Top 5 MORE Underrated But Awesome Subclasses In D&D 

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"Suggest a Prince gives you his prized steed, and forget he ever did so." *gets steed, causes Prince to forget* Prince: "What are you doing with my steed!? GUARDS ARREST THEM!"

I made a major villain in a campaign an Enchantment Wizard and he instilled a healthy amount of paranoia for the party with his antics.

I play a Path of the Beast Barbarian currently in a campaign and its a great time! Small correction, you can make the extra attacks with your claws as long as *either* of your hands are empty, you don't need both empty. This is especially good when you go with a dual wielding build, as you can have a real weapon in one hand and still get your extra claw attack!

Knowledge Cleric: 0:06 Beast Barbarian: 2:15 Ascendant Dragon Monk: 7:06 Enchantment Wizard: 10:55 College of Spirits Bard: 14:16

Way of the Ascendent Dragon sounds like what people wanted out of Way of the Four Elements.

Enchantment is one of my favourite wizard subclasses. Also, undeniably the most evil. A necromancer will use your body to kill your friends, an enchanter will make you kill your friends and you'll thank them for it

Modify memory also seems like a fantastic spell for the enchantment wizard and their split enchantment. Changing what one witness saw can get you out of a jam, changing what two saw can rewrite history

Knowledge Domain Clerics 0:08 Beast Barbarian 02:17 Way of the Ascendant Dragon Monk 07:08 Enchanment Wizards 10:53 College of Spirits of Bard 14:16

4:29 or you target the bodyguard NEXT TO the spellcaster, making them attack the spellcaster dealing damage if it hits, likely taking a spell slot as the caster puts up a shield cus they know how powerful their bodyguard is, and taking both of their reactions

My current character is a Way of the Ascendant Dragon Monk, a Kobold who wants to become a Dragon, its been a constant source of amusement imagining a tiny 3 foot kobold flying past on spectral wings barfing fire exclaiming 'I'm a Dragon!'

"Are candles scary?" May I introduce you to the Greek Lampades, whom follow Hecate, the goddess of witchcraft, and carried torches, lanterns, or CANDLES that is said to drive mortals insane upon being looked at. The Lampades took great pleasure in doing this, often going out of their way in groups to play "pranks", often causing mass hysteria and even free-for-all bloodbaths.

I had the opportunity to play with a high level Enchanter Wizard and let me say I was _not_ ready for how strong they were. The entire table was stunned the moment he ended a huge encounter by dropping a Mass Suggestion and forcing an entire warband of enemies to take a hike for eight hours.

I am so glad we are back to the goofy content I love! I Hope they won’t mess up so bad in the future…

For Beast Barbarian I like to take the Unarmed Fighting style to never need to carry a weapon. Also maybe take a level in monk for a BA attack. If you take Way of the Ascendant Dragon with it you don’t have to go with 6 levels in Monk for your unarmed strikes to be magical and gives you 5 additional damage types (you can also make your bite claw and tail attacks dragon themed)

I'm playing a Spirits Bard in Curse of Strahd. Playing as a Vistani and definitely has great flavor for it.

Thank you for the love for College of Spirits Bard. I’m in my first campaign and using this subclass and I think it’s amazing.

Regarding the Beast Barbs Claws: it says that both hands transform and that you can use them as natural weapons, if free. It doesn't say that both need to be free for that extra attack, meaning you can make all attacks with one claw and carry a shield in the other hand

I run D&D games for people all over the world and have played for years, and I have never seen any of these subclasses played more than once, except number 2 which I think is played a little more than the others but not nearly enough! What subclasses do you think are underrated?

The knowledge cleric and the enchantment wizard are definitely underrated, they can be two of the most powerful classes in 5e if they are played properly.

Rabbitfolk beast barbarian's boosted jump is so much fun

I really enjoy the divine soul sorcerer. Any class that can play way more support than you expect is always fun.

