that humans, even variant ones, are significantly underpowered given those circumstances, could I get your opinion on that? Or what you would do to boost them, come 5.5e?
So, in trying to take advantage of Round 1 attacks, based on TM's video, I did some theory crafting for max attacks, and the most recent posts I could find are a couple of years old. I came up with an Echo11/Gloomstalker3/Assassin3/Monk3) build with Haste. Did I do my math right? +1 Attack Action: Haste +1 Attack Action: Fighter 2 Action Surge +1 attack; Ranger 3 Gloomstalker (when Attack Action, one additional weapon attack) +1 attack; Fighter 3 Echo Knight (when Attack Action, one additional melee attack) +1 attack; Fighter 5 Extra Attack (when Attack Action, attack twice) +1 attack; Fighter 11 Extra Attack (when Attack Action, attack thrice) so that comes to: Attack Action + Echo + Gloom + 5thExtra + 11thExtra Action Surge (Attack Action + Echo + Gloom + 5thExtra + 11thExtra) Haste (Attack Action + Echo + Gloom + 5thExtra + 11thExtra) +2 Bonus Attacks; Monk 2 Flurry of Blows or 17 attacks in Round 1. There seems to be some confusion with RAW/RAI if it actually works this way, that I can't find the resolution on? And does anyone know of any Other sources that state "when Attack Action...one additional...attack"? Thanks in advance for the help!
My Favorite Idea: Bugbear Eldritch Blast Ambusher. Eldritch Assassin The feature doesn't specify weapon attacks; So EB Works 2 Warlock + 3 Sorcerer. We already can get 4 Attacks in our ambush dealing 1d10+2d6+Cha Next 3 Assassin Rogue Assassinate also does not specify weapon attacks. Dealing 2d10+4d6+Cha Next 3 Fighter for Action Surge and Ambush Maneuver EB has scaled to 3 Blasts each casting. We now have a total of 9 Attacks in our Ambush dealing 2d10+4d6+Cha
I've been playing in a gestalt campaign since 2021, before the bugbear rewrite. My bugbears Frost Giant slave name is Hvítr Mús which means bright and colorless mouse in Jotunise (giant speak). Mús pronounced "Meus" is an albino bugbear Yeti (Bear) totem barbarian and Runic Knight. I play the tank/ front line control in my party with glaive/polearm master/sentinnel. When I giant size I stand 16 feet tall and occupy 4 squares. With 15' reach. My favorite surprise attack is called Mús in a box. This is where I hide in a small giftwrapped box that only a small creature could get into and wait to be unwrapped. It's gained so much notariety that the famous minstrel Justin Limbertake wrote diddy of it as a warning to opening gifts with unknown contents. My 37 page backstory can not express how much I love Mús, but my tattoo of him will. Bugbear 4 life people! All of my future character will be from purposefull breeding with Mús lineage. You know the saying, once you go bugbear...
Part of me thinks there has got to be a build here that works on Eldritch blast considering that it says attacks not weapon attacks. Something like blade singer 6, Sorcerer 4 fighter 2/3 and then warlock X. Attack with a Cross Bow/Long Bow +EB, AS XB+EB+Quickened Spell EB=14 attacks 1d10+2d6+5 for 12 of them, 1d8+2d6+5 for 2 of them if you had a +5 Dex and a +5 CHA thats 243 Assuming everything hits (which it wont being perfectly honest ) but this was just the back of the envelope math surely there has got to be more optimization available for this
An alternative is Fighter 2 Action Surge Warlock 2 Eldritch blast + agonising blast Sorcerer 14 Scorching Ray With a 7th level Scorching Ray, Action Surge, 6th level Scorching Ray, bonus action quickened spell Eldritch Blast 4 hits you are making 15 Scorching Rays (avg 105), 4 Eldritch Blasts (avg 44) with 38d6 (avg 133) from the bugbear. There are additional damage that you could get on top of this with setup such as Hex (+1d6 to all 19 attack rolls), Hexblades Curse (crit on 19, +6 to all 19 attack rolls) from the warlock. And then you still have a tonne of spell slots to sustain you through the rest of the day
I was thinking of Warlock/Fighter/assassin/sorcerer build. For Eldritch blast + bonus Eldritch blast + Action surge Eldritch blast? From 600ft away with spell sniper.
