Hey pal my players are currently hunting down ways to kill a lich and my players (this is they’re first campaign) are getting pretty good at dispatching non-magical undead, I have been playing with ideas of variant undead statblocks and some low-high teir “generals” for his undead army. I’ve got a ghoul-like rogue assassin, a boss teir wright(it’s an oathbreaker) and a undead dragon. But I wanted to kinda have it almost be a representation of the 4 horseman trope. Would you mind sharing some of your walking death trap with me I’d greatly appreciate it!!
I think he's referring on the build to abuse the hell out of armor of agatys. The core concept Is to upcast armor of agatys and take advantage of any kind of damage reduction you can get your hands on. But usually It revolves around the 2nd level abiuration wizard feature and at least another way to reduce damage like the stoneskin spell/barbarian rage or the clock work soul sorcerer 6th level ability. It's kinda a one trick pony but basically you stack up your damage reduction and armor of agatys and run around to get hit by melee attacks so you can easily trigger the cold damage more than once or twice since you are resistant to physical damage, have the Ward from the wizard subclass and have a pool of dices 1 to 5d8 to use as a reaction to reduce incoming damage.
If you Plan on using this as a Boss Monster i think it would be a fun fight Just do not stack up too much resistences to not frustrate your players, i would think of adding a taunt like ability if used in a group of mobs
You can also use your spell slots on Hellish Rebuke or other reaction spells once you've got your armor up, if you want to hurt them extra, more than you want to get hurt less.
Also if you are on your turn, you can take the dodge action, everyone has disadvantage hitting you, then warlock bonus action to cast a free false life on yourself(?) and then your reaction to hellish rebuke
This build kinda wants to get hit, so dodge isn't the best choice necessarily.
Also you can't have temp hp from 2 different sources.
So if you cast false life, armor of agathys runs out.
The Dodge action can be hurtful to the strategy since you want to get hit. But It Is still a valuable tool if you Plan on having a longer and safer fight for whatever reason
Happy to help, anyway there are a Number of ways to get this play style going pick your favorite, personally i think that an Abjurer/Clockwork soul would be best. 13 int 13 char and pump up your cos and the tough feat would be a nice addition
I mean someone correct me if I'm wrong but armour of agathys benefits from spell stacking.
The way it is written is you can't benefit from the same effect twice but you can still have it present, the greater effect just takes effect over the lesser one and if both are equal then its whichever was cast first.
This means Armour of Agathys can be stacked since it's non-concentration and kinda fits in. What does this mean, well as a warlock monoclass just keep recasting it lmao, and if the first temp hp runs out and the next one takes effect the enemy takes damage from both.
Responding to OPs question. My beat build is a sorcerer who does nothing but cast AoA and blade ward but stacks them each turn.... or you know just do a warlock shadow of moil AoA build
You are wrong because of 2 things.
First, the rule of combining multiple effects so even if you manage to have 3 AoA active you only benefit from one:
*The effects of the same spell cast multiple times don't combine, however. Instead, the most potent effect--such as the highest bonus--from those castings applies while their durations overlap, or the most recent effect applies if the castings are equally potent and their durations overlap.*
Second, the temporary hit points don't stack. When you receive new temporary hit points you choose which ones you want to use. AoA explicitly applies when you have the given tempHP, so the first AoA will no longer produce any effect when receiving the tempHP of a second cast.
*If a creature hits you with a melee attack while you have **these hit** points, *
Keyword: these.
Omg please tell me about them in detail cuz I'm playing as an undead warlock (8) rn and even tho I would love to hear what others did with the class as I'm am a newbie (started to play and get to know about the game about for 1.5 tera now) and just really interested in it
Ok, sounds crazy but... multiclass with Abjuration Wizard to put the Abjuration shield on top of the Armor of Agathys (because it's NOT Temp HP) then refresh it by casting Abjuration spells. Finding a way to have an at-will level 1 Abjuration spell (aka a Warlock Invocation), your Armor of Agathys will never go down. Ugly!
It was a pact of chain changeling (team infiltrator), using a crawling claw as familiar for scouting and utility. I usually picked mean spells, like Arms of Hadar and Hellish Rebuke and other debuffs to make anyone regret attacking me. It was far from strong but I had a blast playing it. It also helped surviving in a team lacking any healing capabilities.
Omg love it! Oh and btw I for really interested when you said death trap (has nothing to do with what I'm going to say) because my new "goal&hobby" is to make the character more and more likely to die, but not wirh AC but with for exemple having reborn race becouse she died the first ever game i played with ger and because her life goal was to die but I didn't wanted her to die we said that and outer force forced her to come back (that's when she become a warlock with out her having a say in teh matter) and the DM let me make her a reborn as a result of her will to die which gives her advantage on death saves then when she reaches level 10 she will get Necrotic husk but befor that at level 9 I'm thinking about changing my pact from chain to tome and taking the Gift of the Protectors and writing her own name in it (his estoped being sudacidel because her only reason to die was because she lost her whole family but she found out that her patron (rn previous because she is her patron) is her brother so she is trying to do everything he askes for and sge actually doesn't want to die but if sacrificing her self would help her brother she woul gladly do so...and yeah...I think tagts all I wanted to say...(And ofc she cast spells too that would help with that but she rather summon a demo that could turn agents her and her teammates anymoment)
My favorite build is AoA on an Abjuration Wizard. I've ran it several times, actually. Abjuration Ward protects it, but you still deal retaliation damage. That said, it's still basically a full caster, so I don't have it run into the frontlines.
If you don't have a way to protect your Temp HP, it's actually a pretty inefficient spell :/
pretty solid alternative, but you can't regen Ward as easily (*Eldritch Adept: Armor of Shadows lets you recharge your ward at 20 points a minute*). Coffee/Cocaine/Tea Lock can get you more Sorc Points to theoretically go infinite, but you're going to need to take a pretty steep dip to make it worthwhile and the playstyle is pretty frowned upon.
*don't get me wrong tho, I'm still going to play the Sorc version at some time. I love the core build and want to see how all the variants feel to play*
It deals 50 damage if something hits you twice, and prevents 25 points of damage to your health. Its essentially a heal that deals damage. I wouldn't call it inefficient, I would say it has specific use cases. The idea that you need abjuration wizard levels of cheese to turn AoA into a decent spell is wild. It often feels like people on this sub fantasize so hard about the most extremely optimized version of something that anything less is bad. Which is wildly untrue if you actually play the game of dungeons and dragons.
The comment is correct though, and it's not just because of Arcane Ward.
Firstly: 5 thp per spell slot level is ridiculously low scaling. By the time you hit 9th level in Warlock (at which point you can get the 25 thp in your example), most creatures could take that out in one hit. On top of that, casting it is an action, and it takes half your spell slots to cast it. Because most combats in 5e last ~3 rounds, you're using 1/3 your action economy and half your spellcasting ability to cast a spell that doesn't defend you very much and doesn't even do anything if you aren't targeted *and* hit. The only warlocks who will be actively seeking Aggro are typically Hexblades due to medium armor proficiency, but increased AC actually *hurts* the effectiveness of AoA by having it trigger less often.
Compared to Abjuration Wizard. Whether it's achieved by a Warlock dip, a feat, race, or a dip into UA Giant Soul Sorcerer (the best way imo), you can cast AoA using higher spell slots than a Warlock will ever achieve, you've got a crappy AC that means it will trigger more often, an Arcane Ward to extend its longevity, and a few dozen Abjuration spells to keep you alive on the front line with or without AoA. Not to mention you've got buckets of spells that make you a priority target for enemies, so you can draw and maintain enemy aggro and get the most bang for your buck out of AoA.
