The intro "welcome home" is the verbal equivalent of a warm hug from a parent. I love your content, the classes taken tell a story about how the character can develop. The over reactor name, I read it as in a power plant reactor.
This seems like a build where you want to have a buddy who is joined at the hip with your character to really take advantage of every reaction attack opportunity.
I'm playing a paladin right now with shield master. The rest of his front line is a kensai monk with sentinel on the right and storm barbarian with sentinel on the left. Either I knock people prone and my buddies get advantage or I get attacked and two opportunity to tax fire off.
I'm playing a rogue right now that specializes in finding ways to get reaction attacks! He's a level 5 arcane trickster right now and has the skulker and weapon master feats (for whip, pistol, and 18 dex). I'm planning on grabbing mirror image at level 7 and sentinel at level 8! That way I get a sentinel reaction attack when an enemy hits my mirror image, *and* if I'm in full darkness fighting enemies with darkvision, I can hide in melee range as I'm lightly obscured (thanks skulker), and then if the enemy tries to move away to attack another ally of mine I can whip them and they can't make melee attacks against anyone!
I've always wanted to do a Cavalier Fighter for similar reasons. They get a Sentinel effect at level 10, but instead of when a monster leaves your reach it's when they move at least 5ft anywhere within your reach. With a reach weapon you threaten a massive space. Though you'd probably still want to overlap with Sentinel to prevent Disengage and get the reaction attack if an ally is attacked. That combined with 3 levels in Path of the Giant Barbarian and/or an Enlarge spell will allow you to threaten even more space on the battlefield, then if you're playing on the edge of lingering AOE effects from your allies where your enemies are more or less forced to try and move out of them you can really lock them down. Bonus points if the DM gives you the Mark optional feature from the DMG that basically allows up to 2 reactions per round (though only one can be an opportunity attack).
After listening to final thoughts, a control build was the most fun I’ve ever done. I built a fear-monger build Leonin (because their fear resets on a short rest or Asimar for a “better” fear per long rest) and then conquest paladin, and four levels of Archfey warlock for more short rest fear (or the undead if you want a more “per turn” per long rest fear) then getting the pact of the tome and taking Shillelagh so you can JUST use charisma. It was a BLAST having everything reset on a short rest and just having the whole battlefield feared (and rooted when getting to level 7 of Paladin)
I think the best part about these videos is that there's almost always a new take on concepts that most people probably don't think about. Looking forward to how some of the more popular builds will be reimagined under the revised rule set
You are the Mr. Rogers of the DnD community, and I mean that in the most sincere and complimentary way possible. You are exceedingly affable and your voice sounds like butter dripping over the side of a baked potato.
I pretty much made this build back when xanathar's first came out. Only real difference is that I used half-orc, champion, had the mobile feat, and my DM gave me boots of speed and allowed them to stack with the haste spell the wizard would cast on me. Nine and a half rounds of going Cuisinart mode in a tunnel in the Underdark, to buy time for my group to escape the mindflayer's army, before dashing away (with longstrider and expeditious retreat on) before Haste wore off. I might not have done as much damage (even with advantage my rolls are crap) but it was still a lot.
Hey, really enjoyed this week’s video. I totally understand why you would want those free feats that Variant Humans and Custom Lineage gets. Sometimes you don’t have room in the build to get the feats you want. The only reason I do a feat is if I need to even out an Ability Stats or if the stats I wanted to max out is already maxed. So I understand not every build can be a different race. I personally enjoy the builds that are Variant Humans. It gives me ideas on feats that I never thought to use. Like I never use Polearm Master, and I should, it’s a good feat. 😄
I had a thought while listening to this. A Paladin with Polearm master and Crusher can smite on all their attacks and push enemies away with their bonus action attack. And compel duel can encourage the enemy to keep trying to attack you. You could also go variant human to get sentinel to hold them in place
That goes so well with my current works: Construction worker Druid/bard. Spells like entangle, fairy fire, stone wall, transmute mud, spike growth, etc. His inspiration is kind catcalling.
