#weird builds

[fehscr]

Weird builds

[lgrig29]

Just opened uma musume for the first time in months and found this

Is this yay or nay?

I still have no idea of how to properly play this game btw (nor how I made this tbh)

[jwgh]

The Rogue Healer

Yesterday, I played a one-shot D&D 5e campaign, and a few people were intrigued by my rogue/healer build. Here’s how I set it up.

Most D&D play focuses on magical healing, but the rules do also have various ways to heal non-magically, and those other types of healing are key to this sort of character – though access to some sort of healing magic is also quite useful, whether through multiclassing, or a magic item, or a feat.

In practice, I found this character a lot of fun to play!  In combat, a rogue healer’s healing options are pretty limited, and are mostly focussed on getting people back on their feet, saving more substantial healing for after combat. But that’s actually kind of what you want out of a healer 90% of the time, and the usual rogue combat options are also quite nice. So, while ”The jack of all trades is a master of none” rule definitely applies to this type of character, there is some added versatility here which can be helpful, whether in combat or out of it.

Here’s a link to the character sheet of the rogue healer I used yesterday.

The Basics

As a rogue, high dexterity is key, but, as you will likely also be casting cleric spells (even if you don’t multiclass as cleric), you will also want a decent wisdom score. Both must be at least 13 if you’re going to multiclass.

Take proficiency in medicine. If you’re at a level where you can get expertise in it (which doubles your proficiency bonus for that skill), then do that too. If you’re interested in the veterinary arts as well, then animal handling is also a good pick.

Especially for low-level characters, I recommend at least one level of cleric. Pick the ‘Life’ domain, which among other things gives you:

Whenever you use a spell of 1st level or higher to restore hit points to a creature, the creature regains additional hit points equal to 2 + the spell’s level 

Good low-level cleric spells are the ‘Spare the Dying’ cantrip, plus ‘Cure Wounds’ and ‘Healing Word’. Note that, as a first level cleric, you’ll only have two spell slots, so be careful and try not to use them unless they’re really needed.

If, like me, you were a little confused as to why clerics have two different first level healing spells, the distinction is:

Cure Wounds: Takes a full action and requires touch. Heals 1d8+spellcasting mod+3 (with ‘Life’ domain)

Healing Word: Takes a bonus action and can be used on anyone within 60 ft. Heals 1d4+spellcasting mod+3 (with ‘Life’ domain)

In combat, a rogue healer will often use their action to attack an enemy (hopefully doing some sneak attack damage), then their bonus action to heal an ally – so Healing Word really shines there, despite the relatively low number of hit points it heals.

Going forward, most of your levels will be in rogue (or else this would be a ‘stabby cleric’ build instead of a ‘rogue healer’ build). None of the roguish archetypes have any particular relevance to healing, so just pick whichever you think is interesting and will work for your character.

Equipment

Healing potions are the obvious choice here, but they are expensive and single use, and, depending on the campaign, may be in limited supply. Here’s a couple of more mundane items to look at:

Healer’s Kit (5 gp): “This kit is a leather pouch containing bandages, salves, and splints. The kit has ten uses.” Normally, this just lets you stabilize an unconscious creature, but healer’s kits become much more powerful if you have the ‘Healer’ feat – see below for details. With that feat, ten uses for five gp means a tasty healing action for only five silver. Strongly recommended!

Antitoxin (50 gp): “A creature that drinks this vial of liquid gains advantage on saving throws against poison for 1 hour. It confers no benefit to undead or constructs.” In practice, I have not found this particularly useful, particularly given the price, but maybe your experience will be different – or maybe you just want to have some on hand, just in case.

Feats

When leveling up allows you to increase an ability score, your game master may allow you to take one of the following feats instead:

Healer You are an able physician, allowing you to mend wounds quickly and get your allies back in the fight. You gain the following benefits:

When you use a healer’s kit to stabilize a dying creature, that creature also regains 1 hit point.

As an action, you can spend one use of a healer’s kit to tend to a creature and restore 1d6 + 4 hit points to it, plus additional hit points equal to the creature’s maximum number of Hit Dice. The creature can’t regain hit points from this feat again until it finishes a short or long rest.

