The Wall of Fear: A Complete Guide to the Oath of Conquest

[McSkrag]

Some enemies will be immune to frighten, and even when they aren't Wrathful Smite only targets one enemy, and if you pop Fear or Conquering Presence on 3 or four mobs, statistically at least one of them is going to pass their save. Sentinel is basically a +1 to the number of enemies you can lock down in any combat. And even if you already have all the foes on lock with aura of conquest, the reactive attack for targeting your friends is a nice extra bit of punishment to further discourage bad behavior.

You're right that it's not as important for conquerors as it is for other tanks. Again, I wouldn't rate it above maxing your attack stats & shoringbup your concentration save. But if you do have a spare asi in your progression, imo it's the optimal choice.

Totally agree. Sentinel really puts your enemies in a bad tactical position. Even if they aren't frightened they can't run out of your aura, they can't attack your buddies without taking an op attack, and if they attack you they have to hit a high AC.

Having more ways to trigger op attacks+smites is a solid boost to your offense.

[asradur]

I'm not sure if it has been mentioned but i don't agree with the "Dragon Fear" Feat given a light blue.
The enemy gets an additional save whenever it takes damage and your aura damages enemys frightened of you.
So it's possible that even when you fear an enitre group in front of you that they just break out at the start of their turn.
Seems a bit counteractive

[Sception]

I agree. I'd only rate dragon fear as worth taking if you wanted to play a dragonborn conqueror in dice-rolled stats game where your best stat is even. Then Dragonborn's +1 charisma will mean Dragon Fear gets you an extra fear effect while keeping your charisma advancement on track.

In a point buy game, though, the best stat available to put in charisma will be a 15, which the dragonborn +1 will round out to a 16. This means that taking dragon fear will put you behind in charisma advancement, and yeah, since the fear effect has some bad skornergy with aura of conquest it isn't worth delaying cha advancement for imo.

[BullHorn]

This build seems to require so many feats to really shine, I'm not sure how to prioritize it.

Originally I took Warcaster and paired it with a Sword&Board but now I'm thinking going Sentinel with a Polearm and obviously dropping Warcaster... What was your guys experience?

Actually, there's many more things I'm not sure about. What makes Booming Blade so good if it has a 5 feet distance while the build tries to lock enemies 10 feet away? Or is BB only used on the Sword&Board variant? It feels like this thread is talking about 2 different builds and I'm not sure which comments relates to which build.

[Wildarm]

This build seems to require so many feats to really shine, I'm not sure how to prioritize it.

Originally I took Warcaster and paired it with a Sword&Board but now I'm thinking going Sentinel with a Polearm and obviously dropping Warcaster... What was your guys experience?

Actually, there's many more things I'm not sure about. What makes Booming Blade so good if it has a 5 feet distance while the build tries to lock enemies 10 feet away? Or is BB only used on the Sword&Board variant? It feels like this thread is talking about 2 different builds and I'm not sure which comments relates to which build.

Warcaster or Res(Con) are the only feats you really want to maintain concentration. Sentinel is nice but maxing your CHA is more important. Dipping a single level of Hexblade will save you 2 ASI as you don't need to invest further into strength and makes room for some of feats. I'd say start with that approach but you'll still not have spare room for feats till level 13 unless you started as V Human.

I would not necessarily go the polearm route. If you need 10' range, perhaps look at a whip. You are a controller tank and need the best defenses possible which means using a shield. Polearms support skirmish tactics. Your a conquest pally. You don't skirmish. You engage and grind your foes beneath your feet.

[Corran]

Actually, there's many more things I'm not sure about. What makes Booming Blade so good if it has a 5 feet distance while the build tries to lock enemies 10 feet away? Or is BB only used on the Sword&Board variant? It feels like this thread is talking about 2 different builds and I'm not sure which comments relates to which build.

Exactly:

I would not necessarily go the polearm route. If you need 10' range, perhaps look at a whip. You are a controller tank and need the best defenses possible which means using a shield. Polearms support skirmish tactics. Your a conquest pally. You don't skirmish. You engage and grind your foes beneath your feet.

Almost every time the goal will be to fit as many enemies as you can in that small 10' radius. That will often make you want to stand near enemies you have frightened. And there's also the enemies that you didn't frighten that will probably want to attack you (or more likely shove or grapple you, if they are smart). The extra AC from a shield (which plays well with being attacked at disadvantage btw) will come up more often, and generally it will be more important than having reach. And when you would really profit from reach, just bring out a whip. Reach is hard (imo) to make good use of, and if you are really in such a situation, then you wont really mind going from a d10 down to a d4, and that's cause you care little for damage if you can attack with impunity.