I feel quite vindicated because these are all subclasses that I've either recently played or convinced a friend to try out and we had so much fun

I played a beast barbarian for icewinddale. It was so much fun. It could use a little more flexibility, but the flavor is damn near msg levels.

This actually made me realize that knowledge cleric would be a great 1 level dip for a druid to get expert Nature and Religion/Arcana

7:08 - Currently playing a Dragon Monk and it was EXACTLY what I have waited for. The character was originally a Brawler in Pathfinder 1 and had the Elemental Fist feat line (for fire) qnd this subclass brings that vibe. Add the Gunner Feat (or a bow if you are basic) and you can fly, unload your shots as you sail past the enemies without them being able to hit you. It is amazing.

Actually, that Monk subclass sounds fun. I’ve been working on a Monk/Barbarian mix, so I’ll remember that Dragon goodness for later. Thanks, man!

Played a knowledge domain cleric multiclassed into a battlesmith artificer in a campaign once. Will never forget that one, it was one of the most fun characters I ever played

Beast barbarian is great for Tabaxi. Pair it with an Eldritch Claw Tattoo.

I love that you started out with the Knowledge domain. With the baseline Cleric abilities, it's impossible to build a useless Cleric, but they tend to be strongest in combat. Knowledge domain goes a long ways toward filling in the non-combat portion of their toolbox.

Agreed on the list there! And as a fresh D.M I update the Way of As.Dragon monk and Drake Warden from FizbanToD, alongside the Draconic Bloodline Sorcerer from PlayerH.B, so ALL three of these include Gem dragon dmg/ resistance types/drake apperance aswell ( Force, Necrotic, Psychic, Radiant, Thunder ) which is obvious to me that should have been OFFICIALY updated in especially Fizban T.oD.

Our campaign had a knowledge cleric named doc ter. Kept using doctor who references had a sonic screwdriver which was just a multi form tool kit. That changed shape to act as any toolkit needed.

Of all the videos and shorts youve done sir, this by far my favorite one. So glad you threw in the role-playing aspects of these classes as well. Because.. so many players forget that D&D IS a role-playing game. Bravo and cheers mate!

What's nice about Hypnotic Gaze is that it isn't really limited at all, if the creature succeeds their saving throw or the effect ends it can't be used on them again for a certain amount of time, but you can just try it again on a different creature, and you can do that over and over again at no cost, it's basically an infinite mini hypnotic pattern that requires your action to keep up but DOESN'T require your concentration!

"Do you have hypnotic gay guys back there?" My entire group, hiding underneath the table: "He's found us."

Fun Fact: You can use and maintain the Enchantment Wizard's Hypnotic Gaze ability while Raging. Another Fun Fact is that you can use the bonus action attack from the Fathomless Warlock's Tentacle of the Deep or from the Spiritual Weapon spell to maintain Rage if you do not take damage in a round. At level 4 (1 Barb/2 Enchantment/1 Fathomless) you can make your DM apoplectic by round 1 running up to the biggest baddie, hypnotizing them, raging to take half damage and then keeping them locked down until all the minions are dead while slapping things with your tentacle. Add in Armor of Agathys and Gift of the Gem Dragon and you can just stand there doing nothing, raging, while magic abilities dish out damage for you.

I just realized that Breath of the Dragon is extra awesome if you do a stunning strike first, because stunned targets automatically fail dexterity saving throws.

I got to play a way of the ascendant dragon monk for 2 sessions before the OGL thing and our group switched to Pathfinder. It was a lot of fun. The breath weapon is pretty underpowered but the flavor is so cool, and there's a lot of potential for creativity with them since most of the abilities don't eat your ki. My only complaint was the nerfs from the unearthed arcana. I don't know why they did it, the UA version was not at all unbalanced.

Path of the beast is so sick. Its my favorite sub class.

I'm playing an ascendant dragon monk and I'm fairly certain the wings unfurled can be spent just on the "step of the wind" trigger. So you can also disengage as a bonus action if need be and just fly away.