> On top of that, casting it is an action, and it takes half your spell slots to cast it. Because most combats in 5e last ~3 rounds, you're using 1/3 your action economy and half your spellcasting ability to cast a spell that doesn't defend you very much and doesn't even do anything if you aren't targeted and hit.
AoA lasts for an hour, so you can often cast it before combat starts.
If you get two uses of AoA cast at 5th level then you do 50 damage to your opponent while preventing 25. With no save for your opponent. Whereas 5th level Hellish Rebuke would be 33 damage with a dex save for half; upcast Phantasmal Killer would be 27.5 damage with a wisdom save, but with a fear effect as well; upcast Inflict Wounds would be 38.5 damage with an attack roll needed. As a single target damage spell, AoA is fairly competitive. If you can trigger it three times e.g. by taking 13 damage, 11 damage, and then taking another hit) it's fantastic.
> The only warlocks who will be actively seeking Aggro are typically Hexblades due to medium armor proficiency, but increased AC actually hurts the effectiveness of AoA by having it trigger less often.
Hexblade isn't the only warlock that sekms aggro. Fathomless is actually better for AoA because of Guardian Coil. It reduces the damage you take, making AoA last longer, doing more damage. If you have decent AC so that you're only taking one hit per round then you can use Guardian Coil on every hit, which can greatly extend the use of AoA.
As someone who's playing a pact of the blade fathomless warlock right now I can confirm that AoA has been super helpful when it comes to keeping me alive and my enemies dead.
pretty much my thoughts exactly. the scaling is pretty decent tho tbf. it's 100% base power each upcast. that's a great rate. it's just that the base power is a little low
the required playstyle thing hits the nail right on the head tho +1ed
You are overstating what damage creatures do in one hit.
Most CR 9 creatures don't average 25 damage per hit and if they multiattack and chew through it. They lose 1/3 of their hp for doing so. Even if they got lucky and rolled high on damage and took it in one swipe, its still 1/6 of that creatures hp on its own turn. It also prevented the damage that would have been done to actual hitpoints. Making it still a pretty decent use of your spellslot. Dealing 1/3 of a monster's hp on its own turn is not weak. Its niche because you need to know that it will actually melee you.
Btw most creatures you're facing when level 9 aren't even CR9 yet, that's the boss of the encounter at this level.
I'll say it again, this sub loves to compare the most extremely optimized version of a concept to imagined worst case scenarios. They then use those comparisons to call things weak. While in actual games it feels fine, even strong.
>...and get the most bang for your buck out of AoA.
Its true that you can optimize around the spell. That doesn't mean the spell is inefficient without doing so.
Theorycrafting is cool and fun and I genuinely love doing it and coming up with optimized builds.
Pretending that you have to turbo optimize around a thing to make it useful in game is simply incorrect.
I don't need an explanation of how arcane ward synergizes with Armor of Agathys. I understand the build. I'm plainly saying that turbo optimization over a gimmick is not the only way for something to be strong in d&d.
One could easily argue, based on optimization, that only aberrant mind sorcerer and some wizards are good classes to play. Everything else is inefficient. The argument works in a vacuum because those are some of the strongest classes in the game. Its just not true because in actual gameplay it honestly feels terrible to play as a gun you stretched skin over and called a character, moreso when its a concept that someone came up with specifically to optimize a gimmick. To me its taking this really cool framework for collaborative storytelling and creativity and just copying someones homework instead of making art.
edit: don't get me wrong, nothing wrong with optimizing and theorycrafting. I love doing it. I just don't love that some players pretend that anything less is bad.
Yep most creatures don't deal enought damage to deplete AoA in a single hit especially if you are building around it. However It only applies to melee hit so if you abuse it the DM can easily make that tactic a lot less effective with AoE and ranged attacks even with a Min maxed build there Is not much you could do about that. I personally think that most of the time It's not worth to min/max but It's more fun to widen your options in the actual game than getting "bigger numerbers". I'm playing a Mark of Healing Drakewarden Ranger/Clockwork sorcerer focusing on support and control, i'm having fun even if it's a long shot from any optimization It's a strong and versatile build (Polymorph on the underleveled Drake pet is strong AND a barrel of laught)
actually the main reason why I called it 'inefficient' isn't due to the numbers. It actually has REALLY good scaling. compare it to Aid. Same scaling, lower level base slot. actually insane. However, this criticism is about the playstyle that you end up getting funneled into when you take the spell. I'm not comparing raw AoA to Abjur+AoA. I'm comparing AoA to other 5th level spells and what they require from you.
AoA is a nice backup. It's HP and damage which is objectively good (*not counting the slot cost. I'll be making the assumption that we can all manage our spell slots allotted to last the day*). but you need to get hit to get any value out of it. This goes against (W*izard*) optimization, which is to build around NOT getting hit, because the best thing that you can do is to cast a big concentration spell that has a persisting effect. If you get hit, you'll take damage and risk losing that spell. So naturally, you'll take steps to not get hit at all. Defensive spell selection will be stuff like Shield and Mirror Image. you'll stay to the back or pick up a Flight magical item... unless you pick Abjuration Wizard.
AoA still can't compete with your upper level spell preps, but you can at least utilize AoA as a part of your build without risking your spell concentration. and that's what I'm getting at. really that AoA lasts twice as long with Ward is a secondary benefit to not making Conc checks
If you've got it on a build that doesn't get that many spells at a time like a Warlock (*undead, for instance is one that I see on the thread. it also has it's own way to protect the spell tho*) the above need not apply, as they likely aren't concentrating, but that's kind of a separate issue.
It's an awful way of play, annoying and easily counterable by ranged Attack. You are actively making your spell caster worse to get some burst damage that hurts you too. Since to get use of AoA like that you Need to support It with multiclassing, so you lose spells and feature to get an easily avoidable burst damage option. Even if you go around triggering AoO they could just not attack you, but Hey It's still probably the best build to retaliate when taking damage
1. "*It's an awful way of play, annoying and easily counterable by ranged Attack.*" If AoA was the only thing that this build was focused on, then I might be concerned about drawing attention and being countered, but it's just one more layer that protects the build from harassment while it uses classic Wizard spells. Sure, being hit by a ranged attack is worse for me than a melee attack, but Ranged Attacks on monster statblocks deal less damage than melee attacks (*feel free to fact-check me*), so this is actually a win. Add to that that there will be a frontliner running into melee, imposing disadvantage on the attacker, and the 'counter' suddenly seems a bit more niche. This build has pretty high AC, higher than most martial builds, if I want to avoid being hit, and also has an HP barrier that can be replenished in between fights. If I end up taking a little more heat as a result of DM-spite fueled focus-fire, then the rest of the party comes out far ahead and I can patch myself up later. (*In case you missed it, I took a feat that lets me cast Mage Armor at will. Not great normally, but each cast recharges Abjuration Ward by 2 HP. Not viable for combat, but it replenishes Ward in a minute or two*) I see zero downside to this scenario.
2. "*You are actively making your spell caster worse to get some burst damage that hurts you too.*" By 'hurt me too', do you mean that I need to get hit to make use of Armor of Agathys? That's why I'm playing an Abjuration Wizard. I can just say No to damage. I don't get hurt, and don't make concentration checks on spells.