[BullHorn]

My DM doesn't allow going Hexblade (too OP) nor any spells outside of the PHB (SCAG too strong).

A pure Conquest Paladin with a Whip & Shield should work, right? What else do I need to adjust?

[Sception]

the build does not need a lot of feats. It 'needs' one feat - either resilient con or war caster - in order to shore up concentration saves. Stat wise it also needs to max charisma.

Beyond that, there are two main variants of the build: pure paladin & hex dip.


Pure paladin generally prefers resilient to war caster, and also wants to max strength and eventually to take sentinel1 to help tank enemies who are immune to frighten or pass their saves. Only varient humans can fit all that in a build though, so non-vuman single classed conquerors will either skip sentinel or settle for 18 strength.

On a more positive note, pure paladin conquerors don't delay access to asis or any paladin or conquest class features, the biggest being Bless & Wrathful Smite at 2, extra attack at 5, aura of protection at 6, aura of conquest at 7, Fear at 9, improved divine smite at 10, Improved Find Steed at 13, Scornful Rebuke at 15, extended paladin auras at 18 and the capstone at 20, which only single classed conquerors can ever access. And those are just the big ones, every level of paladin has something relevant to the build, so any delay at all is a significant tradeoff.

Single classed conqueror is also the most varied in terms of weapon selection, able to use any melee weapon & even varry their choice throughout the day.


Hex dip doesn't need more stats, and prefers war caster to resilient in order to cast Shield and to cast Booming Blade as an opportunity attack. Opp attack booming blade, like sentinel in the single classsed build, is there to help tank non-frightened enemies, so it doesn't matter whether the range matches your aura. It's not as good as sentinel, but it's a good enough substitute that hex dipped paladins feel more comfortable skipping sentinel. Between not needing sentinel or strength increases, the hex dip's late progression asi's are left open for other feats you might want to take. Alert & Inspiring Leader are good options here, imo.

Hex dip also has access to eldritch blast as a bavk up ranged option - even without agonizing blast it's still better than the single classed conqueror's ranged options - and hexblade's curse for an extra dps option to use against fear-immune foes.

Down side of hex dip, apart from delaying paladin features, is that you're stuck with sword & board, and can't even use a whip as a one handed reach option since war caster opp attack booming blade only works at 5', and whip doesn't get opp attacks at that range. This isn't a huge constraint since plain old sword & board is arguably the best weapon set for conqueror anyway, but halberd or sword & whip are still decent sets to at least have the option of using, and hex dipped conqueror doesn't get those options.

[BullHorn]

Pure paladin generally prefers resilient to war caster, and also wants to max strength and eventually to take sentinel1 to help tank enemies who are immune to frighten or pass their saves. Only varient humans can fit all that in a build though, so non-vuman single classed conquerors will either skip sentinel or settle for 18 strength.

I'm going to have to take War Caster anyway because I want to use a shield, probably with a Whip...

Does this look optimized or is there something to improve: h ttps://ddb.ac/characters/17538533/JGWm89 (can't post URLs yet, remove the space in "https")
I know Lucky isn't highly recommended here but I feel like it's a 'get out of jail free times three' card that's very difficult to skip...

[Corran]

Hex dip
...
Between not needing sentinel or strength increases, the hex dip's late progression asi's are left open for other feats you might want to take. Alert & Inspiring Leader are good options here, imo.

I would throw lucky in there for consideration. Plays well with aura of protection where our saves are concerned (even more reason to do so since we are not taking resilient con), and it will have the very occasional synergy when you really need to smite and miss with your attack or for crit negation. And it can protect against shoves and grapples if they ever come up, which could really hurt us in some cases (eg a non frightened enemy wants to move us behind cover so that his allies which we struck with fear can come back into the battle, or for just moving us slightly so a frightened enemy can move and for example chase our wizard, etc).

[Sception]

My DM doesn't allow going Hexblade (too OP) nor any spells outside of the PHB (SCAG too strong).

A pure Conquest Paladin with a Whip & Shield should work, right? What else do I need to adjust?