Agreed about enchantment wizard. Straight up my go to subclass when making a wizard.

Love the Dragon Monk! Played one recently and had a great time, though it was only the Phandelver module, so only reached level 5 right at the end. Looking forward to a chance to continue with that character.

I actually made a character that was gonna be an Ascendant Dragon monk, but ended up never being used due to our DM cancelling the campaign for a Harry Potter Dungeon game.

I just finished a two year campaign where I played a College of Spirits Bard. I was a nomadic exorcist priest. That subclass is wonderful for a utility caster.

I love the longer videos so much. Especially when I get to see the absolute banger ad segments

I'm excited for the regular content again! Here's to many more happy hours of goofy and blatantly broken d&d combos! Love your stuff Will!

I dunno if you touched on this in an earlier part of this "series", but... Way of the Shadow is like REALLY cool to play if you're multiclassing Rogue with Monk.

So happy to see another of your fun videos!

Bro that ad was actually 10000/10 I always watch your full vids including ads they are always amazing

I shouldn’t think “hypnotic gays” is as funny as I do. 😂

I have a pure Enchantment Wizard! Focused on psychic powers! She's inspired by Emma Frost and has been really fun to play. Love her =^.^=

I play a Tabaxi way of the ascendant dragon monk, the movement speed is crazy, 45 feet ATM, double that with cats grace, then I can move 180 feet using step of the wind and still attack at the end, 270 feet if I just want to run away lol; also, I found out you can use breath of the dragon as a 20 foot circle aoe if you use your spectral wings to fly 20 feet up and fire a cone directly down, really gives some avatar vibes when you pull stuff like that off

Hi, I'm currently playing a half-orc Ascendant Dragon monk. What attracted me to the sub class was the martial arts cries the use when fighting. They shout out things like Biff, Kapow or Sock (I save the last one for kicks), so they are doing the verbal equivalent of the 60's Batman TV series fight scenes. That's right, I'm playing Bat-monk! His name is Adaam Ouest and his melee weapon is a didgeridoo which doubles as a quarterstaff. Oh, and he throws polished dragon scales like batarangs.

I wonder if there's any synergy with Path of the Beast Barbarians and Dhampirs with their bite attacks. 🤔

Honestly the Path of the Beast barb jump effect can be pretty insane. You can get pretty insane hops out of that and make short work of any challenge involving a large gap. If your party needs to cross a bridge but it's trapped or there are enemies on the other side guarding it, your barbarian can easily jump 40+ ft (20 STR+20 total result on the Athletics check) and possibly cross the gap to break their defences long enough for the rest of the party to charge in while their attention is turned toward the raging were-beast that just jumped the gorge, and that alone makes for a pretty awesome fantasy to play out.

Pact of the chain Warlock + Scourge aasimar... take the Gift of The Ever Living one's feat, and you gain damage buffs from scourge (while hurting yourself) but always get max heals from any spells or potions from the feat... basically buffs your glass cannon warlock, and means you can ignore any damage that doesn't insta kill you by just healing and not having to worry about rolling a 1 on your heal

Finally, someone else appreciates ascendent dragon monks. I don't know why people don't use them more, as the damage selection for you unarmed attacks is great in a lot of scenarios, such as bypassing physical damage resistances or simply doubling damage against enemies that have elemental weaknesses (also the breath attack damage increases to 3 rolls of the martial arts die at lv11)

If someone does not now create a Hypnotic Gays spell, I will be deeply disappointed.

Love the epic dramatic chops in the ad.

I love my college of spirits bard. Whenever I use my Tales from beyond, I flavor it as an actual ghost appears and hovers around me. When used, the ghost will enter the person that receives the benefit. Makes my spooky fortune teller, medium even spookier

My party has both a knowledge domain cleric and a divination wizard. I have prepared so many encounters that they just completely avoided or invalidated, it's great.

