Multiclassing

haven't multiclassed before but thought of doing it lately. you?
why change a class when you lose high level perks? can a variety beat mastery?
I can see some merit in it like creating a 6/2 Druid/Barbarian and raging in a beast form or a Sorcerer/Fighter so after you've exhausted all your spells pick up a sword and fight.
Do you have any stories of successful/failed multiclassing? more than 2 classes, interesting combos, regrets?

Only power players dip. I try focussing on roleplaying instead of ruleplaying.

I hear you I hear you, but having 2-3 classes can present new opportunities for roleplay as well. Isn't it the whole reason why we have all those options so we can experiment and see what goes together?
I still focus on roleplaying and I also want to try something new.

Because a warlock 2, paladin 3, barbarian 3 is good roleplaying when?

That's dumb. I had a moment where I was going to try to dip a level into wizard specifically because my rogue came from a wizard family and was getting pretty friendly with the party diviner, who reminded her of a not-so-cunty version of her own mother. Yes, the benefits granted to a rogue by some relatively weak spells would have been great, but it was the roleplaying aspect that influenced me, not the mechanical, believe that or don't as you will.

Unfortunately, my autism and crippling depression led me to dip out and baleete fucking everything, but it would have been cool if I had stayed.

Holy knight takes a dip on the darker side of things to gain an edge against evil; Warrior-shaman from an uncivilized tribe that fights for justice; Formerly evil sorcerer seeks redemption in the path of light.

And those are just ideas made under the assumption that character fluff is locked to class.

that was the whole point of me asking.
surely some of the classes aren't going to work together or make sense. But some of the combos might actually compliment each other well. Like barbarian/druid or fighter/wizard that I mentioned earlier.

What system? What classes are you thinking of mixing?

give this man a silver roleplaying medal

i get the point - you need to have a personality first and build a character around it.
My counter point - I'm not very versed in game and sometimes feel left out for one reason or another.
Ex: Playing barbarian all I was doing during the fight was spamming one single attack because others weren't as effective and I couldn't come up with interesting or useful ideas to help the group. I built a wizard later and ran out of spells during the minion's fight and was spamming cantrips on the boss.
This is what moved me to consider multiclassing.

I played a guest character for a 5e session and tried a multi class build, a super cheesy warlock/paladin/fighter. It worked fine but I could only meet all the requirements because I rolled stats, and I got the feeling it wasn't really more effective than a pure fighter or paladin would have been.

It can be interesting for roleplaying reasons in editions where classes are more segregated, such as 3.5, but with the flavor and floating background skills from 5e it's less necessary, I don't need to multiclass rogue to make a sneaky wizard anymore.

And 5e (and to a lesser extend pathfinder) discourage it mechanically with how ASI's are handed out tied to class level along with valuable features buried deeper in the class. It seemed to me that it was a huge headache and usually made a less effective character unless you are taking advantage of how front loaded paladin and warlock are in 5e.

I'm playing 5e AL
I'm thinking brawler with a caster. And Paladin just isn't for me in terms of spell versatility.
So... sorcerer/fighter or wizard/rogue or druid/barbarian. I don't know. never done it before so was wondering if there were some good/bad pairs/trips

You have to consider what you're gaining versus what you're losing. No matter which way you look at it, if you don't go full barbarian you will be less effective *as a barbarian*. One important thing to look for is if your problem is something that can only be solved by a single permanent choice in character creation, or with a little bit of creative thinking.

While having a little bit of magic might be nice, a decent portion of the fun is finding interesting ways of overcoming your limitations.

Waiting on my DM friend to set up a game of 3.5e, It's gonna be the first game of DnD for myself and a few others in our friend circle (DMBro DM's for his family and other groups, seems to know what's up). Gonna be playing a Monk2/PsychicWarrior because punching things really well with a bit of magical leeway seems fun.

Caster/Martial combinations usually aren't that good because the class abilities don't synergize well. Multiattack and higher spell levels get delayed, and you have to pick one or the other to do with your action, not to mention they don't run off the same stats.