While hexblade is strong, the idea that it's too OP is a little off base imo, as it's well within the power range of phb options. That said, I do agree that it's probably more dippable than it should be. IMO that's fully fixed if you make hexblade's curse scale with warlock level instead of character level, and if you remove hex warrior from the hexblade and add it to pact of the blade instead. That pushes the cha melee to level 3, and cha melee was already a level three warlock dip option via pact of the tome shillelagh.

Ditto for SCAG not being overpowered. Rather the SCAG cantrips are just popular because they fill a gap in PHB options in terms of at will magic themed melee.


But whatever, it's not worth arguing about, especially since single classed Conqueror works fine, arguably better at some levels, it's just a tighter squeeze in terms of ASIs.



Have you chosen a race? Anything that gets both charisma and strength bonuses can be considered "A tier", with the best of that batch being Fallen Aasimar (right stats, good features, necrotic resistance, daily fear effect is very strong despite short duration thanks to being resisted by a rare charisma save), Half Elf (best stats by far, solid racial feature, two extra skill proficiencies are welcome in an otherwise skill-anemic build), and Variant Human (good enough stats, bonus skill again helpful, bonus feat is a big deal).

You want to start with minimum Str 16, Con 14, Charisma 16 after racial adjustments. Any race & stat spread that meets those minimums is acceptable. Obviously higher con is better if you can manage it, but that's difficult. Likewise decent dex & wisdom would be nice but not strictly necessary. You'll likely be taking resilient con, so if you can get con up to 15 before taking the feat even better. Alternatively a vuman can start with 13 con to make room for other stats and take resiliant at first level. I don't really recommend that, though, as IMO Vuman should try for sentinel as their fist level feat, since it vastly improves your tanking ability from levels 1 to 6.

For fighting style I recommend defense. It's the most versatile, working with whatever weapons you might pick up, stays effective through your entire career, and as a lockdown tank you don't rely on personal damage output to hold enemy attention, so extra defense is generally going to win out in usefulness to you over more damage. Next best is dueling since it works with a shield, and a whip especially could really use that extra bit of damage, especially early on. That said, it doesn't scale well and doesn't work with two handed weapons, so while it's not a bad choice I still think defense is better.

For ASIs, there's a lot of pressure. You want resilient con. Or war caster, I guess, but without Shield or Booming Blade I think resilient is better. You can always drop your weapon to cast a spell on your turn, then item interaction to pick it back up again. Inelegant, but effective.

Beyond that, you want to max your charisma, max your strength, and take sentinel to shore up your tanking ability against fear immune and high-wis-save enemies. Unless you're playing Vuman, that's one more ASI than you get in a campaign, so you'll have to sacrifice one of the things you want, generally either by skipping sentinel or settling for 18 strength.

Order is tricky, since you want basically all of that stuff immediately. For a Fallen Aasimar I generally go with +2 cha at levels 4 & 8, resilient at level 12, +2 strength at level 16, and sentinel at level 19. For a half elf, usually the same, although I might use their +2 cha to start with a 17 charisma, and round that out to 18 with Elven Accuracy instead of +2 cha at level 4. For a Human, I usually take Sentinel as the first level bonus feat, and will take another +2 strength at level 19.

All these builds are left with a +3 stat mod until level 16, and that does get pretty painful, especially and increasingly so between levels 8 and 15. I still try to tough it out in the hopes that the DM will notice I'm having trouble hitting things, take pity on my subclass's MADness, and drop some gauntlets of ogre strength or the like in my character's lap. If they do, then I can skip strength ASIs all together, grab sentinel at 16, and have a slot open at level 19 for maybe Alert or Inspiring Leader, or maybe shield master, or polearm master if they've picked up a magic halberd, whatever really. The Vuman version already has sentinel, so gets two open slots at the end of their progression in this case.

But that's only if you luck into some gauntlets of ogre strength or a belt of giant strength. If not then by level 16 the strength situation is pretty desperate so that what's penciled in there by default.

In your case, with a somewhat controlling DM skittish of potentially overpowered PCs, hoping for help from magic items might not be best call, in which case you might want to take +2 strength at level 4, +2 cha at 8 and 12, and push your choice of concentration feat back to 16. It hurts, but you've still got aura of protection to help bridge the gap, so it might hurt less than living on a starting attack stat. And you can console yourself with the fact that, if you're rolling concentration saves at all, then you've already gotten an enemy to attack you instead of one of your squishier team mates, so even if you lose concentration sometimes you're still doing your job at least a little.