Tunnel Fighter (UA). As a bonus action, you can enter a defensive stance that lasts until the start of your next turn. While in your defensive stance, you can make opportunity attacks without using your reaction, and you can use your reaction to make a melee attack against a creature that moves more than 5 feet while within your reach.
when you mentioned the wildemount book, i was SO SURE youd take cobalt soul monk.. at level 11 they get to spend ki to gain extra reactions. i actually think that with my build here, you go monk 11, then get to rogue 3. sneak attack pairs well here, because it triggers per turn, and you can pay ki to potentially deal out sneak attacks on three or four turns per round, depending on when you get reactions. id go rogue 3 to get a subclass and 2d6 sneak atk damage, and id choose either scout for a potentially life saving disengage reaction, or inquisitive to consistently hit sneak attacks on all of your reaction attacks against an enemy. since monk already has good wisdom, and inquisitives combat skill is insight, it pairs great.
at monk 12 and rogue 4, id imagine mage slayer would pair great, as another way to trigger reactions and shut down key enemies, and ASI would be a good idea too. then rogue 5 for uncanny dodge and sneak attack boost. after this im kinda mixed on. both paths are kinda unhelpful. maybe druid for faerie fire, for a source of advantage? fighter for great weapon fighting style, then get to lvl 3 of either for subclass?
@@DnDDeepDive To be honest you haven't been in my recommends for a couple of Months for whatever reason I stopped watching as much once you got into Boulder Gate builds. You tube stop recommending you for a little while. Glad to see that they're recommending you again.
@DnDDeepDive , I was thinking about how to use the barbarian subclass to boost the reaction theme. Would the Giant Barbarian give more reach to our polearms, helping to trigger more reactions?
Duuude your videos are sooo looong, and i love them because your voice is so soothing, I love your ramblings and your observations on theorycrafting and maths, I find them inspirational for my next characters and you are the perfect intellectual soundtrack for when I am doing trivial tasks and my brain is free to follow something cool
The pure fighter version of this build was what I used in BG3 for Lae'zel. It absolutely rocked my enemies because she was the crowd control, and kept up damage-wise with my bear totem Karlach. This more reaction heavy build sounds fun too!
And for those who want a taste of a feat at first level, The Book of Many Things provides new backgrounds which include feats. The Rewarded/Ruined backgrounds each provide a small list of feats from which to choose. Also, the Giant Foundling background provides an awesome selection of feats . Again, check with your DM if these are available in their game.
The monster slayer ranger from Xanathar’s would be good here. The level 3 slayer’s prey feature allows you to deal an extra D6 damage for the first time you hit it with an attack on EACH turn. This would apply on other creatures’ turns as well.
Fun idea: Start taking your full build vids & make a short afterwards where you attempt the build in bg3, linking the full build in said short. I know it's a lot of work, but it'd cross over your bg3 & your dnd audiences and potentially create more traffic to the full vids!
Your intro reminded me of a build I've always wanted to try but that would need some help from the dm. A pure rogue thief build that uses longbows, getting proficiency from a racial trait or bracers of archery, and uses them by using the ready action to ready an attack against an enemy that is a threat on the condition that they do anything. With your DMs permission, you could use steady aim and stretch the "turn" into "round" to still get advantage on the attack. More importantly, with your DMs permission sometime after you get Use Magic Device at 13th level, get your hands on the Tome of the Stilled Tongue , and if it doesn't already have them, get a 17th lvl wizard to copy Foresight and Shapechange into it. Then every day before it resets cast foresight, maybe into a diamond spell gem or using extended spell if you can get metamagic adept, even if you need to dip into a caster class one lvl, and when you get into a fight, use shapechange to turn into a Marilith. The way Ready is worded, if you ready an attack against ANY creature that moves, there's nothing to stop you from making a different attack on EACH turn that any hostile creature moves with the Mariliths Reactive trait. And if Foresight is still up, each of those attacks is guaranteed to have Sneak Attack damage unless there's a source of disadvantage that isn't negated by the Mariliths 120 ft Truesight. And be sure to get expertise in perception and intimidation so you can truly lock down anyone and everyone in your sights with the threat of an arrow through the eye.