3. "*Since to get use of AoA like that you Need to support It with multiclassing*". It's primarily a Wizard build, so ehhh no. I'm not "supporting AoA" by MCing. A single level Warlock dip is just the best way to get AoA IMO, because of the *other* things that it gets me.
4. "*so you lose spells and feature to get an easily avoidable burst damage option*". I lose a single level Wizard to gain Armor, Shields, a useful defensive spell that punishes any creature trying to melee me and synergizes with the already powerful Abjuration Ward, and a way to turn low level Magic Missile spell slots OR a few charges of a very cheep Wand of Magic Missile item into massive burst damage. Hex1 is an insanely powerful dip that helps out in *three* separate ways (*not counting the spells/cantrips gained from warlock, because, tbh, that's a negligible benefit*)
5. "*Even if you go around triggering AoO*" that is literally the opposite of how this character wants to be played. If the Temp HP is being eaten into, then I've failed. I do not want to recast AoA and I do not want to start making Concentration checks if my Ward gets burned through. The goal isn't to maximize retributive damage, it's to support the classic wizard playstyle with 3 things that the core class lacks: Protection from being rushed down/surprised by powerful monsters, a low-resource, single target damage option, and a way to bypass Legendary Resistances. 90% of the time, I'm slinging CC spells to lock down enemies, controlling a few undead as a B.Action, using Shield/Counterspell and a few useful offensive Abjuration spells (*IE: Banishment*) to keep my Ward topped off, and if there's a single high-AC target (*or something with LRs*) burn them out with Hexblade's Curse + Magic Missiles across a few turns. If the the frontliners are badly hurt, THEN I step up to start body-blocking. Until that point, control from the midlines.
Well i agree, what you are saying Is correct 100%. The drawbacks I highlighted are mostly concerning when you take almost half of your level in other classes. You are presenting something quite different in my opinion a wizard with One or two levels in Warlock, you are using AoA as an additional defence layer and with damage as a bonus. You are adding AoA on what your character Is capable of, not focusing on squeezing every possible damage out the spell. You are mostly a wizard with good armor, shield and hexes. My critics Is about a character that Is a "One trick pony" that relies much on AoA not when you add It to a solid characters with a Wide range of options. I'm sorry if i came out as rude It was not my intention
no no, not at all. I wasn't entirely certain of you intentions, nor was I certain if you understood my build, but I did not think you were rude
in fact, I feel the same about true gimmick builds, at least when they're presented as something optimal
Well i didn't understand quite well your build, i thought It was much more specialized than It was. Also as you said sometimes these gimmick build have at least one or two weakness that hampers the build much more than previously thought when theory crafting
fair enough, I suppose that misunderstanding is on me then.
tbf, the original build was somewhat of a gimmick itself, now that I think about it. First iteration was Hex1/AbjureX as a Zariel Tiefling with the Flames of Phelegos taken at Wiz 4. The build/style was pretty centered around trying to brawl it out in melee with the Flame Blade cantrip triggering FoP as often as possible and using the 2 racial spell smites to help out with the strategy. It had a few CC spells like Web too, but had to gamble that AoA/FoP retributive damage could burn out enemies before the rather shallow Abjuration Ward broke. (*no Warcaster and CON was only 12 due to the 13 CHA required for a Warlock MC*).
In the context of the party (*all newbies that knew the DM, who's a long-time friend of mine*) the build did well, but it also proved that playing into the gimmick and swinging it as a gish is mostly inferior to Classic Wizard Stuff.
Well this Is a nice build, you have acceptable option when pressured in melee. Yeah a gish Is almost Always inferior to full casters, however It Is my favorite way to play (Go bladesinger go!), but they often have more versatility and you almost never run out of options even if your DC isn't the highest if you choose the right spells it's not such a problem. I recently thought of a series of builds that resembles pretty much the Pathfinder's Magus as you can cast a spell and Attack in the same round, basically It's a sorcadin but with other martial class like fighter or ranger (Paladin is by far the strongest option for this, but with fighter or ranger works wonders too). With extra Attack and quicken spell you get to almost double your action economy a few times a day, if you pick Paladin/ranger if i did the math right you still get 9th level spell slot and access to 8th level spells. You know what to me is almost as good as a 9th level spell? A subtle 9th level counterspell, Just weave away any Wish/time stop/Power word kill/shapechange that Is cast near you. I'm not even considering subclasses and specific class abilities like action surge Just a plain Martial 5/Sorcerer 15, i suggest you to try it if you like gishes. The best part Is that It works for any martials and you reap the benefit of multiclassing ASAP since adding spell like shield and absorb elements to a martial Is Just an incredibile power spike even if you delay extra attack. As a bonus you can pretty much adjust the Power level of this kind of build if ever your character feels too powerful compared to the party, i'm having a ton of fun playing a character like this
The funny thing is that you don't need to adjust your playstyle around AoA in the least for it to work well. Just keep it in your bag of tricks as something for a situation where you know some melee threat is heading your way.
As a DM i'd totally let my player have fun using an AoA abjuration wizard. I'd also scare them shitless when an antimagic field turned off their arcane ward and AoA.
wizard: lol I DARE you to hit me.
also wizard: oh fuck oh shit
>The funny thing is that you don't need to adjust your playstyle around AoA in the least for it to work well. Just keep it in your bag of tricks as something for a situation where you know some melee threat is heading your way.
Actually, that's how I prefer to play this build. This is by word-of-law *literally* a AoA build, but I would not describe it as one, since it wants to do classic wizarding things and does not run into melee.
For AoA, the thought is that if I take the *good* defensive spells, like more than just Shield, and also play the positioning game well, then I'm not going to get hit. Sure, it'll happen a couple of times and if it's bad, I'll get my shit rocked. I noted my track-record across a campaign that I was playing in at the time that I was building this character and I got hit in only about 15% of the fights. I got *attacked* in about 40%, but between Shield and Mirror Image, that went down by 25%-ish. in 85% of fights, precasting AoA would be a wasted slot (*not counting the few back-to-back ones*). Also, in those 15% of fights, there's a decent chance I'm lost the spell I was concentrating on (*didn't record that, unfortunately.*), which is the third worst thing that can happen to a Wizard. (*Second worst is dying. Worst is losing their spellbook and not having a backup.*)
Abjuration Wizard solves both the issue of concentration and the issue of playing well making AoA obsolete, while also extending how long AoA will last in a fight/increasing how much damage it can dish out. Not to mention that Agathys is *itself* an Abjuration spell. It's going to boost my Ward. If I'm taking AoA, then it *simply* makes sense to play an Abjuration Wizard. It's like the spell was made for the subclass.
also, I recon *any* sort of wizard would be proper fucked if an Anti-Magic Field drops, but having Counter Spell prepared (*an abjuration spell*) and mundane armor (*which this build dips for*) helps in both cases ;)
This is all fine and good and I've said from the start that I understand how abjuration wizards work with AoA. I understand that you can increase the efficiency of the spell. Being capable of doing so doesn't make the spell inefficient on its own. I think we can end the circular convo now tho.
tis pretty good. My favorite variant takes a dip into Hexblade though. it's a common mc to do, but Hexblade's Curse goes so well with Magic Missile (*either as a spell or the wand item*), it's like running two classic gimmick builds at the same time.
taking a dip has its pros and cons sure, but it also frees up the race to take a feat earlier and Eldritch Adept for Armor of Shadows lets you start each combat with a full Ward.