[BullHorn]

This build without Warcaster will be completely unplayable. I'll have to drop my weapon and use my 'interaction' to pick it back up for each time I plan to cast a spell. Not only is it extremely annoying, I can already predict that the DM will come up with a mechanic/reason why this won't work (or just make me lose my weapon that one time when I drop it in a bad place).

I must add that our campaign has some House Rules, like disallowing some things that seem too strong, but specifically this 3 horrendous changes:

• Spellcasting in Melee range triggers an AoO
• Can't heal during a short rest
• Heal 1 Hit Dice during a long rest (+1 more Hit Dice if the rest was comfortable)

VHuman isn't allowed either. It's just a Human but better, so what's the point of having regular Humans? Originally I chose Half-Elf but I'm looking at Half-Orc and with our harsh house rules, being able to survive going to 0 health once is a huge bonus. His stats fit decently well too.

[Sception]

I'm going to have to take War Caster anyway because I want to use a shield, probably with a Whip...

I forgot to mention gear suggestions in my last post.

When it comes to weapons, there's basically three goals - decent damage, reach, and ability to use a shield - of which you can have two at any one time. Halberd gets you decent damage & reach, longsword (or equivalent) gets you decent damage & a shield, whip gets you reach and a shield.

All three options have their strengths and weaknesses. One of advantages pure paladin conquerors have over hex dips is that they don't have to commit. Assuming you take defense fighting style and invest your ASIs in stats, sentinel, war caster / resilient, and any spare slots go into feats like lucky (thanks Corran, yes, lucky is a decent choice here), alert, inspiring leader, & the like, then you can reasonably use whatever melee weapons you happen to find, so carry all three options, plus some javelins, and use whichever is appropriate in a given situation.

While halberd, longsword, & whip are the optimal mundane weapons, a magic version of otherwise non-optimal weapons will still often be the best choice. If the party stumbles across something exotic like a magic glaive, long spear, flail, falchion, what have you? As long as it's a melee weapon you can use it. Since you aren't investing feats or class features in particular weapon types you can afford to be flexible, so don't think of your character as a specialist when they're not.

Does this look optimized or is there something to improve: https://ddb.ac/characters/17538533/JGWm89 (can't post URLs yet, remove the space in "https")
I know Lucky isn't highly recommended here but I feel like it's a 'get out of jail free times three' card that's very difficult to skip...

Half Orc isn't optimal, but... from the looks of it you're playing in a diced stats game & rolled crazy well? That frees up a lot of pressure on ASIs & starting stats, making a sub-optimal-in-point-buy choice like half orc perfectly fine.

War caster is acceptable here, but I'd still recommend resilient instead. As a single classed conquest paladin most spells you cast don't need war caster anyway, since you can cast non-expensive, non-consumed material component spells using the emblem on your shield as a spell focus without worrying about somatic components. Your most important spells - Bless, Wrathful Smite, and Fear - can all be cast while wielding your sword & shield without war caster.

You only have to worry about somatic components if there are no material components to the spell. Or if the material components are either expensive or consumed, but War Caster doesn't help with those spells. Some of your relevant spells fall into this category - Spiritual Weapon for instance. However, the spells of this type that you care about mostly last the combat, so you can cast the spell before drawing your weapon to begin with. Even when they don't, you mostly cast spells on your turn, in which case you can drop your weapon, cast the spell, then pick it back up with your 1/turn free item interaction. Inelegant, but it works. Chain your weapon to your wrist if you're worried about enemies readying actions to kick your sword away when/if your drop it. Or just draw a different weapon - again I recommend carrying several different weapons for versatility anyway - and collect the kicked away weapon after combat ends.

Or just don't cast those spells if enemies have wasted actions readying to do that. Again, your most important spells can all be cast with weapon & shield in hand without war caster, thanks to either not having somatic components (wrathful smite) or being castable with the spell focus holy symbol emblem painted on your shield (bless, fear).

War Caster is *really* only needed for non-material, somatic spells that are cast as reactions during other creature's turns. For instance, Shield or Endure Elements or Hellish Rebuke, that sort of thing. As a single classed paladin, none of those are spells that you have or care about.


Again, War Caster is a fine choice, but for your specific character I'd recommend resilient, since you'll have some spare asis later in your build and you could use one to both round up your constitution to 18 and round that 15 up to 16. But there are enough good feat choices for spare ASI slots that you could stick to war caster and not worry about it.