I am thinking Battle Master8/Swashbuckler3/Warlock2/Sorcerer4+. Take Alert as one of the fighter ASIs. Not as good as GWM/Sharpshooter martials, but 2/3 of 12 EBs (at level 17+) should be somewhere in the 140 average damage range against lower initiatives. BM dice could still be useful for init and various skill rolls.
Started a short campaign with 8th level characters. Testing out Bugbear (MotM version) natural lycanthrope werebear with Ranger (Gloomstalker) 3 & Fighter (Echo Knight) 5 for mine. Neutral good stalker with a preference for non-lethal damage to humanoids. The non-squeezed small spaces and the reach really plays off the origins of the term bugbear, the Fey tweak (Labyrintian/ Goblin king/ Muppet feel), and boogeyman concepts. Plays well into an ambush hunter. I get that optimizer streamers avoid lycanthropes. It is a core 3 books PC option (i.e. Monster Manual, DMG, PHB) and Rime of the Frost Maiden gave clarity on canon stat structure for non-human lycanthrope rules first explained in the Monster Manual (e.g. Goliath Werebear stat block).
My prediction is that we might see swashbuckler + warlock so we can add cha to our initiative in addition to dex. We'd be losing the benefits of assassin there, but I'm sure there will be plenty of ways to find advantage elsewhere in the build.
I don't know if you're looking for suggestions, but what about a Bugbear with Scorching Ray? Surprise Attack only requires you to hit with an attack roll, it doesn't seem to require a weapon. 10 rays with a 9th level spell slot for an additional 20d6 damage for 40d6 total at level 17? It's only 140 on average, but you can get another 10d6 with hex for 175, I'm sure you can think of some way to tack on even more damage. But if you're an Evocation Wizard, you can Overchannel a 5th level spell slot for maximum damage for 144 damage, another 6d6 from Hex to bring it up to 165 (and your Int bonus on one damage roll) so that's 170 at 14th level. Still not as amazing as using a crossbow, but it's at least unique.
A couple of notes: Base + to hit should be 11 for a level 18 chat with 20 dex, with that chance to hit raises to around 80% with adv, with that and presicion attack i think it's safe to assume you hit 8/8 attacks with the heavy crossbow You took Assasin 3 so crits are not "very likely" they are guaranteed in the nova. With this we get just a bit more damage, a total of 16d10+52d6+4d8+120 flat damage=408 nova, with the bugbear's surprise attack accounting for 32d6=112 of that damage, so a 37.8% increase compared to other races (or 27.5% of the total whichever way you chose to look at it)
Bugbear Sorlock with Fighter 2, action surge + quicken, up to 12 agonizing repelling eldritch blasts on the opening round at 1d8+2d6+5 per. Scales with level perfectly and you get all the flexibility and utility of a sorlock, plus access to invisibility for setting up surprise, and extreme long range. I'm just saying. 70% chance to hit = approx 140 average damage on opener spread out among multiple targets if you wish, and it's Force damage making it quite consistent.
Playing a level 4 Bugbear Gloomstalker with the Alert feat. I have a +11 to initiative, and if you consider that at an average of 21 initiative I Dread Ambush them on a surprise round which is (because I am dual wielding, it specifies *attack rolls* so bonus action attacks count towards surprise attack), three attacks with 3d6+4 damage EACH, total of 9d6+12 in one round if all hit. And then because I will likely have a higher initiative, I get to hit them before they act on the NEXT ROUND, for an additional 6d6+8 damage if they all hit. That is an average of 72.5 damage on a surprise round at level 4.
My rebuttal to whether or not bugbear is busted? Let's take a snapshot of each tier: Level 1: bugbear can get at most 4d6 extra damage per combat assuming two weapon fighting or double-bladed scimitar Assuming the 6-8 medium/hard encounters a day that's 24-32d6 extra in a day (assuming you're hitting and going first) I don't think there is anything race wise that can quite replicate this from level 1. Level 5 - This goes up by 50% thanks for extra attack. So 36-48d6. That's an average of 21 extra damage per battle. Pretty good. We can also add on more via action surge or Gloomstalker extra attack, or monk flurry of blows, or other combinations thereof. But a level 5 warlock regardless of race can also shut down an entire encounter in one turn without dealing damage with hypnotic pattern. And it can do it for every single encounter assuming a short rest every two combats. So damage stops mattering. Obviously not every creature is going to fail their save. But conversely a bugbear isn't going to hit every time nor are they going to win initiative every time. Level 11: Fighter gets extra attack. See the same info as above. Hypnotic pattern may not be as powerful anymore thanks to charm immunity. However, a MoM Kobold Shepherd druid is going to deal significantly more damage throughout the day thanks to Draconic Roar and Conjure Animals. Plus it's going to provide healing, utility, transport, control, and a whole host of other things. So no. Not broken still. Level 17. Wish is online. Damage doesn't matter. So no. Not broken. 3/4 milestones and their feature is outclassed by other races or raceless classes. Is it neat? Sure. Is it significant? Not really. Doesn't change the meta of the game at all.
