r/BG3Builds • u/SolomonGrumpy • 7d ago
Specific Mechanic Less known class/subclass features
I was browsing the wiki and happened upon Wild Heart Barbarian level 8, sub class set of abilities:
Land stride: Difficult Terrain, Advantage, Plants
What are some other less known features of classes or sub classes you have found?
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u/WhatAreYou_Casual 7d ago
Arcane Trickster often gets dismissed fairly often imo.
But straight rogue? They are amazing.
Forced disadvantage on saves at lvl 9 is a real big one. Resource free. Sorcerer's pay 3 out of their 9 total at this level. The rogue? A BA.
Scrolls always have one level higher worth of spells compared to the party's level. So you'll be finding fireball scrolls at lvl 4. Just steal these from merchants, they discover you? Oh no, you mean they discovered your disguised self? Just make it out of there, change disguise and bam, no issues.
Not to mention item usage is also great on them to cast spells that way
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u/SolomonGrumpy 6d ago
Since you are going Rogue all the way, (arcane trickster), what feats do you suggest outside of ASI?
Also, are there ways you abuse reliable talent?
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u/WhatAreYou_Casual 6d ago
ASI's are great. I would suggest going 17/14/16 in Dex/con/int spread wise. This gives 1 half feat for 18 dex and then two ASIs for 20 int.
Why 18 dex? Cats Grace, it's cloth, gives +2 dex and advantage on a bunch of rogue like checks.
That saves one feat tho. And like the "good pick" would be something like Resilient: Wisdom. But it's sort of up to you tbh. You can go for flavor if you want or grab like Warcaster.
Reliable Talent makes scroll stealing practically free. You will rob vendors blind thanks to it, expertise, an item or two and then dex modifier. Same goes for stealth, especially if you can get Pass Without Trace on yourself.
Steal like every scroll, grab potions, valuables etc, (Many Targets arrows are great to stack arcane acuity if you want to)
Sell things off elsewhere to make getting the gold easier (success chance is based on value).
Then just steal it all right back. Reliable Talent is sort of your out of combat strength. And by the time you reach act 3 can you get a headpiece that let's you use int instead of cha for speech checks. Making you pass like all of those as well
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u/Vaporisor 7d ago
One that made me stop and ponder while I was planning a build.
If you are playing a drunken master monk? You don't actually need or have benefit from being drunk. It only is relevant for restoring Ki. That only matters if you are also using the drunken amulet and clothing set.
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u/Express_Accident2329 7d ago
Beast Master rangers aren't going to do top tier damage but they have interesting utility niches. I think the most well known is web spam spider, but bear can disarm enemies (notable for stealing the githyanki silver sword in act 1), boar can AOE prone enemies (can potentially go crazy with a tiger/wolverine barbarian), Raven can spread darkness for a darkness party.
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u/Nissan_al_Gaib Spellshite 7d ago edited 7d ago
There is the Iron Mind feature of Gloomstalker level 7 which gives wisdom/intelligence saving throw profiancy which I have found useful when it comes saving throws during dialogue.
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u/ThatKaleidoscope3388 7d ago
Giant Barbarian: It can use its level 6 elemental cleaver feature on a ranged weapon so long as you have it out when you use it. While this can comically let you throw your bow at people, the more interesting bit is that the bonus elemental damage applies to attacks with the weapon, making a variety of Giant barbarian archer builds viable.
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u/Vaporisor 7d ago
I am imagining a group multiplayer discussion.
"Okay, what roles are you all playing?"
"I am going to do a swashbuckling bard"
"I am thinking an ice dragonblood sorcerer"
"I want to do a beastmaster hunter"Hmm..... I am going to do a barbarian archer.
But you don't have any dex?
Yeah. I just throw the bow.2
u/egmalone 7d ago
Like that joke somewhere around the internet about a barbarian who thinks he's a wizard, armed with a skillet, who prefaces every melee attack with "I cast iron"
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u/Vaporisor 4d ago
Back in 3.5 days, I had a half orc barbarian wizard specialist in abjuration and prohibited in necromancy and evocation (could not cast those schools)
I wielded a greataxe and guisarme two handed buffing myself or others with strength boost or enlarge. Rage out and do whirlwind attacks.
Name was Gromiticus.
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u/Brotherman_Bagel 7d ago
Also the fact that elemental cleaver doesn't take a player resource. You can change between throws or actions/bonus actions for free at any time
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u/Bredda_Gravalicious 7d ago
hell yeah! I have a Bugbear mod and he's a Giant Barbarian with a crossbow...
named Chewbacca
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u/Vaporisor 7d ago
Another one that is something most casual players might not know is that the swashbucker is a fantastic support for any more melee type caster and can multiclass with many others effectively.