My Path of the Beast Barb Hobgoblin has been a stomp fest with the Saving face features - love that you're giving it some more love!

You don’t know how much I needed this tonight. Love your channel, really thinking about getting one of those beanies!

Love your stuff. I’m so glad to see you making content again.

I've had a blast playing an ascendant dragon monk! Took a few levels in ranger bc the party needed someone who could handle a gun, and ended up going with the drakewarden subclass for EVEN MORE DRAGON. Having a couple spells and a familiar in battle definitely rounds out some of its weaknesses, but ascendant dragon monk is worth it for flavor and cool factor alone imo.

Dhampir Beast Barbarian is the most fun Ive had in any D&D game. Not only do you get to make all the Morbius jokes but dropping from the ceiling with 4 reckless attack lets you out-monster the monsters. So good.

I think I’m sold of playing a Knowledge Cleric next campaign. The mind-reading/auto suggestions is crazy. Good shit!

Honestly a HUGE fan of Knowledge domain cleric. Played one once before and acted like the tank/support/utility of the group in this dark underground water world trying to learn the mysteries of where we lived. And knowledge was power there. Was a blast of a game using all sorts of tool skills to craft boats, learn lore, and create crazy contraptions for crazy antics.

Honestly, this just cemented my love for Path of the Beast Barbarian. I never really thought of the class being that interesting (except for the Wild Magic Barbarian, which is a treat), but one of my favorite characters i ever built was a Simic Hybrid POB Barbarian/Inquisitive Rogue The backstory was that he was a genetically engineered infantry soldier for a colony (they were all based on ants). With that build you could climb or swim whenever you wanted, attack three times per turn with the claws, plus close range sneak attack damage with Insightful Fighting (From Inquisitive). So, at level 20, every turn this build could deal +50 pts of damage every round. Yes, Totem Barbarians have resistance to all damage, but with a Shield and Tail up, you could reliably shrug off most hits with 0 damage and a reach attack.

For beast barbarian I have a idea for a pirate dwarf I have in mind. He was once apart of a mighty army but had to leave or was kicked out (still working on that part of his backstory.) and he didn't know anything outside of fighting so he joined a pirates crew. He learned his way around a ship and the sea fairing ways quickly and enjoyed this new life for a time till they were attacked by adventurerers paid to get rid of them. The entire crew died and he was about to drown, exhausted and severely injured he couldn't swim any longer and his body failed him. He sank into the depths of the sea thinking this is it till he heard a voice in his head. A second chance. He made a deal with a mysterious being at the depths of the ocean and was able to live tusks to it. After recovering he eventually went back to land and swore to get revenge for his old crew but also succeed where they failed. He'll become a pirate and a mighty one, own that doesn't just steal and kill but also rule and become a legend. After making a deal with the being he would be able to shift parts of his body to help him in battle. The tail would be a tentacle and the claws, also tentacles but more then one. The bite a beak, ones octopuses have. Also thinking of going a few levels into fathomlees warlock for the surviving part to make sense I guess but I think I'll just go straight barbarian.

After watching this video, I had an amazing idea for a ridiculously fun multi-class character. Loxodon Beast Barbarian/Drunken Master Monk. Form of the beast weapons are considered simple melee weapons, and therefore monk weapons, which means it can benefit from both rage and martial arts. The AC bonus from the tail can help compensate for reckless attack. The loxodon trunk acts as an unarmed weapon, and can be used as a snorkel while swimming, taking care of the big bonus of the first of the Bestial Soul effect, which leaves you free to use the second effect all the time, and when combined with level 9 unarmored movement means that the only thing you can't do is fly. Throw in feats like Alert to compliment Feral Instinct, Mobile because you'll be moving around a lot and the extra movement will compensate for splitting Monk levels, along with Barbarian Fast Movement, Shield Master to help with shoving and dex saves (and shields can be dropped), and Tough to compensate for splitting Barbarian levels HP. Loxodon Serenity grants advantage against being charmed or frightened, which means you're using an action to use Stillness of Mind less often, but it's there if you need. I'd say 11 levels of monk and 9 levels of Barbarian at max level, but long before that, you'll be a Rampaging Pink Elephant.