That and Eldritch Knight and Arcane Trickster offer fully functioning martials with casting baked in that complements what their class is already good at. Either could be a decent brawler depending on what you want from that, or you could do a melee ranger- they get some good spells with things like hunter's mark and pass without trace that give you a lot of utility, just be sure to use the revised ranger- its AL legal.

appreciate the honest response.
I got bored from my barbarian. At lvl 12 I was doing the exact same thing I was doing (in battle) as when I was lvl 10 or even 8. Only my damage output changed.
wasn't sure if it was me or the dm. different moves seemed inefficient. I tried potions and magic items but in the end I asked dm to kill him because I was just too bored with him.
I was hoping that if I spiced him up with some ranged attacks, crowd control and other fun mechanics that come with magic I would revive my interest.
It could be all my shitty gaming for all I know, but I still want to try it.

>Eldritch Knight and Arcane Trickster
look like two fine options to my dilemma I guess. Some feats like arcane caster might do as well I presume.
I might try and build a wizard with high hp and ac so he can hold his own at the front lines.

This isn't all on you, barbarian isn't a very varied class, but there are some ways to spice it up. Barbarians have some ranged options with javelins and handaxes, and you can try to grapple your opponents for some shenanigans.

If you are totem path you can go eagle warrior and fly away with people, which is good for a laugh at least. The I believe new storm herald barbarian gets to choose their elemental effect each rage as well, which gives you some more tactical decisions.

And if you really want to multiclass then battlemaster or some flavor of rogue is probably better than going caster as a barbarian- the maneuver die while raging and they have some interesting effects, while rogue will give you more damage from sneak attack at the same time it gives you more mobility from cunning action sprints and disengages. Swashbuckler could be especially good with it's free disengage on a hit, letting you essentially run around the battlefield raging and sneak attacking at will.

The new hexblade and the valor bard from the phb are also good choices- they are viable melee combatants even if they don't get all of the fighting abilities a pure martial will, and they more than make up for it with full casting. However, they are more spellcasters who brawl in their freetime than brawlers who also cast.

Bladesinger would give you a high AC wizard though they are still fairly squishy.

War cleric is a good brawler and caster, being good at both for the first few levels and frankly one level of war cleric with any martial character is broken because you get so much.

I'll look into all those options once more. A mage that fights or the fighter that casts. choices choices.
thank you guys.

Arcane Trickster is fun as hell. Been playing a game with friends and having spells for utility while being able to murder anything that gets close is awesome. Was thinking about dipping into wizard a bit for some more spells though since the later bonuses for rogue/AT aren't that great once you go past 11.

Isn't Bladesinger just for elves, though?

>>Isn't Bladesinger just for elves, though?
seems it's a homebrew elves only class.
Can't trust it to be reliable. Once my player wanted to play an alchemist. there're a few homebrew variants online but they need playtesting. Can't play that in AL

Yes, you would have to be an elf wizard for that unless your DM is willing to waive the restriction. As a melee wizard you probably want to go dex anyway since you would have to burn several feats/racial abilities to get heavy armor proficiency.

Bladesinger is from the Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide. However, they have a rule that you can only use phb content +1 pick from another book, so this would block you from picking any newly published spells or feats.

>not multiclassing with full retard Hexblade is now official

Are you a physical attacker? You not have an upgraded Hex, Eldritch Blast, Shield, Green Flame Blade.

Are you a spellcaster? You now have upgraded Hex, Shield, Eldritch Blast, able to equip medium armors, shields, and martial weapons.

Fuck Hexblade.

I disagree. In 5e lot of classes is pretty frontloaded and you can get a lot of flavor with 1-3 levels of it. It is true about mechanical advantages as well, though.

The other side is, if you are dipping for flavor without regard for power, you might end underoptimized, which might be problem.

>I got the feeling it wasn't really more effective than a pure fighter or paladin would have been.
I think that is ideal outcome - you get different character with approximately same power level.

Level-by-level multiclassing is cancer. It dilutes class strengths, and makes designing classes that start out diverse (because of front loaded features) a fucking nightmare because of dips. The fact that 5e went back to it is a fucking shame.