I’ve worked out a bugbear build that is “done” at level 12, and any extra levels are just gravy. It ends up being a Sorcerer (any?) 2/Fathomless Warlock 2/Battlemaster Fighter 4/Assassin Rogue 4. I’m not sure which official sorcerer is really best. I’d pick the Haunted Sorcerer from the Grim Hollow Player’s Guide, but that’s 3rd party. As for official, probably one of Tasha’s. Really, we want sorcerer for sorcery points for quicken spell. We want warlock for eldritch blast, agonizing blast, and eldritch spear. Fathomless for the “tentacle of the deep,” which acts similar to a spiritual weapon, and it’s uses are proficiency bonus times per day, so it’ll continue to improve. Fighter for action surge, battlemaster for Ambush. Assassin rogue for advantage on attack rolls, and expertise on Stealth is a plus. We get two feats with this build. First, Fey Touched will let you get Gift of Alacrity (if the DM allows), so we get a +1d8 to initiative for 8 hours. Tack that on to ambush, and we’ll have +2d8 to initiative. That should be good enough. There’s a couple different options for a second feat. I like Spell Sniper so we can ignore cover and change eldritch blasts range to 600 feet (thanks to eldritch spear). Alert is a good choice. Also, Shadow Touched for invisibility and maybe silent image as a spell choice. The main point is to eldritch blast, since we’ll get more blasts as we level. If we nova, we cast eldritch blast as an action, quicken spell eldritch blast, and action surge to cast eldritch blast. At level 12, that’s nine blasts all with advantage. We have several options to let us get surprise on enemies, such as invisibility, stealth expertise, silent image to hide in illusions, or a 600-ft range. Surprise makes all hits crits. We can only nova once per short rest, which recharges action surge. We can spend our 2 1st-level warlocks slots for sorcery points to recharge our quicken spell. If we go above level 12, I’d probably continue as a sorcerer for more sorcery points and more spell options when not nova-ing.
Hunter's Mark is a pretty bad choice IMO, yeah you increased your DPR above the handbow but only by *3%* at level 18! You're burning CONCENTRATION and a spell slot on what is almost identical damage numbers
Chris, yours and Colby's channels are my favorite optimizing D&D channels. And it's not because you're both making great, functional and thematic builds (you do). No, it's because watching any of your videos is like catching up with an old friend. Welcoming, reasonable, chill, fun. With the influx of some quite aggressive gatekeeping and unnecessary vitriol into the hobby over the last decade or so as it exploded in mainstream popularity, it is sadly a rarer thing to find such wholesome places like Treantmonk's Temple or D4 Network. Cheers!
Most optimizers are surprisingly one dimensional thinkers. If you can output more DPR than any prior build they have seen, then it's OP. Even if a build with 20% less DPR has twice the survivability. No one ever seems to talk about the fact that a cleric draconic sorc can maximize chain lightning for 340 damage (85 to 4 targets) as a bonus action using only a few features. Now you can't do it a bunch every day., granted, but without a lot of short rests, neither can the bugbear build. The OP bugbear should alpha strike pretty hard, and while it's a fun build, you probably aren't killing everything round one if your DM is any good, and then your damage falls to normal levels. In a 3 round fight, you're dealing what, maybe half or more of your total damage on turn 1 in that build? Do you out DPS a smite happy polearm master HWM paladin over 3 rounds? There's also the question of how it stacks up defensively compared to other high damage builds.
Man, you are giving us tier 4 math. When Wizards are slinging Wishes and True Polymorphs around while Druids obliterate everything not immune with Conjure Animals. Are we seriously discussing if Bugbear is broken on a martial in tier 4? And, before level 9 (when the majority of the game takes place), VHuman is still better for that build because it allows you to have both Sharpshooter and CBE.