What a great Video! Thanks for these nice round ups.

So glad to have these videos back.

I’m currently playing a path of the beast barbarian, and have found that they have a great combo with longtooth shifters, as comboing your claws with your bite allows you to make 4 attacks, and since its not two weapon fighting you still add strength to damage on the bonus action bite. Furthermore, the claws only require 1 free hand to use the extra attack, so you can use a shield and still gain the full benefit of 4 attacks without requiring the two weapon fighting style to keep up in damage. Also thematically, the combo of the long tooth shifter bite attack with the barbarian claws means you’re pretty much a full on werewolf at that point, and can truly rip and tear.

Absolutely want to try all of these.

I run a knowledge domain cleric / divination wizard in a Theros setting with the Oracle boon and the scholar background. It is such a great combination for lore delving and plot piece solving.

I played a Beast Barbarian Archaeologist for Candlekeep, she wasn't optimized, but it was a game we had maybe 3 rounds of combat over 6 sessions. Nesali had 16 Int and a +11 History check. But also, she was a barbarian... so she had tons of HP compared to the rest of the party for the rare times we had to fight. Narratively, we decided her Beast path was a yuan-ti malison mutation. I've also played a Dhampir Spirits Bard in some of Beth the Bard's playtests for some adventures. It's quite fun. And one of Nesali's party members was a goblin spirit bard.

Multi-Subclass: Defender of the Green (Tank, Lv 9) Moon Druid (6)/Ranger Hunter (3) We want 12, 14, 17, 8, 15, 8 for Stats to start and take 1 Con, 1 Wis at Lv. 4 Moon Druid is mostly to get the deeper pool of Wildshape for HP sponging. Any flavour of Druid works for this, really. At Ranger 2, take Defensive Fighting for +1 AC, then at 3 take Hunter for Horde Breaker. This gives you 19 AC at Level 9, without any bonuses from armour, shield, misc., 90+ HP(+2 Combat Wild Shapes) and enough slots for AoE CC spells to drive your DM (and party) insane. Throw in being a Warforged, the Warcaster Feat, a +3 between Armour and Shield and you've got a 23 AC, plus some nice immunities.

Magic Domain cleric is another awesome subclass. The spellbreaker feature at 6th level is very useful against enemy casters who have debuffed your allies.

The first character I ever played was a knowledge cleric. The DM mistook him for a wizard a few time because of the high rolls in history and arcana I was getting. And that became the running joke in the party for quite some time.

I used the knowledge domain with the OneDnD cleric. With the knowledge domain's expertise and the holy order (scholar), at lvl 15, i had a +12 in 4 skills, investigation, nature, arcana and history, it was insane

Three points- Enchantment Wizards tend to use Manacles and rope to get the best out of the Gaze so having a familiar or summon that can help with that is a must. (Note that knotting the rope you familiar wrapped them in is not going to allow a reaction) also this is not concentration effect. So. It makes a great back up if you need to pick up the last enemy that saved hypnotic pattern and is still intent on hitting you to break the spell. Knowledge domain + Soulknife means you are able to use all skills and tools and have a huge chance to be effective for 10 minutes at a time. Dragon Monk - originally they flew until the end of your next turn but they removed that because they realized that if you can slow fall. So fly dash fly up to the silly dragon (90ft at base) stunning strike them midair. And then slow fall. Not only can they do a nice amount of damage to fliers in similar fashion regularly because KI points come back on a short rest. (They are still not at par but hey you be a monk mostly to look good :) )

I really enjoy these long-form videos!!!