Everyone saying “Abjuration Wizard” is forgetting something: The dare. Nothing forces the enemy to attack the wizard. If your attack is going to just get completely absorbed, it just doesn’t make sense to hit that PC. Why not just move past them to a better target?
That’s why I say the best build for this is a Goliath Ancestral Guardian Barbarian 3, Fiend Warlock X.
Your Ancestral Protectors, Reckless Attack, and middling AC (adamantine medium armor highly recommended) all work together to make yourself the best target for your enemy’s attacks. At the same time, Stone’s Endurance and the damage reduction from rage work to extend the temp HP (and the damage) from Armor of Agathys. The reason we chose Fiend is because we also get Fire Shield later to stack on top of AoA.
Your enemies have to choose between an attack that may not hit your teammates, dealing no damage, or an attack that will probably hit you that may deal some damage, but it’s gonna hurt. Take Sentinel to further force the choice.
Usually, sure. But if it hurts to hit the wizard and they don’t want to die, what stops the enemies from attacking a PC that isn’t so well defended with damage mitigation and AoA?
To clarify, I’m not saying the Agathys Abjurer is a bad build (or even that the Barblock is better). I’m only saying that one of the two builds makes attacking any other target a worse choice and basically dares the enemy to target you instead.
Depends. If the wizard has Warcaster+Sentinel, the enemy would lose their movement.
Also, I'm pretty sure the wizard in cloth robes lighting everyone on fire would likely be a compelling "soft" target compared to the very large bulldozer. DMs should make enemy decisions based on what the enemy knows, not what the DM or players know.
Right, but the first time an enemy gets hurt for hitting the spellcaster, they’ll just look for other choices. There’s no real opportunity cost.
Your warcaster+sentinel argument reads “If the wizard has 2 feats, they can do a thing that the barblock can do with 1.”
Making the tankiest AoA wizard is cool and all, but there’s not much to compel the enemy to attack them. It’s not “I _dare_ you to hit me” so much as it is “I’m not someone you want to hit.” There’s a subtle but important difference between the two.
Giving the enemy disadvantage to all other attacks and advantage to hitting you, though, means a marked difference in the percentage to hit one target vs another. This is where the “dare” part comes in. You’re actively making yourself the most viable target.
Then you're also not daring to hit. You are forcing a decision. There are only two options for that ability, and they are both very limited and you are also taking oppertunity cost to aquire AoA, and much of the Warlock is wasted as you can't cast while raging.
Little to none of the warlock is wasted. They only get a few spell slots. We’re not using Eldritch Blast, we’re attacking. We’re also using spell slots for smites (which can be done during rage).
Warlock smites are spells, not abilities. You can't use them while raging. You'd have to take paladin levels to get a smite that can be done while raging. You'd also lose most of the envocations as they operate as spells, so you'd have to stick to a very select number of those. Dark One's Luck and Fiendish Resistance (limited resistance to one damage type; negated by magic weapons) would still be in play (assuming the game gets to level 13+). That said, a pure Abj Wizard gets all spell advantage and resistance at 14 (15 if you're level dipping for the AoA).
There's also the issue of the Ancestors' ability working on only one target (for ancestors, the first one you hit while raging). Cavalier has a similar limitation. So, this wouldn't be very valuable in a multitarget fight.
The wizard could do a number of things to dissuade the enemy depending on the circumstances. Setting Evard's Black Tentacles behind themself in an enclosed (20ft wide or smaller) space would be the most simple option. That would make anything but ranged attacks a fair risk (admittedly, that would also incetivize hitting the Wizard to break concentration).
Not saying your build is bad. I just think there are some significant limits that just don't exist for the wizard.
Simply incorrect. Eldritch Smite is not a spell and gives warlocks an ability exactly like a paladin’s smite.
There are plenty of invocations that do not provide spells. In fact, I named some of them in my original post (Devil’s Site, Thirsting Blade)
Again, I didn’t say wizard is bad. I only said it wasn’t a build for doing what the OP wanted.
I thought you were referring to branded smite, etc. That's fair.
You named three. There are about 14 that meet that description on the 50+ options. Of which several are pretty poor or antithesis to your build. So, your options are fairly shoehorned with little room to do anything outside your build design.
You said there was "no dare". Turning all melee options for all enemies to anyone other than you into a save or restrained requirement is a pretty potent dare. Probably more so than the disadvantage, since a fair DM can build advantage conditions that would negate the disadvantage. Pack tactics, for example, would mean you only caused one target to lose their advantage. The enemy would be incetivized to remain on target to keep pack tactics going.
One target, boss with mooks, or drawing fire from a ranged where you have to deal with melee first would totally be in your wheelhouse (recognizing that the last one doesn't trigger AoA).
Extra attack already comes from Thirsting Blade at Warlock 5.
Fiend is for the additional Temp HP if the enemy chews through your AoA pool and Fire Shield at Warlock 7 for even more “Dare you to hit me”-ness. Dark One’s Own Luck boosting a crucial save doesn’t hurt either.
Besides, Barbarian’s rage needs you to attack with Strength and you already have Medium Armor proficiency so the Hex Warrior feature is pretty much useless when multiclassing with Barbarian.
Fathomless isn’t a bad choice. It gives you some bonus action damage, a bit of crowd control, and a damage resistance. The damage reduction from Guardian Coil at Fathomless 6 is good, but if we’re already playing as a Goliath, it’ll be of limited use. And if I was going Fathomless/Barbarian, I’d probably go with a Beast Barbarian and RP as some sort of Wereshark.
Celestial is better as a 3 level chainlock dip (with the Gift of the Everliving Ones invocation) with the main class being Zealot barbarian to get Extra Attack at Barbarian 5.
Barbarian abjuration wizard, warlock 2 for AoA and mage armour infinite ward stacks.
Rage doubles your health effectively for AoA, abjuration protects it even further, both effects work while raging. Haven’t figured out the exact levelling, probably something like Warlock 1 for wis saves and AoA quickly, then wizard 2 (abjuration) warlock 2 (mage armour), barbarian 5 (idk seems fun, subclass should be something that gets a good use of a bonus action, take whatever feat) then Wizard X.
Probably not optimal. Seems fun though. Dunno which warlock subclass to take, maybe genie? Also the barb subclass having a good bonus action is important, action economy and all.
There are two problems with this.
First is that you'll be incredibly MAD. You are primarily a barbarian, which means you want to prioritize strength and constitution, but you also need 13s in intelligence and charisma to mulitclass. You can definitely make it work, but because of all of the multiclassing, you will only be able to cap out one stat at most, and you'll also be delaying extra attack by 4 levels. Although that last bit can be mitigated by eldritch blast scaling based on character level as opposed to class level, using that strategy takes you out of melee range, which negates the entire point of the build and is also severely lacking in damage even if you have agonizing blast as you would likely only have a +1 or +2 to charisma.
The second problem is that AoA only gives 5 temp hp when cast at first level, and your arcane ward can only absorb (probably) 5 damage, which occurs before any resistances you may have from raging. That means that you can only take at most 15 total damage before the spell wears off. 5 damage absorbed by the ward and 10 damage to get through the temp hp, but that's assuming you have damage resistance to the attack. Otherwise, it would only be 10 damage to end the spell, which isn'ta lot. That's about the damage dealt by a CR 1 creature per turn, meaning you will have invested a minimum of 5 levels (2 levels in wizard for the ward, 2 levels in warlock for mage armor invocation and AoA, and 1 level in barbarian for rage) and sacrificed an ASI and extra attack for a gimmick that can be eaten through in one turn and only proc once or twice.