If you decided against multiclassing, then there’s another feat that can give you ‘Spare the Dying’:

Magic Initiate Choose a class: bard, cleric, druid, sorcerer, warlock, or wizard. You learn two cantrips of your choice from that class’s spell list. In addition, choose one 1st-level spell to learn from that same list. Using this feat, you can cast the spell once at its lowest level, and you must finish a long rest before you can cast it in this way again. Your spellcasting ability for these spells depends on the class you chose: Charisma for bard, sorcerer, or warlock; Wisdom for cleric or druid; or Intelligence for wizard.

Finally, there’s a feat that could potentially allow you to cast ‘Cure Wounds’ as a ritual (allowing you to avoid using up a spell slot by instead casting the spell as a ten-minute ritual). See the Player’s Handbook for details, but the important bit here is:

Ritual Caster [...] You have learned a number of spells that you can cast as rituals. These spells are written in a ritual book, which you must have in hand while casting one of them.

I would pick Cure Wounds rather than Healing Word for this, as the latter’s main advantage is that it’s quick and doesn’t require physical contact – I don’t see it as being a good candidate for ritual casting.

Characterization

I’m not sure how accurate this is, but I have this idea that there’s a trope in Westerns where there’s a gang of cowboys and/or outlaws which has attached itself to a doctor. He’s come west because of some disgrace or other, and he doesn’t approve of the violence, but is able to remove bullets, sew up wounds, and otherwise patch up anyone who needs it. Maybe he works with the gang because, although he deplores the violence, he sees its necessity in the violent world he lives in; maybe he does it because he has some personal connection to the gang’s leader; maybe it’s because they give him the respect that others don’t; or maybe he does it for the money. Probably, on some level, it’s a mixture of the four. He doesn’t think of himself as a fighter, but, if there’s no other choice, he can give almost as good as he gets. The members of the gang all call him ‘Doc’, or some similar nickname, though he probably doesn’t have much actual formal medical training. Most of the characters in Westerns know they are in Westerns and love it, but this character knows it and kind of hates it, most of the time.

So, let’s transfer that idea to a fantasy RPG, while minimizing the elements that make the character less than useful in a standard campaign, and/or difficult for other players to work with. That was the idea.

All that aside, when you’re putting together your rogue healer, here are a couple of questions to think about, when putting together your character’s backstory and traits.

Why isn’t this character just a cleric? Maybe they were originally, but they were expelled due to some scandal. Or they were originally, but became disenchanted with their church. Or they never formally studied to be a cleric because they were rejected by the local temple due to bad reputation / lack of money / lack of family connections / insert other reason here. 

Why isn’t this character just a rogue? Maybe roguish skills were the best way to keep alive when they were young, but they always hated seeing people and animals in pain, and when the opportunity to learn to heal people arose they jumped at it. Maybe they were in a party that lacked a healer, and started picking up some healing skills just to keep everyone on their feet, and found it rewarding. Maybe they’ve always loved animals, and have acted as an amateur veterinarian from a young age, only to find that those same skills could be useful as a party member, too. Maybe they originally planned to be something else, but life happened: training with a doctor was interrupted when the doctor was killed by bandits, etc.

The fourth page of my sample character sheet mostly comes from my attempts to think about all of this.

[a-lover-of-hounds-blog]

Today on strange 3.5e builds

Cleric/Heartwarder/Oozemaster Immunity to crits and a ton of other things, a focus on mind affecting spells, wear all armor, oozy touch attacks, and awkward ooze kisses. Oozes can be pretty too.

[summoner-req]

Hey, anybody know any weird builds?

I've been wanting to try my hands at some of the odder ways to build champions that still work. So far, I've got on-hit Orianna down pat (building her more based on her passive than abilities. Abilities are nice, they help me control the field, but the autoattacks are where her power comes from,) which is a specialized rune/mastery page, Malady, AS boots, Wit's End, BotRK, Nashor's Tooth, and a Hextech Gunblade. I'm also working on AP Xin Xhao, and what I'm tentatively calling Trinity Mundo, balancing health as primary but with more AD and AP than normal. (I'm thinking Rylai's, Warmog's, Zhonya's, Atma's, Maw of Mal, and Ninja boots.)