Thanks for the detail in all your videos. We can watch in 2x if they get too long ;) Be nice to have a final summary chart of you ratings of the character at level 7, 9 13 20 or whatever to see how it would potentially perform in different campaigns and cross compare to other builds. but maybe that's all in your expanded content?
Another way that makes reactions really helpful is through the prepare action and the teleportation spells, since you can use it to get away from area of effects like fireballs, breath attacks, anything, and if the spell is freedom of the waves, or thunder step, or even steel wing attack, you can do so while at the same time causing damage. What's even better, it turns spells like scatter or warping vortex from niche into surprisingly efficient protection either for the whole party or a party member (unless you use the warping vortex in the opponent so they look to the opposite direction where you are when they fire their cones, in which case, it's also a full party protection that can be saved). I tried it with my wild magic kobold sorcerer, and it's one of my favourite builds, since it feels like the whole "think with portals" deal I thought the horizon walker ranger would be about.
Colby, challange build: make build where you combine and exploid 2 heavy obscurement spells at the same time! (Hint: pyrotechnics doesn't require concentration)
For third level barbarian I really thought you would go path of giant because that increases your reach by 5ft so with Halbert you would have 15 ft reach and getting reaction when anyone comes within 15ft or out of 15ft that make it very hard for enemies to avoid getting an Opportunity Attack
My concern there was we don’t get to take a normal opportunity attack until they move out of our range. With a 15’ reach that gives an enemy a lot of space to move around in without triggering it, ya know?
This is a folk duo so no need for the changing of any minds 😉 they are remarkable and I think more people should know about them. They are called Roswell you should check them out; the track Restless is particularly fantastic.
Battle Master 15's Relentless feature doesn't offer much at first glance, but reminder to all that this level also gives us 2 more Maneuvers and 1 more Maneuver Die. This is the last point at which you gain maneuvers or dice. Then Relentless is just a bit of icing on the cake for at least 1 per combat. Assuming we always had enough dice for Reaction attacks, having 1 more at max and minimum for every fight means that we always have a nova round in the tank. Which is completely unaccounted for on this mostly Fighter build that isn't calculating for Action Surge. With Str capped, we have a good chance of landing Trip Attack at the start of our turn, and can then proceed to make 5 more GWM attacks at advantage. Sure, we had a way to generate advantage with Reckless Attack, but we won't realistically always want to use that. Rage Resistance won't always be relevant against our enemies, and we only have 2-3 Rages to use. More importantly, Trip Attack can generate advantage for our allied melee attackers, leading to one seriously screwed over target. Damage of course isn't the only thing we can do. Menacing Attack is amazing to work in, and at this point we could have Goading too if enemies are Immune Frightened. BM 15 is also a good reason to push monoclass Fighter assuming the table sticks to Reckless' limitation off turn. It's a bit bold to build around Reaction attacks and take not only GWM, but also the Barb 2 dip! I appreciate Rage adding to the damage, but we're losing an attack from PAM to activate it, and increasing our Str sooner would have likely been better. I'd definitely dump Dex if I were making this character to work in 15+2 Str to set us up for a half feat, and it would be Dragon Fear with some extra Cha (14). This allows the racial selection to hold its weight a fair bit more as we crowd the initial Reaction attack with friends. I know we can't replace an attack with Dragon Fear like with Fizban's, and we're only getting one use per rest rather than PB/day. It's still that powerful of a control ability to me, overriding a plain Str ASI, getting us social skill prowess, and playing into our strategy perfectly. If every monster approaches us within the first round or two, we don't get anymore mileage out of Brace/PAM's Reaction attack. If we lock out MOST the enemies on the battlefield from approaching until we start to pummel them, then we could preserve a ton of resources. It's not every fight that we'll be able to move up and start swinging from Reach right from round 1. Enemies need to be within 40ft for that, and we easily could overextend ourselves. Especially with less Rages per combats in a day. Dragon Fear is a 30ft Radius around us to affect enemies that are 60ft away at the start of our turn. If they're further than that? Well, we might not be getting a Reaction attack that way, and could opt either way to Ready our Action to make a Dragon Fear breath attack. Even if enemies Dash to get into melee range with us, we could stop them short of their goal.