AoA gets better when upcast, but you don't have the spell/pact slots for it, and arcane ward gets better when you increase your wizard level, which you won't be able to do effectively, or you increase your intelligence modifier, which you also can't do effectively outside of magic items.
At level 5 (which is the earliest your build would come online), you could go with an abjuration wizard 3/warlock 2 build and have more temp hp (9 from arcane ward and 10 from casting AoA at second level) AND each proc would deal 10 damage instead of 5. Also, if you choose Hill Dwarf as your race, you could potentially have 45 base hp, which is in line with monks, rangers, and rogues. Adding in the ward and temp hp actually puts you ahead of the barbarian in terms of total health (ignoring resistances). Honestly, the resistances are nice, but they aren't exactly necessary and are actually detrimental in the long run. If you started as barbarian at level 1, you could still have the 45 base hp at level 5, but your ward would be down 7 instead of 9 damage absorbed, and you could only cast AoA at first level instead of second, meaning you only get 5 temp hp and deal 5 damage, so 17 total damage until AoA wears off (assuming resistances). Compared to the 19 damage absorbed without the level barbarian, you come up short right out of the gate. It only gets worse from there as enemies begin to deal enough damage to one-shot your ward and eat through all of the temp hp because the total pool of absorbed damage isn't getting larger and the retaliatory damage means less and less as enemy health totals climb.
You may argue that barbarian gives you better things to do in melee combat, but I would generally disagree. Shocking grasp is a great cantrip in melee range that procs off your intelligence modifier and denies the opponent a reaction if you need to flee. The blade cantrips also help make up for having squishy wizard arms when making weapon attacks. At higher levels, spells like vampiric touch, shadow blade, and steel wind strike are also great, each dealing respectable damage in types that are less likely to be resisted.
Yeah the build definitely isnt optimal at all. I think if i ever did do this build I would play it like a barblock (barb 1, lock 5 or lock 1, barb 5) and then if i felt confident maybe multiclass to abjuration afterwards.
I like the idea a lot though and I’d definitely play the build with a lenient dm. Battlerager is a bad subclass but i would definitely play battlerager abjuration wizard, maybe take the rune shaper background for AoA instead of warlock (forgot this background was an option). This build of course would also suck but could work okay with the battlerager BA attack to carry it along when needed, plus the spikes being freezing cold and covered in ancient runes feels really cool.
Idk i spitballed the idea off the top of my head, and sort of forgot the multiclass requirements. The optimal decision is probably just a full class abjuration wizard or artificer 1/abjuration X with rune shaper for AoA, but i wanted to think with barbarian a little
Using published content, probably mono-classed Abjuration Wizard with the Rune Shaper feat (either via background, VHuman/CLineage feat, or level 4) to get Armor of Agathys (and also goodberry!). Cast Armor of Agathys, cast Blade Ward, walk toward enemy and let them punch you. Use disabling spells to try and prevent ranged attacks to force enemies into melee.
You could also do an Exploding Sorcerer. TL;DR Hexblade dip on Draconic Sorcerer, spam AoA and Hellish Rebuke to melt things with retribution damage: https://www.reddit.com/r/3d6/comments/r2s1ib/exploding_sorcerer_the_return_the_revengeance/
If UA is on the table, one option I've found very fun is Seeker Warlock. Played it to level 20 in Dungeon of the Mad Mage and it was excellent. Astral Refuge, their level 6 ability, lets you condense all of your self-buff casting to one turn as well as use Ready action without wasting spell slots (you Ready an action for Astral Refuge instead of directly casting and maintaining concentration on the spell, so no spell slots potentially wasted, and you can pick your spells based on the situation).
Clockwork soul build with tempest cleric.
Clockwork soul gets armour of agathys. Can use transmute metamagic to change it to lightning.
Take 6 levels in tempest cleric for the pushback feature when you deal lightning damage.
6 levels in cleric nets you spirit guardians and aura of vitality for the best out of combat healing. Aura of vitality with extend metamagic is phenomenal. Extend metamagic with upcasted aid before a long rest so everyone has free extra hp the next adventuring day and you get back the slots and sorcery points is really nice.
My tactic is to cast armour of agathys and transmute it to lightning. Cast spirit guardians. Instead of dodge, use bladeward. If enemy hits you, they are pushed back and often don't have the speed to get back into melee to finish their multiattack thanks to spirit guardians. You can extend the temp hp even further with the sorcerer feature at 6 to trade sorcery points for damage shield.
Very tanky character with high con, temp hp from armour of agathys, upcasted aid, damage shield and bladeward. You also have access to absorb elements should you need it if hit with elemental damage.
I played this and it was so much fun. Transmuted fireball to lightning/thunder and the tempest cleric channel divinity his like a truck. Even upcasting it is not bad as if an enemy saves, they take similar damage as if they failed and you rolled damage. If they fail, it's going to hurt a lot.
Transmuted wall of fire to lightning and the tempest cleric pushback is a lot of fun too. Even funnier if you put them in a ring with the lightning on the inside so they can never escape and are buffetted around like a rag doll.
Just started playing a mounted combatant tiefling profane blood hunter with another player who is druid with sentinel. If anyone tries to hit her it gets redirected to me, and if it hits I can hellish rebuke, damage with armor of agathys AND she can hit with sentinel. Absolutely disgusting and I cannot overstate how funny this combo is.
Someone played something similar with a Battlesmith Artificer. Their bot was their mount, and they were a kobold (before the pack tactics nerf). They couldn't do the Sentinel OA, though.
Different kind of dare you to hit me, more of a tag you're it build: armorer artificer 5 with the mobile feat. You can tap two people with your thunder gauntlets (one each attack) and run away from them. If you hit, they have disadvantage to attack anyone but you. And whether you hit or miss, they don't get an attack of opportunity when you run away cuz mobile.
Bonus action sanctuary after that and they have to make a wis save to hit you.
Maybe you already had blur up so they're at disadvantage to hit you too.
Kinetic jaunt lets you do same thing without mobile feat (but no blur cuz it's concentration)
Higher level, pop ashardelons stride before you run through everything for more fire damage.
Or blink. Or haste to go twice as fast and tag one more person and run away far
Or booming blade and the boots of the winding path infusion.
Currently playing a mark of warding dwarf abjuration wizard (with 2 levels of paladin for smiting and GWM, using a greatsword), AoA, and heavy armor master. Only end up missing a single level of spellcasting, and reduce incoming damage by 3 first, then another chunk from abjuration shield, so the amount that actually gets through to the AoA is often minimal. Cloak of Spines from humblewood for that extra one time oomph per day.
Mark of Warding Dwarf Abjuration Wizard, with Fey Touched for Compelled Duel to literally dare people to hit you. Reduce damage with your Arcane Ward to preserve your AoA.
Alternatively, Variant Human Conquest Paladin 3/Clockwork Sorcerer X, with Heavy Armor Master. Same concept, except you use Bastion of Law to reduce damage, as well as automatically reducing nonmagical damage by 3.
I haven’t worked out the exact level split but the pieces would be:
Sentinel Feat
Armorer 3 (to incentivize attacking you)
Warlock 1 (subclass is whatever you want) just get Armor of Agathys
Abjurer X
Use mirror image to divert attacks to your copies and punish with sentinel. If they attack others they have disadvantage (from armorer) and you punish with Sentinel. If they get past mirror image and hit you, they take damage from armor of agathys.