Otherwise, I'd personally lean towards putting that spare 15 in dex rather than wisdom. Both are fine options, but imo the initiative will matter more for you in the long run. Especially with acrobatics trained.

Though, on that note, what is your background? Any way you could get perception trained instead of religion or acrobatics?


Also I don't see your level 8 asi here. I'd recommend +2 cha over anything else, and worry about other feats starting at level 12. Sentinel is the feat I'd recommend for that slot. After that lucky, alert, inspiring leader, and +1 to two stats (if you swap from warcaster to resilient) are all solid options for 16 and 19. Heck, you might take both war caster and resilient for this character, I've heard worse ideas. Your crazy good stat rolls really bought you a lot of slack here.

Overall your character looks fine & should do well. Make Gruumsh proud.

[Wildarm]

[*]Spellcasting in Melee range triggers an AoO[*]Can't heal during a short rest[*]Heal 1 Hit Dice during a long rest (+1 more Hit Dice if the rest was comfortable)[/LIST]

Ouch. That first one is pretty rough for a Paladin who relies on melee spell casting. At least you're somewhat self sufficient for healing due to your lay on hands and access to cure wounds so the other two are a bit more palatable.

If that is the case, I'd actually recommend Inspiring Leader as a starting feat choice for V-Human. The extra temp HP will be well worth it for your party.

[Sception]

I must add that our campaign has some House Rules, like disallowing some things that seem too strong, but specifically this 3 horrendous changes:

• Spellcasting in Melee range triggers an AoO
• Can't heal during a short rest
• Heal 1 Hit Dice during a long rest (+1 more Hit Dice if the rest was comfortable)

Missed this before, and honestly this is a pretty horrific list. With such excessive nerfs to natural healing, I hope your party has a strong magical healer, and you're likely to be pulled into supporting that role between combats with cure wounds and aura of vitality, which is going to be pretty taxing on your spell slots, which in turn will eat away at your ability to frighten enemies.

The spellcasting in melee range thing isn't as bad as you'd think for a conquest paladin, as bless it typically cast before engaging, and fear is typically cast on the way in to combat but still before you've actually engaged. But it's a heavy, and extremely counter-intuitive, nerf to wrathful smite. You might ask if your DM would be willing to make an exception to that rule for the smite spells specifically, as they're so clearly intended to be cast while fighting in melee.

Otherwise... between this and the bans on scag cantrips & hexblade, it sounds like your DM is just dead set against the idea of melee spellcasters, at which point you might just want to play a different character. While these house rules don't invalidate your character so far, they seem like they're *intended* to invalidate your character, or at least characters like your character, and if that's the attitude the DM's coming in with then they're just going to keep layering on more and more arbitrary red tape (all undead, fiends, aberrations, & dragons are immune to frighten in my game even if they aren't normally, you can't make melee attacks while concentrating on a spell, etc etc) until your character finally collapses under the pressure.


If you do still want to play this character in this campaign, I'm going to repeat and redouble my suggestion to swap your dexterity & wisdom, and I'll recommend alert on top of that. Initiative is going to be super important if you need to cast spells before you're in melee range with the enemy. I'd also echo the recommendation to pick up Inspiring Leader, and encourage someone else in the party to take the Healer feat.


Mostly, though, it sounds to me like your DM doesn't actually want to be running 5th edition, and would be more comfortable running 2e or 3.5, which are more built around assumptions like 'the only healing is magic healing'.

[Wildarm]

Is there a list or something sortable anywhere you can list all published fear immune creatures? Would be handy to link to the top level of this guide.

[Sception]

https://www.dndbeyond.com/monsters?f...ion-immunity=5

In general the list is all, or at least nearly all, constructs, plants, oozes, & swarms. Also many - but not all - fiends & undead. Beyond that a bunch of scattered individual monsters on a case by case basis. 259 frighten-immune monsters out of 1561 monster entries on dndbeyond - though that proportion may be misleading as not all monsters in the game will appear with equal frequency in most campaigns.

39 out of 333 in just the basic rule monsters.

[Rhunah]

Hi,
work The Prone Trap when someone other fears the bad guys?

[Wildarm]

Hi,
work The Prone Trap when someone other fears the bad guys?

No they have to be afraid of you to have 0 movement.

[MrWesson22]

This build without Warcaster will be completely unplayable. I'll have to drop my weapon and use my 'interaction' to pick it back up for each time I plan to cast a spell. Not only is it extremely annoying, I can already predict that the DM will come up with a mechanic/reason why this won't work (or just make me lose my weapon that one time when I drop it in a bad place).

