D&D5e Characters-What has worked for you?

[Fred Brackin]

I've committed to another 5e game ( Storm King's Thunder) and I'm not at all sure what kind of character to make. All I know is that I want to do something different from last time which was a Half-Orc Barbarian who was raised by wolves (which worked very well).

I've looked though the Player's Guide but have come up with only vague ideas. I'm looking first for something that's basically functional but then I need some sort of "shiny" element to hang the character on.

Last time the Half-Orc and the Barbarian were the mechanically strong combo but it was the Raised by Wolves that set the character's personality.

This would only be my second 5e character though I took the last one to the end of the adventure (Curse of Strahd) at level 10. I know some of you have more experience than that. So what has worked (or not worked) for you?

[L.J.Steele]

I ended up with a Half-Orc Fighter in our last D5 game because I said to myself: (1) what classic DnD race haven't I played, and (2) what character class haven't I played -- never had done a 1/2 orc, or a pure fighter.

Next might have to be a dwarf. The group has bad history with a dwarf druid, so maybe a dwarf bard (rock music, of course...)

[RyanW]

If I ever play D&D again I will probably play against type. Something like a half-orc lawful good cleric or a halfling fighter.

I really can't comment on effectiveness, as I've played D&D in one campaign (which might have actually been Pathfinder, now that I think about it) and maybe three or four one-shots, all between 2004 and 2011.

[tanksoldier]

As I understand it the whole point of 5e is to eliminate the “best build” strategy. There are supposed to be multiple avenues to effective characters,with no option a must have or must not have.

The only combination I’ve read about so far that seems to break that is the half orc fighter/champion with great axe... the half orc gets to roll one additional weapon damage die on a critical, champion doubles critical range and the axe rolls 1d12 for damage instead of 2d6 so gets to roll one d12 instead of one d6.... and it isn’t that big of an advantage mathematically.

However I’m going to play my first 5e game next weekend so I don’t have any direct experience.... but I’ll be playing a half orc fighter, a choice I made before discovering the above, so we’ll see.

[Fred Brackin]

It's not a re-roll. It's an add. Like the Barbarian's Brutal Critical ability at 9th level. I was rolling 4D12 crits late in curse of Strahd.

Then the Reckless trait let me attack with advantage by giving my opponents Advantage attacking me. I made out better on the deal than they did. :)

Then you add in Frenzy from Path of the Berzerker and you get another attack. You can't do it all the time because you get a level of exhaustion but after you get a feel for picking out the biggest encounter of the day it's a great bonus.

I had spotted the Fighter/Champion's Improved Crit and thought about leveraging it with dual-wielding but it's also be helped by the Half-Orc;s ability and I wanted to get a little farthr away from my old character than that.

[mlangsdorf]

For power builds, necromancer wizards at 5th level can juggle the durations of repeated castings of Animate Dead so they can have 3 or 4 instances up at the same time for roughly 12 hours. Walking around with 24 skeletal minions is surprisingly effective at that level. (I think that's how it works, but exact details may be wrong).

One of the top PCs at my table were a Storm Cleric in heavy armor with the Sentinel feat: it made a reasonable tank/aggro attractor, giving monsters the option of attacking someone else and taking a Sentinel hit or attacking the cleric a getting Storm Retribution. Past 5th level, any cleric can cast Spiritual Guardians and wreck stuff in melee range, but Storm Clerics can also cast Call Lightning, which is a pretty nasty spell in outdoor combat.

I also saw a sneaky archery assassin be effective, by scouting ahead, starting fights with the a big critical hit attack, and then kiting survivors back to the storm Cleric and pals.

The most effective thing our party ever got was 4 NPC paladin retainers. We were about 8th level and they were about 5th, but they still doubled our damage output and gave us a lot of tactical flexibility. We had to coddle them a bit and throw potions and healing spells their way, but they were worth it. Take any opportunity you can to recruit NPC retainers and followers, because having several more friendlies in a fight makes a huge difference.

[tanksoldier]

It's not a re-roll. It's an add. Like the Barbarian's Brutal Critical ability at 9th level. I was rolling 4D12 crits late in curse of Strahd.

Corrected it

[DocRailgun]

How about a High Elf (so you get a cantrip for free - maybe Fire Bolt) fighter who will become (or is, if you start higher then 3rd level) an Eldritch Knight. Their gimmick is that despite being a fighter they refuse to use weapons (though they might wear heavy armor and carry a shield) - only magic in combat. Luckily, blasting things is all an Eldritch Knight can do.

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

I've looked though the Player's Guide but have come up with only vague ideas. I'm looking first for something that's basically functional but then I need some sort of "shiny" element to hang the character on.

5th edition is a much different beast than 3rd or Pathfinder - in 3.5 there was no reason not to take a level of monk if just to be able to use a Monk's Belt someday, and fighter levels were just for certain feats needed for the best prestige classes. There's no reason to do that in 5th edition. Fighters are just as viable at any level as wizards, clerics, or rogues.... and I mean FIGHTERS, not rangers. WotC has shown great design restraint in not making books full of broken things for munchins to chase down. There WERE things in the playtest people were going to exploit the heck out of - improvised weapons being 1d6 damage (why would wizards carry daggers for 1d4 damage when they could whack people with frying pans for more damage?) and the Alchemist feat making it possible for anyone to make healing potions on the fly. Who needs clerics at that point?
Even better, the game is still a challenge for players even at high levels - magic items are a lot less powerful and PCs don't have armor classes in the 40s (since there's no natural armor) so even swarms of kobolds have the potential to hit and wear down 20th level PCs.

And... there's no possibility for Pun-Pun to be created.
"As I understand it the whole point of 5e is to eliminate the “best build” strategy. There are supposed to be multiple avenues to effective characters,with no option a must have or must not have." - Tanksoldier

[DAT]

Just finished Curse of Stahd with a Dwarven Barbarian Battlerager. A few of the interesting ones I have been considering are:
> Wood Elf Monk (Open Hand) with the Hermit background but focused on Herbalism, using a dump stat of Intelligence - i.e., a stoner Elf played like Chong of Cheech & Chong
> Half-Elf Warlock (ArchFey)with Guildsman (Cartographer's Guild) background, who is interested in discovery and generating new maps, but isn't really a very good cartographer - sort of a whiney snooty guy who does the hex+eldritch blast solution a lot when frustrated or attacked
> Goblin Fighter (Two Weapon - Short swords) and Outsider background, a samurai from Kura Tura on a mission from his master who has become separated from his party and is looking to earn enough money and find directions in order to travel "home" (I found a picture of a samurai goblin miniature) - does the more civilized than though with people, and argue logic in the face of anti-goblin
> High Elf Druid (Moon) could be useful in SKT

[Fred Brackin]

Just a quick question if anyone's still following this. Do you think a party really needs a cleric in 5e?

Our potential fifth player just bailed on us and by early declarations we've got a Tiefling Warlock, a Human fighter and a Human Sorceror. In earlier versions of D&D I would have been sure that we needed a cleric but in 5e I'm not sure.