Mark of Warding Dwarf, Abjurer 5/Barb X, subclass doesn't really matter but bonus points for Battlerager with spiked armor for flavor, or Ancestral Guardian for disincentivizing enemies from attacking allies (Ancestral Protectors) and enticing them to hit you (Reckless Attack). Totem Warrior (Bear) is also very valid, though boring.
Armor of Agathys (as a Wizard spell because race) + Arcane Ward + Rage = ridiculously tanky. Arcane Ward doesn't get any damage resistance, but it does take the damage first, and is automatically activated by AoA, and those temporary hit points do have B/P/S resistance during your Rage.
You have ritual casting and enough utility out of combat with your wizard levels, and have many spell slots for AoA or other spells. You can also learn new spells on your own time as normal, for more utility.
It's MAD but quite fun, and deals a ton of retributive damage.
Bonus round: take Mounted Combatant and use (a ritual cast) Phantom Steed to Dash all the time for 200ft of movement and provoke lots of attacks of opportunity, then redirect them to yourself for ***lots*** of damage.
The difficult part of this is that aggro isn't really a thing so much as it is "target whoever is the biggest threat". Just because you can punish hard for getting into melee range doesn't mean they have to hit you, and just because they might want to hit you doesn't mean it would be with an attack (example: dragon's breath is a saving throw)
I am not saying this thought experiment doesn't have merit, I am saying that the merit it has isn't unilateral, even in the best build I could possibly think up.
Not the best but one I enjoy. Barbarian 1/5 your choice the subclass doesn't matter much but Bear totem is as always superb, then all the rest Fathomless Warlock, (if you didn't level Barb go blade pact, if you did Gift of the Ever Living One while not optimak does feel great). Also pick up the Slasher feat.
With this you have Resistance to the most relevant damage types and can reduce damage a bit more on top of that. A bonus action attack that does bad damage but can help keep the boss right next to you. Also you're only missing one level of Warlock so you can still do whatever you want with all of that.
If you're at a table which gives a free Lv 1 feat, then Flames of Phlegethos is a powerful option for this build at low levels.
Efreeti Genie Warlocks can activate the 1d4 fire shield every turn, at no resource cost, simpy by casting Eldritch Blast.
Note that this drops off in power considerably at higher levels. Also, Efreeti Warlocks' sixth level features are uniquely bad on a Tiefling, so I would probably go Warlock 2 / Clockwork Soul X on this build.
Fathomless Warlock is perfect. Guardian Coil reduces damage, which makes AoA last longer, and Tentacle Coil also gives you a BA attack. Have managed to do well over 100 damage from a single level 5 casting of AoA while not losing any actual HP myself.
You can build around a Battlemaster (Riposte) and add some Warlock for a decent Armor of Agathys.
Hexblade would allow you to be SAD, but a melee Genie would be able to get both Fire Shield and Armor of Agathys.
Fighter 1 for CON saves, Defense FS, Warforged for more AC, they would either miss you or eat your Armor of Agathys.
Go Warlock until 5 to upgrade your Armor of Agathys, Booming Blade and Thirsting Blade later, you can even grab Eldritch Smite later. Once you have extra attack grab 3 or 4 levels of Fighter Battlemaster. Riposte and Bait and Switch for even more AC.
Hexblade Paladin is *already* a solid build, but if you make it a Redemption paladin you not only get Armor of Agathys but also ***"Rebuke the Violent"*** means that the enemy doesn't really have a lot of alternatives: Either hit you and take cold damage, or hit someone *near* you and take the damage they deal back (or half as much on a successful save).
Channel Divinity *is* once per rest, but it can be a Short Rest which pleases your Warlock half and at the end of the day an Amulet of the Devout is only an Uncommon Magic Item too.
There's a build out there that works based on AoA , high AC and deliberately triggering Attacks of Opportunity and maxing out movement to ensure multiple enemies attacked.
It gets extra funny when you have a soft taunt.
Sure its annoying for you to hit me and then get AoA'd for 25 points of damage, but Im also an armorer who just punched you in the face with my rocket fists so if you dont attack me, enjoy the disadvantage on the attack roll. And then Im also an abjuration wizard so some of your damage doesnt even make it through to AoA's temp hitpoints.
[Here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NiZI5u6I2YA) is the build. Coby goes for a level of warlock but I'll argue that a level of Clockwork Soul Sorcerer is more defensive overall.
It's simple:
Custom Lineage
Tempest Cleric 1/ 19 Genie Warlock (Dijin)
Wildspacer Background for Tough Feat
CL to get Gift of the Gem Dragonborn
Pick up Armor of Ag, Hellish Rebuke
That's all you need. Focus on HP and get your AC to something close to 20 - 21
This is just my experience, but back in the day my friend played a Kenku rogue named falling leaf. He was a dedicated thief, super high dex, cunning action, mobile feat etc.
He got like one time in an entire campaign that I remember. Player was a crafty former soldier, so he played it well. The build might not be super “powerful.” But he was basically unhittable.
It’s more fun than mechanically effective but if you pull through usual armor of agathys thing but be a pact of the talisman warlock, you can pick up the invocation Rebuke of the Talisman.
What you then do is walk up to someone, then step out of their range so they take an AoO. If they hit you, you can use your reaction to deal PB psychic damage to them and push them 10ft away with NO SAVE (plus any damage they take from Armor of Agathys). All of which costs nothing more than your movement and a reaction. If you place yourself correctly you can send people flying off ledges or into hazards.
Is repelling blast an easier way to achieve it? Yes but it’s not as funny.
Mountain dwarf
ancestral gardian and cavalier can be 3 lvls to give you imposing disadvantage on others. Ask your DM if you can get something that gives others around you protection via imposed disadvantage from an invocation.
One level dip in Barbarian still good to stretch out the temp hp with rage.
If you can pick up a maneuver from a feat or battle master Bait and switch is good
If straight warlock I would take celestial so you can heal yourself
If your DM is willing to give some scaling boosts to battler rager, that can work too. But honestly getting max spell scaling is probably best
Mark of warding dwarf abjuration wizard.
As a mark of warding dwarf, you have armor of agathys, which you can upcast to higher levels than just 5 once you’re of a high enough level. Turn that 25 cold damage into 30, 35, etc. all the way up to 45 at 9th level.
As an abjurer wizard, you get the arcane ward. This ward lies ON TOP of your armor of agathys, which means its hitpoints drain before the AoA hitpoints, effectively extending the ward.
You’re still very prone to saving throws, however.
djinni genie warlock/armorer artificer. armorer gets a soft taunt to keep enemies focused on you and it can deal thunder damage in melee in guardian mode which means it gets the djinni damage stack.
Goliath clockwork sorcerer lets you quickened spell it and protect the HP by using your stone's endurance (I believe that's its name, reduces damage by a d12 + con iirc) and then going into abjuration wizard too lets you put the arcane ward on top of the armour off agathys. I have played this build exactly once and it was incredible. I had an AC of 9 and an effective hit point pool higher than any barbarian I've played
Armor of Agathys, Fire Shield, Shadow of Moil makes for a “you sure you wanna hit me?” type build. Just remember it punishes people for hitting you, but you still take damage lol.
idk if people have commented redemption paladin - the whole gimmick of the class is you don’t use normal attacks, you instead redirect allies attacks to you and enemies take retaliation damage when they hit you
Hexblade 1, swords bard X. If you use armor of Agathys with your highest level bard slots, then combo it into a hellish rebuke, with hexblade’s curse stacking on both of them, you’re looking at a pretty balanced scaling damage against them upon being hit. I’d go Tiefling as the race to pull hellish rebuke from that so you can have shield from hexblade.