Best (as in most effective) character I've ever played was heavily multiclassed. If I recall, it was by the end;

>Paladin 2
>Sorceror 4
>Spellsword 6

Mostly utility and support spells, with a few damage ones, all the while fighting and tanking away in fully heavy armor, shield and all for it all being mitrhil and then the arcane spell failure reduction. He wasn't an amazing damage dealer but well enough, and could outlast pretty much everything with a hilariously high AC and some magic resist and just keep hacking away (with channeled weapon spells because class features), and occasionally zapping off a spell. Wasn't far from getting adamantine armor since the spell failure was getting negligible.

Ah, I miss that kobold. Hell of a lot of fun.

i avoid players like you.

I don't like to have my character be constricted by class concepts.
Therefore, I always multiclass if I'm forced to play in a system where there are classes.

And people avoid you because of the smell, what's your point?

Star as a barbarian, dip into warlock as you explore your darker side after discovering magic for the first time, then something happens to make you "see the light" and makes you decide you want to be a paladin.

Obviously this is a set of character arcs you'd want to spread over more than a few levels and game sessions, but it could provide some nice role-play opportunities.

My group are self-admitted powergamers. We like to run high-power games and have powerful characters. Multiclassing for us follows either two reasons

>character concept fits better into two classes than one
Sometimes your vision for the character requires two classes, plain and simple, or as a character grows on its' own, another class fits better. It happens. It's legitimate.
>It's better mechanically
This is usually the reason, that it has mechanical benefits, and contrary to Veeky Forums opinion there's nothing really inherently wrong with that so long as your honest about it and still playing and getting along with the group.

I think three classes is excessive and fairly blatantly going for cross-class power benefits, but two classes is often flavourful and interesting both narratively and mechanically.

For the record as well, I end up with about half of my characters with levels in two different classes, and about half with levels in only one

Considering Paladin of the Ancients and fey pact and the barbarian itself are very nature themed, you don't even need to finnagle this much.

>5e
>GM wants to run CoS
>ask what everybody else is playing
>Artificer, EK, Warlock
>no divine casters
>no full casters
>no dedicated arcane casters
And that's how I ended up with my janky as heck Divine Soul/Grave Cleric multiclass. She's definitely not as powerful as a full-class sorc or cleric but I've taken a liking to that her.

>2017
>not picking a new class per level

Explain yourself.

creative players? sounds like some boring games you take part in user

Nature paladin, fey patron warlock, super angry lord of the ring elf

This is a fun character, and these combinations write themselves.

stormwind fallacy

System?
Anyway multiclassing doesn't make sense, it's boolean situation, you either are A or B you can' never train in both, but that's what you get with class systems
Also unless dips and/or certain combos you always end weaker than going full class

>sorcerer/fighter
Eldritch Knight
> wizard/rogue
Arcane Thief
>druid/barbarian
Totem Barbarian

Srly, the fucking system gives you mixed archetypes so you don't need to fuck up with multiclass and you go and multiclass? the fuck?

Bladesinger is 100% official class and is mostly for elves yes, but the class can be open to other races (literally said in the class description) if the GM agrees.

this, I'm playing a full wizard evoker admixer with 5 sacred geometry and because I went full class I'm the best roleplayer, meanwhile the Monk/Paladin is a minmaxer rollplayer because he went with a "divine martial artist" concept

They suck dick

All of these options are in core rulebook. No UA, but not sure if errata-ed yet.

You've got the classic 5e Fighter 2 Wizard 18. Access to Action Surge, Second Wind, and armor can really help with survivability. Simple yet effective.

Warlock 2 Wizard 18 can also be good, but because of a gimmick. Warlocks get an invocation that lets them cast Mage Armor unlimited amounts of times. Abjuration Wizard gives them a ward that gets recharged upon casting ANY abjuration spell. Infinite ward recharge outside of combat.

Warlock 2 Paladin 18 is also pretty decent, depending on when you take the Warlock. At lower levels, taking the invocations for Eldritch Blast gives you a great option for ranged, while giving you recharging support spells like Shield, and regenning spellslots for your smites. At higher levels, if you take it you can get the invocation that gives you extra weapon damage and total blindsight. Cast magical darkness and laugh as your opponent's trying to flail at something that isn't there while you get bonuses to hit.

Holy Warrior of a polytheistic religion dedicates himself to one of the lesser gods that, whilst less famous, is more hands on and obvious with the blessings. He also has somewhat of a temper problem.

I like that a lot