One if my best PCs was a knowledge cleric. Sadly i forgot to get components before we got dropped into avernus, and... well... we never got more supplies. Still, she was the best soccer mom the team ever had. Im proud of her. She made a cameo appearance recently and gave a new group PC a tome about how to wear medium armor properly. The same tome that she used to master the wear of medium armor, which started her off with 19AC at level 1 when the game first started hehe Edit: oooo I had an enchantment wizard too! That was a one shot though. He was a clown. It was hilarious.

Your in-video ads are the best. I never skip them.

I've just started playing a spirit bard after taking two levels in divination wizard. Hoping to get a Darren Brown feel to it, particularly after taking the telepathic feat to really help me get my readings accurate!

Hi! I discovered your videos thanks to the whole WOTC drama and really enjoy how you break down DnD into easy to understand videos. I was wondering, do you have any plans to discuss artificers in more detail? I'm thinking about creating an artificer character but I'm having trouble deciding what subclasses and/or multiclass to use for them. I think you have the expertise that would be most useful for determining good builds, or how to make "bad builds" become usable. Have a great day, and I look forward to watching all the other videos on your channel ^.^

Loving these. Keep it up!

Played recently in a oneshot with my Path of The Beast Barbarian. She was a knight in some small order dedicated to destroying undead but due to overestimating her abilities, wish to show her devotion and some misfortune she was turned into a dhampire and was forced to run and hide. Her "beast" form is basically her monstrosity form (like light version of vampire lord from Elder Scrolls) and her "class abilities" are ways to survive and thrive of her monstrous self which she learns to control. I think it's a nice blend of class and race together :) So much pleasure to create, roleplay and fight with her :)

I haven't watched the video but since the last one of this gave me a entire character that I loved (light domain Cleric), I'm already starting a new character sheet

I played a Locothath Beast Barbarian for a while, built for grappling. There was another player who pumped into strength and Charisma, and played a barefisted Fighter/Bard as a Luchador. We actually had a few fights where we would tag in and out with Disengage and take turns soloing enemies, with the other staying just out of range and using the Help command. So much fun and nonsense

Haha, oh my gosh, I don't think I ever expected to see a commissioned art piece of one of my D&D characters on a RU-vid cover! Nice! Roderick Elsworth, Knowledge Cleric and Chronurgy Wizard Extraordinaire. He was lovely fun to play. His lantern was (is?) his spell focus!

Hell yeah, Knowledge Cleric is my absolute favorite subclass to play! Good to see it getting a little acknowledgement!

YASSSS KING. Back at it again with the classic vids. Bless!

Ill always love ascendant dragon monk because it allows you to bonus action dash 100ft up in the air, fall onto an enemy, force a dex save or split the fall damage between the two, and you can just featherfall your side of the damage away. you can use mobile to augment that movement speed and stop them from taking opportunity attacks, use mind sliver to subtract from their saving throw, or it's also good when a party member has restrained a target with a spell.

Dude all my respect to you for using a clip from the Dads Army movie👍👍

Love these ideas. Plan to try them in the future. Also, like he misheard "Hypnotic Gaze", I first misheard him say candle as "Ken Doll".

The extra cool thing about the Spirits Bard to me is that you can retain the Tale you tell until you use it or finish a rest, it doesn't require concentration or anything to keep it in mind you just keep until it's spent, I think it mitigates the randomness of the Wild Surge type classes by letting you decide how to use it. You can also roll it well before combat even begins and decide when in the day to use it. I'm kinda cheating in my game, I play a Spirit Bard that is also a ghost who doesn't need to take short or long rests so long as I don't use up all my resources, so I can just kind keep the tales for however long I want.

If your DM lets you work in Simic Hybrid as something setting specific for a non-Ravnica game, the Path of Beast is a great way to explore being a weird body horror hero; Circle of Spore druid is also fun for leaning into that sort of 'oh gross' stuff if you get creative in describing how your spells get cast from your body and how you use spell components.

I played a spirit bard and it was super fun. Also took Find Greater Stead so by myself could get lvl 2 spells with the spirit session.