Since we focus on opportunity attacks, why not grab war caster? A quick dip or high elf lets us replace our opportunity attack with a booming blade. Stay out of barb, but benefit from the extra AC for riposte. There's also Sentinel rogue with a dash of echo fighter. Surround your enemy with your echo. Or grab a whip and position the echo floating out of reach of the enemy but over their path to the most enticing target. A little more technical to set up, but so many d6s. As is, reckless+gwm is the bulk of the damage, which is certainly tried and true, but getting the most out of a reaction attack is a different build altogether.
I'm having a lot of fun as a Centaur 2 weapon fighting style Rune Knight armed with a maul. It means I get a bonus action attack every turn (hooves) as well as my maul attack all with my strength bonus
Tunnel fighter for the fighter is unearthed arcana but base DnD Beyond has it as an option for rogue when they get to third level. This would also give you sneak attack damage and a more reliable source of advantage. It is a three level dip though which definitely is a fairly large downside
i'd love to see a build that really tries to take advantage of the whisper bard's quasi sneak attack with its bardic inspiration. I think you used it in the lockadin a long time again but I'd love to see what you could achieve while still trying to maintain the theme of the whispers bard (a bunch of damage in one attack/sneaky/whathaveyou). Apologies if this is something you already did
Loved the video, reminds me of a creative build i made based on lucky and portent dice....kinda like some sorta "fatecaster"..lots of reactions. Also, your background is missing BG3 pizzazz and would be a warm addition.
Hi Colby! Have you thought about using Summon Fey (Tricksy) to create an small area of darkness on a target as a way to force him to move, while using some way to see in the darkness. This build could also use echo knight to get an opportunity attack on a target away from us using the mencioned strategy. Could you try and make a build around that someday? Thanks in advance! :)
I'm playing as a Goliath Fighter Psi Warrior and I'm always using my reaction & Bonus action each round which is nice yet its better because I took the Heavy Armor Master feat I'm reducing damage for allies as well which if a party has temp & max hp increase as well as healing covered then damage reduction is always available!
You know what pissed my DM more than my battlemaster halberdier using PAM + sentinel to stop then at 10ft? Him tripattacking the enemy and also leaving them flat and helpless for an entire turn
If you're playing a level 20 one shot and want to try a crazy reaction focused character, ask your dm if the reaction from war caster and the OA from polearm master can combine to work with eldritch blast. If so, go cavalier fighter 18/warlock 2, take those 2 feats, the blind fighting style, the agonizing+repelling blast combo, and keep a glaive/halberd/pike in hand. Now, every turn an enemy gets within 10 feet of you, eldritch blast them away up to 40 feet away and reduce their movement to 0. Have fun!
Sadly this doesn't work. Warcaster says you can cast a spell instead of making an opportunity attack. Sentinel requires an opportunity attack to function. Regardless echo knight warlock is a staple for being one of the most potent 'keep off me' builds.