Just add a 1 copper leather strap to your weapon. Drop it as a free action. Cast your spell. It's hanging by its strap off your wrist. Now use your free interact with object to grab it properly again. Done.

[Belthien]

Hello brain trust, I could use some advice. Planning to play a conquest paladin in SKT soon.
Starting at level 6, 5000g, 2 uncommon magic items, 1 free feat, rolled stats of 17, 17, 14, 14, 10, 10
I'm planning to play a fallen aasimar (+1str, +2 cha) conquest pala, sword & board, specialising in defense. Hexblade dip is allowed as it makes perfect sense for my character.

I see 3 main options for the build:

Option 1:
Paladin 6
11(19) 14 18 10 14 20
ASI at level 4: +1con +1cha
Magic items: Gloves of Ogre Strength, Cloak of Protection
Free Feat: Sentinel
Planned ASI at 8: Resilient con or Warcaster

Option 2:
Paladin 6
18 10 16 10 14 20
ASI at level 4: +1con +1cha
Magic items: Cloak of Protection, +1 Shield
Free Feat: Resilient con
Planned ASI at 8: Sentinel

Option 3:
Paladin 5/Hexblade 1
15 10 18 10 14 20
ASI at level 4: +1con +1cha
Magic items: Cloak of Protection, +1 Shield
Free Feat: Warcaster
Planned ASI at 8: Sentinel

Upsides of each:
1: No delay in paladin levels, highest hp, higher Dex for initiative & saves, Sentinel straight away
2: No delay in paladin levels, highest ac
3: Highest hp, highest ac, highest attack stat, shield spell, hexblade's curse

I hate delaying paladin levels as conquest gets good stuff every level until 13, but the shield spell seems so useful if I'll be going face to toe with those hard hitting giants.

[Wildarm]

Hello brain trust, I could use some advice. Planning to play a conquest paladin in SKT soon.
Starting at level 6, 5000g, 2 uncommon magic items, 1 free feat, rolled stats of 17, 17, 14, 14, 10, 10
I'm planning to play a fallen aasimar (+1str, +2 cha) conquest pala, sword & board, specialising in defense. Hexblade dip is allowed as it makes perfect sense for my character.

I like option 1 a lot. Solid and tanky. Perhaps switch to Scourge Aasimar if you're dumping Str.

Other races like half-elf or Drow or feral Teifling open up some interesting Dex based Paladin options if you're not locked into Aasimar.

Check with your DM to see if they will let you take the new AL Season 9 feature for Aasimar:

If your character is a tiefling or an aasimar:

Plane-Touched Wings:

Aasimar. At 5th level, you can remove both the Light Bearer trait plus the trait you receive at 3rd level (Radiant Soul, Radiant Consumption, Necrotic Shroud)—to sprout feathered wings which grant a fly speed of 30 ft.

At will flight is fantastic for a Conquest Paladin to get where he needs to be and lock foes in place.

[CheddarChampion]

Belthien, I'd go with build #2 unless you can't take a 1 level dip in Hexblade later on.
Have you considered a Weapon of Warning, Winged Boots, a Stone of Good Luck (because of +1 to saves), or Pipes of Haunting over a +1 shield? You do you with magic items, though.

[Sception]

Personally I'd rather have necrotic shroud. Flight is great, but there are other ways to get it, and the fear effect of necrotic shroud, while it only lasts a turn, is the only non-wis-save based frighten ability you have easy access to.

Racial flight options also often preclude heavy armor. Double check to be sure there if you do want to go that route and your dm is ok with it.


Otherwise, all three options look good. I'm partial to option three. Delaying conquest features hurts, but its only one level and you get a lot of variety out of it.

Definitely recommend at least 15 strength if you go with option 1 though, just of the off chance you fing yoursrlf in an antimagic field or 'gear stolen' scenario at some point in the campaign.

[Chadsius]

All:

Assuming the new Unearthed Arcana (can’t post a link, just google dnd unearthed arcana class features) goes through: any thoughts on the impact of Spirit Guardians’ addition to the paladin level 3 spell list for the Tyrant? Does this represent a nerf (relatively speaking) to this build compared to the other Oaths, since all will have a competing, extremely good 3rd level control spell?

Viewed in a vacuum, it is of course a straight buff: fighting fear immune enemies? Use spirit guardians.