Apparently this build is more obvious than I realized. Last night I used almost this exact build to theory-craft what I thought would be the ultimate dart thrower. With fighter and ranger, you get two fighting styles, so I was grabbing Archery and Thrown Weapon Fighting to offset the d4 damage of the dart. My "Crossbow Expert" bonus attack was, instead, the Quick Toss maneuver, but I wasn't sure that was better than Hunter's Mark. I only factored in the Bugbear today, right before watching this video. Hahaha!
Here we go folks; Echo Knight 11 / gloomstalker 3 / twilight cleric 1 / assassin rogue 3 / (endgame) Bard 2 (jack of all trades initiative) Advantage on initiative and support from twilight, 10 attack nova opener (Rapier) from fighter all at advantage (thank you assassin), all this and support casting. Pro tip: take the Piercer feat By level 20 you have a mega bugbear with +11 or so initiative at advantage and if you can crit you do god tier damage
In terms of the general whole : Races and Classes and Archetypes are Not broken---- the game of 5E is broken. From 3.5 D&D to 5E it has progressively become a game of Math and Optimization . There is just too many minor flaws and free give aways in 5E. At this point I'd rather play any earlier TSR era D&D or Retro-clone. ------ Their are a lot less broken elements to those games and its a lot easier to hack!!
@Treantmonk's Temple Hello. Could you please give love to the Fighter Champion. CRIT is the main thing and no one has every talked about how to maximize the champion's crit chance and damage by either multiclassing or not. Examples would be Straight Champion with Polearm and sentinel or Multi with Palaldin (V) to increase hit chance and damage...etc.
Honestly, if the stars alligned with all the spheres of the universe and you *somehow* have a player at your table handing you a character sheet with this Level 20 Gloomstalker/Assassin/Fighter character and you *let them play it*, I would be amazed. At any real table on earth where they were running an actual campaign, it would blow my mind if this actually happened outside of these discussions of "Build the Most Broken X". Speaking as a DM, the only time you'd ever see such a nonsensical combination of classes is if you intentionally created a Level 20 Oneshot/Campaign and let the players go wild with their builds to see who could make the most broken build. In that case, a DM complaining that *any* build at their table being "broken" is just dumb. I'm sorry but *they arranged the scenario* which encouraged Min Max Dexter to show up with his crazy build at their table in the first place. Instead just enjoy how broken it is and let the dice fly! Otherwise, if I were to set up a *serious* Level 20 game, intending to roleplay and make things believable, I would expect my Players to show up with good backstories about how their level 20 characters got to where they are in the first place. Speaking for myself as a DM who loves roleplay, those backstories would be half the fun of it. Yet I would challenge any player to even describe to me how, throughout the course of this adventuring Bugbear's career, they spent all this time as a Fighter, then suddenly trained to become an assassin in some secretive ninja assassin's guild, then stopped off at Gloomstalkers R Us to learn how to...gloom... stalk? and then just... what? That Backstory would certainly be worth price of admission for me. The point I am making is, if a DM is somehow complaining because they allowed this "broken" build at their table (while it is theoreticially possible to do RAW) you only have yourself to blame. And if a player showed up to an otherwise normal table and handed you this character sheet, just give Dexter his new character sheet with the Level 2 Furry Footed Burrower Rogue on it and get on with your session.
I'm currently on my path for a Gloomstalker Samurai (started at lv3, currently lv 4), and as a Ranger 3 Fighter 1, with my luck, I still didnt found that big turn where I actually won initiative and dealt a big ton of damage T-T (during combat/checks, the highest number on my d20 is 10). I was thinking on a different character before, using Eldritch blasts and Schorching Rays, at least on early lvls, but I didnt had much time to build the character and couldnt figure it out how to boost my initiative. I'm looking foward for the solutions and build you thought
So with fighter 2, assassin 3, warlock 2, sorc X, then I think you get ~200 DPR when using Quicken+Action Surge on round 1, and ~135 when you can only Quicken. The calculator I used when one which does exact averages, so the numbers you get might be a bit different. At a guess, you are losing around 50 damage on round 1, assuming you can do full combo, but end up as good, or around as good, when you can't. You also might have a bit more use after round 1 and out of combat. I also haven't counted archtypes, which would probably be genie for a bit more damage and divine soul for turning a fail into a success.
one thing I read would be using Scorching Ray scales up nicely with this race so I'm toying with just Warlock 2/Sorcerer x, first round in combat, upcast Scorching Ray, Quicken Eldritch Blast, maybe do so from within a globe of darkness with devils sight, magic missile is also good
While I doubt it's worth it due to MAD, you can get a lot of "attacks" per round by taking 6 levels of Bladesinger, and then either dipping into Warlock for Eldritch Blast, or taking it as a feat instead (less damaging than taking the Warlock dip). The Bladesinger multi-attack allows you to cast a cantrip instead of an attack, which you can use with Eldritch Blast. Eldritch Blast gets you a class-independent scaling number of spell attacks. And then, because you are wizard, you can use Spirit Veil on top of this for an AOE slow with some extra damage on top of all of your attacks (if you stick a bit close of your target). If you wanted to throw in Gloomstalker to this though, you would need 13 dex, wis, int, and charisma though, and somehow not entirely tank con.