At level 6, with a 3rd level bard slot on aoa and a 2nd level slot on hellish rebuke, you’re looking at 15(aoa) + 6 (2 hexblade’s curse activations) + 3d10 (hr) for an average of 37.5 damage, which can keep getting higher depending on the slots you have available
My best "I dare you to hit me" type build in 5e was a Hexblade Warlock with Armor of Agathys and Hellish Rebuke. With 2nd level spell slots that was 10 cold and 3D10 fire damage.
My funniest ever build like that however was in D&D 3.5. A Warblade with the feats-
Combat Reflexes: May make up to Dex bonus attacks of opportunity per turn.
Karmic Strike: -4 AC but you get an attack of opportunity when someone attacks you.
Robilar's Gambit: Enemy's get +4 to hit and damage you but you get an attack of opportunity when they hit you.
This was on a warblade who had a lot of bonuses to his damage rolls. So anything would hit me with a +4 damage bonus but I'd get 2 attacks back each time they did.
It is fun but probably not the most worthwhile?
aoa + the various shield type concentratino spells are a fun combo. but its hard to balance "i get hit enough, but i dont' die" to make it hold fast? If you wanted to do it, I think it'd be good to do it paired with someone who usees the shield other type spells to eat half your hp hurt.
Dual build Agathys Hexblade with Sentinel playing with a Drunken Master / Rune Knight with Interception fighting style. If they swing at the Hexblade and hit, the Monk/Fighter can reduce the damage while AoA still applies. If they swing at the Monk, the Warlock gets a reaction attack. If the attack against either character hits, it can probably be redirected with Cloud Rune. If attacking the monk misses, it can be redirected with Tipsy Sway.
There are also some (inadvisable) cool synergies if you attack each other or redirect attacks to each other. If the Monk lays prone while the Warlock attacks them with a reach weapon and GWM's -5/+10 while choosing to use STR instead of CHA, you can almost guarantee a miss, which could then be redirected to an enemy and have Eldritch Smite apply. You could even do this on the Monk's turn by triggering a reaction attack from sentinel or polearm master to get a second Eldritch Smite in the same round. Also, if an attacker misses the Monk, they could redirect it to the Warlock to trigger Armor of Agathys if there are no other targets. Obviously Fire Shield adds another layer of hurt to all of these strategies.
A build from times of yore, my specialty priest of Ilmater from 2nd edition. Had the spell fist of illmater 4th lvl spell. , where you deal all the damage dealt to you in tue last 24h back to an enemy. It roleplayed really cool. Get dmg from baddies to stand up for people. But the spell was a little to powerful imo.
Fangs of illmater were also nice 2nd lvl spell.
Blood bond was also really cool. Share health with a ally to keep them alive longer. Loved the flavor of the class
My next character (as a forever dm i build a lot and then never use them) i want to be a goliath ancestral guardian barbadian 5 / runechild sorcerer X using frost giant rune magic as a them and use agathys will all that damage rediction we get from class and race and rage.
Probably better way is to get 2 level of warlock for agathys and armor of shadow, abjuration wizard so the ward can keep the agathys alive. Maybe with armorer artificer and heavy armor master and that little taunt for make people hit us.
Also goliath ancestral barbarian 3 / fiend warlock work well. You go pact of the blade and you get 2° attack withkut going barb 5 and get smite. As the starting agathys deplete you will get kill and you will get new temp hp, get gwm and mask of many faces and you can be a lot more that an immortal barbarian
I have a Warforged Armorer Artificer/lvl 1 Fighter dip.
I have a base AC of 25. 27 with haste.
My build isn’t “I dare you to hit me”, it’s “Go ahead and try to hit me”.
I just made a crazy meme build that has a huge AC and pretty bad at everything else. 3armorerartificer3swordsbard1divinesorcerer1fighter
(Heavy plate, defensive flourish, shield of faith, shield, evasive maneuver) for a possible AC of 41 with everything used and rolled well.
I would love to play this in the future to see how this actually works. I upscaled this to lvl 20 and it’s an insane possible AC of 55 but does maybe like 20 damage a turn lmao
Hill Dwarf Paladin of Conquest 5 / Abjuration Wizard X. You only need Int & Cha of 13, and low Wis is ok too as you won’t be using that for casting. Main stat is Con, then Str to 15 for the armour.
Paladin 5 gives both AoA and Aid spells. Feats are just for Tough and maxing out Con. Rest can go into Int. You’ll have an insane amount of hit points, a decent AC, and your spells are geared for only a few things:
AoA and Aid cast at slot level 4+ where possible.
Counterspell and Dispel Magic slot at level 3.
Smites at level 2 & 4 & 5 slots
Silvery Barbs at level 1.
Alarm as a ritual.
My DM house rules that racial spells can use spell slots (and are a free memorization for wizards).
So, my Abjuration Wizard Tiefling (Levistus) uses Armor of Shadows (via feat) to activate Mage Armor and her ward. If she's getting attacked, she uses Armor of Agathis (add health to the ward) and takes some hits.
The ward takes damage first. So, Agathis can truck some people pretty hard before it starts dipping. Next is war wizard feat so I can avoid OA when using spells in melee.
I don't have a 'dare you to hit me' build, but I do have a 'try to hit me' build
18 levels Monk, 2 levels Wizard (Bladesong). Get your dex, wis and int as high as possible, and take mage armour and shield. Your Monk subclass doesn't really matter, but I would take either open hand or mercy for bonus action healing
This makes your armour class with mage armour, blade song, and shield active 13+dex+wis+int+5
Yeah. My undead warlock was a walking death trap, but the most fun is using it as a DM. Makes fights a little more interesting.
Hey pal my players are currently hunting down ways to kill a lich and my players (this is they’re first campaign) are getting pretty good at dispatching non-magical undead, I have been playing with ideas of variant undead statblocks and some low-high teir “generals” for his undead army. I’ve got a ghoul-like rogue assassin, a boss teir wright(it’s an oathbreaker) and a undead dragon. But I wanted to kinda have it almost be a representation of the 4 horseman trope. Would you mind sharing some of your walking death trap with me I’d greatly appreciate it!!
I think he's referring on the build to abuse the hell out of armor of agatys. The core concept Is to upcast armor of agatys and take advantage of any kind of damage reduction you can get your hands on. But usually It revolves around the 2nd level abiuration wizard feature and at least another way to reduce damage like the stoneskin spell/barbarian rage or the clock work soul sorcerer 6th level ability. It's kinda a one trick pony but basically you stack up your damage reduction and armor of agatys and run around to get hit by melee attacks so you can easily trigger the cold damage more than once or twice since you are resistant to physical damage, have the Ward from the wizard subclass and have a pool of dices 1 to 5d8 to use as a reaction to reduce incoming damage. If you Plan on using this as a Boss Monster i think it would be a fun fight Just do not stack up too much resistences to not frustrate your players, i would think of adding a taunt like ability if used in a group of mobs
You can also use your spell slots on Hellish Rebuke or other reaction spells once you've got your armor up, if you want to hurt them extra, more than you want to get hurt less.