I've been watching your channel for years now and I love every build you make! I've recently rewatched the soul knife rogue builds and all of your bladesinger builds again and it got me thinking. Could you make a build that combined the two and was still viable? Maybe not because of the dumb way the psychic blade is worded, but they are my two favorite subclasses and I think it could be so fun! I've had so many ideas on how to build it but all of them I feel like would sadly require the dm to tweak things to actually make it work
Hmm Thri-kreen shadowblade+normal weapon+psychic blade dipping paladin (optional) and echoknight. Normal weapon+attack cantrip, than shadowblade attack with extra attack and in order to keep the psychic blade dual wielding sequence active we can rely on either haste or unleash incarnation. That should give a few ideas.😜
I'm playing mostly as a DM and there is no combo which frustrates me. If the PCs run wild with “silvery barb” there will be a NPC who does the same. And the “polearm master” + “sentinel” combo I put recently on some gladiators which my players had to face. Fair game. 😈
Now I curious what the best burst overreacter build would be, since this probably significantly changes class choice, due to rogue and paladin. (Hmm arcane trickster/paladin with blind sense inside a heavily obscurred area with a whip and sentinel, yeah I wanna see this, Could you build it Colby?)
Hmmmm... Interesting build but what about a build focused on Tiny Servant and Possibly Crusader's Mantle? The Mantle would basically double the damage output of your Tinies. If you throw in (somehow) the Darkness spell then all their attacks would be at advantage because they all have Blindsight out to 60 feet. Also I think RAW you could just give then one command at the start of the day and they would continue to try and do that command. So have they ride someone then give the standing order to "Attack hostile creatures." I think that would work. But I don't know if that is at all possible with all the concentration spells.
I got a rules question suddenly. Does the Echo Knight Duplicate trigger Sentinel's Opportunity Attack clause for attacking someone other than the Sentinel? Cause if so... that might be fun. Use your knight to bait attacks and react to them...
Have you ever considered making a build using thief rogue throwing either oil or acid? Grab tavern brawler to get proficiency with thrown vials and go from there. I think grabbing 2 levels of artificer would be a must to be able to get an alchemy jug, as well as green flame blade to both get the extra damage from the oil vials as well as trigger sneak attack.
19:00 based on your other 'how often will this happen' builds, you're so much closer to 100% than any of the other builds. You've done sustained damage for spirit guardians and it's less likely you'll have multiple enemies in the aoe than this. Same with your dragging through spike growth or 'will we have someone available for Telekinetic Push'. I think you could have done a full 100%
Tldr: fight with a melee buddy. I've been playing essentially this over the last 6 months and gotten up to level 9. Main difference is I was playing as a minotaur to have essentially a free pushing attack with hammering horns. I can say first hand that 90 percent is a safe bet that you'll be using your reaction as long as you're fighting alongside another melee buddy. If you don't have a buddy, it probably drops closer to 50 or 60 percent and then even lower when you run out of superiority dice.
I have a (still vague) concept for knight minotaur called Loyn, who insists that you apply the Sir title of his as well. 1 of his catchphrases is "that ain't no meat off my back" 😂😂 With a noble background merchant friend called Reel Pryce.
been watching for awhile love your vids best wishes to you and the family. But wouldnt the reckless attack be negative to the build since the enemy would have advantage against you so more than likely not able to trigger risposte. And also yes i was a liara guy also
Potentially, yep. Admittedly, we’ve got so many other ways to get a reaction attack I’m not *too* worried about it, but this might drop our likelihood of an attack by a few %
Does sentinel plus trip-attack mean the enemy stays prone until their next turn? You knock them prone, and reduce their speed to 0. They don’t have any movement left to spend to stand up.
I really dig this idea, though I am experimenting with an alt human version. That give pole arm master at level 1 and sentinel at 4th. My question is at level 6, would +2 to str be stronger than great weapon master. Being honest, I feel sacrificing that once per rest reaction is totally worth it to open up polearm master reactions from level 1.
Can you explain your love to me about elven accuracy? As a fellow optimizer I’ve crunched the numbers and sustained the DPR even if you have a way to have advantage for both attacks every round is marginal over 4 rounds. I do love the flavour of the feat but I really don’t find it that powerful outside of Rogue with an odd Dex and a pile of sneak attack dice.