Even before the multiverse changes, bugbears had the propensity to be OP with the right multiclass. I have a bugbear monk from a 2018 campaign that took just enough in barbarian for Bear Totem. DM wanted to start at lvl 3, so he and I had to have a sit-down beforehand to basically hobble my PC with a "i'm afraid to hulk out, i've hurt too many people before" quip for my backstory until about lvl 8 or 9 so that I didn't just completely murder everything on the field when I raged. It was a cool way to keep early combat balanced, I got to weave in my character's story to the campaign in a cool way, and it led to some cool (sometimes frustratingly fun) interactions with the other players.
I would actually argue that Bugbear appears its most broken (shines brightest) in Tier 1 on a monk or War Magic wizard with Scorching Ray. The 2d6 per hit will seem strongest at this time as enemy health pools are much smaller, as are player damage numbers. The monk and War Magic wizard both can get 3 attacks in a turn while most builds are getting 2 at most. The monk's naturally high Dex will help win them initiative, as will the War Magic wizard's Int. Both of these characters obviously fall off in Tier 2 and beyond compared to other opimizations, but if you're trying to make the new Bugbear look broken, T1 is the time to do it, and I think these are the two characters that can do it best at that time. Honorable mentions: A Hunter ranger with Horde Breaker is another possibility (since enemies are usually most clumped at the start of combats), but would have to wait until Level 4 to take Crossbow Expert for their 3rd attack, which I think still puts them behind the monk and wizard. Sorcerers can pull off 4 attacks in T1 if they quicken Scorching Ray and then cast an attack cantrip, but without a boost to initiative, they are probably less likely to be able to apply the Bugbear damage at all.
I concur with Gloomstalker and Assasin, but I'm not certain Battlemaster is the optimal figher subclass here. How about Champion for the half proficiency bonus to initiative? Or Arcane Archer with a longbow for some added control, while dropping Crossbow Master for Alert to win initiative more often? Rune Knight doesn't maximize this characters main schtick but does add some versatility.
what I'm looking forward to is the new UA barbarian path. that + bugbear + polearm gives 25ft melee attacks (20ft opportunity attack with sentinel anyone?).
You know I actually see the "long limbed" feature as something different than the "oh suddenly my arms grow 5 feet longer" but rather the bugbear is swinging so dang hard that their arm stretches out on the swing, with their bones actually becoming temporarily unhinged/detached mid swing and coming back together after the swing is done. Their sneaky also states they can force themselves into smaller spaces, which means their bodies' physiology are more elastic and flexible. As for the surprise attack, this is definitely powerful but to get bonkers with it you have to build around it. I just see it as something that can be built around, like the centaur's charge or warforged extra armor. It's powerful because it is iffy and situational. Depending on the situation, this feature becomes very limited, where you could even roll very very low on initiative and you don't get it AT ALL. It'd be almost sheer mockery to get in a boss fight and you're thinking "YEA IM GONNA NUKE THIS BOSS DOWN" and then after initiative the only enemy that hasn't had it's turn yet once it gets to you is one of the boss's weakest minions. And again, you have to be very strict in the build in order to get there. I believe it would be best to make a build as usual and just be happy when you CAN get the drop on someone.
I think when you're looking if something is truly broken or not you need to look at more middle of the road than an optimized white room, as in, how better does a bug bear make an average run of the day build? You don't need to -win- imitative, you just have to beat 1 or 2 monsters that you can target and that condition happens a good bulk of the time for almost any build. Sure you can get unlucky, but at the same time Fey Touch Gift of Alacrity isn't exactly uncommon either someone at your table will probably have it. Surprise Attack at the end of the day is very close to a "free" GWM/SS that works on any attack roll without the accuracy penalty on turn 1 only. For a basic champion fighter at lvl 5 it's almost a 33% damage increase on turn 1. Ditto for a basic 2 lock/3 sorc throwing around quickened EB's. Is that broken? Not sure, but it's definitely power creep. It does make it feel a bit dirty for me to pick if I'm playing at a table that isn't too min/maxy, that's for sure.