However, since one of the main features of the Tyrant is shoring up the weakness of the paladin to groups or crowds of enemies via area-based control, and spirit guardians accomplishes a fairly similar goal through speed reduction (but also deals damage), does this new addition somewhat weaken the attraction of the Oath of Conquest?

Curious to hear peoples’ thoughts. I know that I will roll ahead with my T1 Tyrant, but once I get level 3 spells, using fear vs spirit guardians will be a much harder choice. I suspect I will use fear when I’m in front of my teammates with significant open space, allowing me to control enemies and stop them from reaching my teammates. If I’m in a narrow-ish space where enemies must pass within 15 feet of me to reach my teammates (and therefore would enter the range of Spirit Guardians), or if my enemies are fear immune, I will probably use Spirit Guardians.

[asc]

Does this (new account, can't post links yet, so delete the space before the s: http s://ddb.ac/characters/16935308/eUTUOb) work, or does the lack of res(con) or warcaster really break it? Let's assume that my mace has a leather strap so I can easily drop it to cast and then interact to get it back. Between the sheild and the pipes of haunting, does that make up for potentially losing concentration? Obviously nice to have the Manual -- what can I say, I have a generous DM?

[Shomeking]

Hey, I am starting a new session and was thinking about playing a Dragonborn Conquest Paladin. We're starting at lvl 3 with a free feat available and using point buy.

I was thinking of going 16 10 13 10 10 16 and going for Resilient feat so I can get con. proficiency but I am kinda torn between Dragon fear feat and Resilient.
I kinda like Dragon Fear because it fits with the archetype so good. How important would Resilient actually be?

[Sception]

Re the playtest variants:

yes, spirit guardians helps other paladins more than conquest, since the spell competes for slots with Fear. It's still a nice tool in the conqueror's toolbox, since it is a tank build, and does have a weakness when it comes to tanking against fear-immune enemies, something spirit guardians helps a great deal with.

burning a CD for a first level spell is another thing that's a nice option to have, but that benefits other paladins more than us since our CD is generally speaking better for our play style than any first level spell we might cast instead.

As for variant combat styles, we arguably benefit a bit more from the cantrip style, since we're more likely to have a maxed spellcasting stat to make use of offensive cleric cantrips like sacred flame or toll the dead. But that's only a benefit to single classed conquerors since any of our common multiclasses will have better cantrip options anyway, and even I'm not sure toll the dead is enough better than javelins as a fallback ranged option to justify giving up the +1 AC from defense style, and it doesn't matter anyway because if these variants are in effect then blind fighting is so much better than every other fighting style on any character at all that it's basically the automatic choice.


In the end these are just play test options, and I'm not sure they're worth getting too worked up over. They're unlikely to see official print as is - on our end in particular I've already seen complaints about both spirit guardians being too good to just give to all paladins for free and of the CD being a problem since it theoretically allows a second level paladin to cast more spells per day than full casting classes like bard, wizard, sorcerer, or druid.

[Wildarm]

Any thoughts on the recent warforged changes on how to build a Conquest Pally? +2 Con and +1 Cha seems the way to go but the build gets stretched thin with point buy if you want heavy armor now that you need 15 Str for plate once again.

Best I could come up with was:

Hexblade 1/Conquest X build with 15 Str, 10 Dex, 15 Con, 8 Int, 10 Wis, 16 Cha.
Max Cha and then Res(Con) at level 13?

Medium armor dex based build would be:

Hexblade 1/Conquest X - 13 Str, 14 Dex, 14 Con, 8 Int, 10 Wis, 16 Cha

[Voodoocaoz]

Hello guys!

We are going to play Sackled city revised to be played in 5e. I absolutely love the conquest paladin, and i'm going to be a Paladin of wee jas...
Background aside i rolled these stat: 17,16,15,14,11,11. I can't choose between the Fallen Aasima (+2 cha, +1 str and so many nice bonus) and Human Variant (feat yeah!).

Str 14 (+1 for both FA and HV)
Dex 11
Cos 16
Int 15 (don't mind this i'm going to roleplay and inqusitive guy looking for bad guy's clues)
Will 11
Cha 17 (+2 for FA and +1 HV)

I really want to take the dip into Hexblade but, how many levels? And when (pala1/hex1->pala2,3...etc)? That depends on choosing sword-n-board or polearm master.
I am really troubled by having so many path to follow, that i can't really choose the best one.

Any raccomendation or word of experience?