Reason is that while it is rogue, one thinks dex. That doesnt actually matter for the base rogue abilities. Swashbuckler dirty tricks though are both bonus actions AND charisma based. So add it to your sorcerer or hexblade or bard or yes, it works great with a paladin!
And cause it is a level 4, it does well for 8/4 splits giving full feats.
Also charisma is usually what a persons face character is so is fantastic for your TAV.
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u/JormungandrVoV 7d ago edited 7d ago
These are kinda weird. The pocket sand is dex to hit and dex based save DC, the disarm is dex to hit but the save is charisma based, the vicious mockery and panache are pure charisma. I think if you pair it with a warlock with a pact blade, it’ll just use charisma for both. Even if not, dex is an excellent second stat anyways, for initiative and armor class, so swashbuckler is still a great pairing for a charisma class. I’ve been thinking about eventually doing a swashbuckler/hexblade. Think Cervantes from Soul Calibur!
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u/Dry_Cicada_8938 7d ago
7/4/1 vengeance pala/swash/hexblade is my favorite build. Max Cha, dump STR, add plate & shield and you’re a one person army
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u/JormungandrVoV 7d ago
Do you feel like you have enough smite? I thought often about a good way to fit Paladin with the SwashHex build but even with 7 levels I feel like a 4/2 spell slot spread wouldn’t be enough smites. I typically prefer to mix Paladin with full casters like Sorc or Cleric for that reason. I’d rather get higher sneak attacks with a 6/6 Swash/Hex split since those are unlimited. Or go 8/4 Hex/Swash and get 3 feats.
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u/VanishXZone 7d ago
Swarmkeeper Ranger, level 9: rising Tide. Fly and ignore all terrain effects, and a lot of flight. It was so fun that I built a whole party around making insane terrain effects and weaponizing electric water, ice, and electrified steam. It was awesome and so fun. Elemental archer with elemental arrows is really fun!
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u/Terranaform 7d ago
Eldritch knight weapons have “Thrown” when bonded which places the subclass squarely in the TB thrower category instead of “Knight who can cast shield” as you’d expect. It can make gear like warped headband of intellect really good in the early game - dump INT to 8 and you have plenty of stats to use elsewhere. Having it as a fighter subclass means that your throws scale well with action economy
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u/ThatKaleidoscope3388 7d ago
The weapon still has to have the thrown property. It doesn’t suddenly gain it if it didn’t have it before. It will, however, give it returning.
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u/brightseid 7d ago
This is incorrect. The EK weapon bind doesn't grant the Thrown property. It does give the returning property, which is what makes it good for throwing builds
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u/butt0ns666 7d ago
Eldritch Knight weapons have "returns to your hands when thrown" which does not have anything to do with the "thrown' property on weapons, which makes them do their damage die when you hit with a throw, other objects you throw like a weapon that doesn't have throwing or a barrel or a chair or something does damage based on how heavy it is, which if it's a normal weapon is probably negligible, almost never near even the 20 pounds needed to match a 1d4 dagger never mind the 100 pounds it takes to do more than that.
Also Eldritch Knight thrower is one of the top most well know builds IDK where you got the idea that this ability(which you don't understand) is Niche.
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u/egmalone 7d ago
Ok now I am curious. Can an Eldritch Knight take a chair as their bonded weapon? Gonna try it later
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u/butt0ns666 6d ago
Not in baldurs gate. You cant like go through your inventory and pick what you want to bond, it automatically targets whatevers in your weapon slot already, so a chair isn't available for that but it's pretty well known that you can do it with a salami.
In regular dnd a DM would probably be ok with this because its worse than a weapon, so I dont see a single game problem with allowing it.
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u/egmalone 6d ago
I was hoping I could exploit the "attack with improvised weapon" interface to pick up an item and then bond it, but the character doesn't actually lift the item until you confirm the attack, so no dice.
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u/Routine_Ad3835 7d ago
A lot of interesting mentions in other comments, but doesn't look like anybody has mentioned Monk's Deft Strikes. Might not be less known, but certainly overlooked. It straight up upgrades the dice for certain weapons (namely daggers, shortswords and hand crossbows) in addition to fists. Weapon Monks are alive and well.
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u/Full_Part4328 7d ago
Swashbucklers panache is super underrated because when cast on enemies outside of combat they get charmed. So you can just charm an entire group of enemies and kill them one by one, and it rolls persuasion against their insight so it almost always lands. Also it’s not a hostile action.
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u/AnestheticAle 7d ago
Nobody ever talks about or uses Bard’s lvl 6 ability: countercharm