What about samurai instead of battle master to forgore an advantage on a shot for an additional attack? Personally atm I'm running a gloom/sin/ Champion wood elf in my high lv 17 game. Originally looked at BM but my DM allowed me to use a revised fighter ruleset so I gained some maneuvers just as a fighter so Bm wasn't required. I looked at possibly going samurai as well but figured an Elf would have a keen eye on weak points so went Champion as the ruleset I'm using from GM binder gives champion some sub-class-specific maneuvers as well. I am only torn on say do you go 3/3 or 4/4 for gloom and assassin to get 12 in fighter or 14? As going 3/3 you miss out on a feat/asi no? 1 from rouge/ 1 from ranger/4 from fighter if you go for 12 compared to 5 from fighter if you just go up to 14 going 14 gets you and extra use of indomitable not sure if that's worth the loss of a feat but we are also talking about going into mythic levels too so I'm torn.
I don't think it's broken. it's just dmg. wall of force removes the enemy from combat. tacking on additional dmg that might not be enough to remove an enemy from combat in 1 turn. this is just about as broken as wall of force at best. looking forward to that non-gloomstalker build as the way i'd go when presented with that question would also be fighter 2, with EB/Scorching Ray (using only a 14 dex and superior technique-ambush for initiative until i have more asis at tier 3+ for alert).
Pair the bugbear feature with a mage casting scorching Ray as a 3rd level creature. That's if all hit 12d6 to up to 3 creatures. Assuming your dex is decent. I don't see how that's balanced at all. Obviously I'm being generous in my favour here but on those combats where you've rolled good and your first before a few enemies. They just won't get a chance regardless of what type of character your playing. Wizards, monks, gloomstalkers and fighters will thrive with this race
I'd also note that the 2d6 isn't just limited to weapon attacks, a spell attack will do. So there's an alternative build where you take 3 levels in a sorcerer subclass of your choice for an extra 3 attacks as a bonus action with quicken spell via scorching ray. This could be done with Wizard 1 for Jim's Magic Missle and Metamagic Adept for quicken spell, where a second level in War or Chronurgy wizard for another bonus to initiative is also valuable.
I’m annoyed by all the same builds for bugbears. A unique take would be to try out ranger hunter, the level 11 ability allows you to just demolish groups. Creatures within 10 feet of a location which I believe can be up to 25 creatures so take 3 in fighter for action surge, 50 attacks (possibly, not garunteed) take alert for +5 initiative. Also the hunter level 3 ability gives you an extra attack if there’s another creature within 5 feet so possibly 52 attacks, unleash incarnation, gives 54. Yes this is hypothetical and won’t always work but it is a unique take
You forgot the +1/+2 weapon they'd have at that level, so their acc is 10% better and they'd get +2 on all those attacks. So they might hit with all 8 attacks at that point. That also might change your fighter class to Echo Knight for an additional 2 attacks so 10 attacks. Additionally if they can go GWM with a +2 greatsword they'd have the same acc as your calcs here, but a 2d6 weapon instead of a 1d10 for more damage. And melee weapons are likely to have additional effects on top of their magic +1/+2 more than bows, so we might be able to add even more damage on top of that. Yeah it reduces the bugbear's contributing damage, but that contributing damage allows the bugbear, on average, to kill an adult dragon before it takes its turn, and with something like a Potion of Giant Size, kill an Ancient dragon before it takes its turn. Thats still pretty strong.
Why do I feel like it might be a scorching ray build? I mean, using high level spell slots on scorching ray can net you 19 attacks when using top level spell slots, and with a multiclass in sorcerer that can give bonus action eb for 23 attacks. War mage with wild magic sorcerer and alert can give 5+int+dex on initiative, with advantage from wild magic sorcerer. Getting eb can be done from several feats. After that it's just pumping primary caster from asi's and you can end at 20 in the preferred stat.
I wonder if you could make a good monk out of bugbear? Long limbed helps against opportunity attacks, focus on dex helps with initiative, mobility helps getting to the desired target, monk brings a lot of attacks at low levels and bugbear helps monk with their poor damage. I'm thinking mostly low levels here, probably until level 5 or so. Pales in comparison with the ranged options though...