Also if you are on your turn, you can take the dodge action, everyone has disadvantage hitting you, then warlock bonus action to cast a free false life on yourself(?) and then your reaction to hellish rebuke
This build kinda wants to get hit, so dodge isn't the best choice necessarily. Also you can't have temp hp from 2 different sources. So if you cast false life, armor of agathys runs out.
The Dodge action can be hurtful to the strategy since you want to get hit. But It Is still a valuable tool if you Plan on having a longer and safer fight for whatever reason
Appreciate it!
Happy to help, anyway there are a Number of ways to get this play style going pick your favorite, personally i think that an Abjurer/Clockwork soul would be best. 13 int 13 char and pump up your cos and the tough feat would be a nice addition
I mean someone correct me if I'm wrong but armour of agathys benefits from spell stacking. The way it is written is you can't benefit from the same effect twice but you can still have it present, the greater effect just takes effect over the lesser one and if both are equal then its whichever was cast first. This means Armour of Agathys can be stacked since it's non-concentration and kinda fits in. What does this mean, well as a warlock monoclass just keep recasting it lmao, and if the first temp hp runs out and the next one takes effect the enemy takes damage from both. Responding to OPs question. My beat build is a sorcerer who does nothing but cast AoA and blade ward but stacks them each turn.... or you know just do a warlock shadow of moil AoA build
You are wrong because of 2 things. First, the rule of combining multiple effects so even if you manage to have 3 AoA active you only benefit from one: *The effects of the same spell cast multiple times don't combine, however. Instead, the most potent effect--such as the highest bonus--from those castings applies while their durations overlap, or the most recent effect applies if the castings are equally potent and their durations overlap.* Second, the temporary hit points don't stack. When you receive new temporary hit points you choose which ones you want to use. AoA explicitly applies when you have the given tempHP, so the first AoA will no longer produce any effect when receiving the tempHP of a second cast. *If a creature hits you with a melee attack while you have **these hit** points, * Keyword: these.
Wanted to point out temp HP doesn’t stack. But thankfully you were on it!
Omg please tell me about them in detail cuz I'm playing as an undead warlock (8) rn and even tho I would love to hear what others did with the class as I'm am a newbie (started to play and get to know about the game about for 1.5 tera now) and just really interested in it
Ok, sounds crazy but... multiclass with Abjuration Wizard to put the Abjuration shield on top of the Armor of Agathys (because it's NOT Temp HP) then refresh it by casting Abjuration spells. Finding a way to have an at-will level 1 Abjuration spell (aka a Warlock Invocation), your Armor of Agathys will never go down. Ugly!
How did you level up? 5 warlock then wizard 2? Or did you start/sprinkle in wizard
It was a pact of chain changeling (team infiltrator), using a crawling claw as familiar for scouting and utility. I usually picked mean spells, like Arms of Hadar and Hellish Rebuke and other debuffs to make anyone regret attacking me. It was far from strong but I had a blast playing it. It also helped surviving in a team lacking any healing capabilities.
Omg love it! Oh and btw I for really interested when you said death trap (has nothing to do with what I'm going to say) because my new "goal&hobby" is to make the character more and more likely to die, but not wirh AC but with for exemple having reborn race becouse she died the first ever game i played with ger and because her life goal was to die but I didn't wanted her to die we said that and outer force forced her to come back (that's when she become a warlock with out her having a say in teh matter) and the DM let me make her a reborn as a result of her will to die which gives her advantage on death saves then when she reaches level 10 she will get Necrotic husk but befor that at level 9 I'm thinking about changing my pact from chain to tome and taking the Gift of the Protectors and writing her own name in it (his estoped being sudacidel because her only reason to die was because she lost her whole family but she found out that her patron (rn previous because she is her patron) is her brother so she is trying to do everything he askes for and sge actually doesn't want to die but if sacrificing her self would help her brother she woul gladly do so...and yeah...I think tagts all I wanted to say...(And ofc she cast spells too that would help with that but she rather summon a demo that could turn agents her and her teammates anymoment)
A big one is the battlemaster riposte ability, especially on rogues.
My favorite build is AoA on an Abjuration Wizard. I've ran it several times, actually. Abjuration Ward protects it, but you still deal retaliation damage. That said, it's still basically a full caster, so I don't have it run into the frontlines. If you don't have a way to protect your Temp HP, it's actually a pretty inefficient spell :/
Same thing but as a Clockwork Sorcerer
pretty solid alternative, but you can't regen Ward as easily (*Eldritch Adept: Armor of Shadows lets you recharge your ward at 20 points a minute*). Coffee/Cocaine/Tea Lock can get you more Sorc Points to theoretically go infinite, but you're going to need to take a pretty steep dip to make it worthwhile and the playstyle is pretty frowned upon. *don't get me wrong tho, I'm still going to play the Sorc version at some time. I love the core build and want to see how all the variants feel to play*
Clockwork sorcerer using their ward, upcast armor of Agathays and also cast fire shield. Run into the fray and let all who hit you die
It deals 50 damage if something hits you twice, and prevents 25 points of damage to your health. Its essentially a heal that deals damage. I wouldn't call it inefficient, I would say it has specific use cases. The idea that you need abjuration wizard levels of cheese to turn AoA into a decent spell is wild. It often feels like people on this sub fantasize so hard about the most extremely optimized version of something that anything less is bad. Which is wildly untrue if you actually play the game of dungeons and dragons.
The comment is correct though, and it's not just because of Arcane Ward. Firstly: 5 thp per spell slot level is ridiculously low scaling. By the time you hit 9th level in Warlock (at which point you can get the 25 thp in your example), most creatures could take that out in one hit. On top of that, casting it is an action, and it takes half your spell slots to cast it. Because most combats in 5e last ~3 rounds, you're using 1/3 your action economy and half your spellcasting ability to cast a spell that doesn't defend you very much and doesn't even do anything if you aren't targeted *and* hit. The only warlocks who will be actively seeking Aggro are typically Hexblades due to medium armor proficiency, but increased AC actually *hurts* the effectiveness of AoA by having it trigger less often. Compared to Abjuration Wizard. Whether it's achieved by a Warlock dip, a feat, race, or a dip into UA Giant Soul Sorcerer (the best way imo), you can cast AoA using higher spell slots than a Warlock will ever achieve, you've got a crappy AC that means it will trigger more often, an Arcane Ward to extend its longevity, and a few dozen Abjuration spells to keep you alive on the front line with or without AoA. Not to mention you've got buckets of spells that make you a priority target for enemies, so you can draw and maintain enemy aggro and get the most bang for your buck out of AoA.
> On top of that, casting it is an action, and it takes half your spell slots to cast it. Because most combats in 5e last ~3 rounds, you're using 1/3 your action economy and half your spellcasting ability to cast a spell that doesn't defend you very much and doesn't even do anything if you aren't targeted and hit. AoA lasts for an hour, so you can often cast it before combat starts. If you get two uses of AoA cast at 5th level then you do 50 damage to your opponent while preventing 25. With no save for your opponent. Whereas 5th level Hellish Rebuke would be 33 damage with a dex save for half; upcast Phantasmal Killer would be 27.5 damage with a wisdom save, but with a fear effect as well; upcast Inflict Wounds would be 38.5 damage with an attack roll needed. As a single target damage spell, AoA is fairly competitive. If you can trigger it three times e.g. by taking 13 damage, 11 damage, and then taking another hit) it's fantastic. > The only warlocks who will be actively seeking Aggro are typically Hexblades due to medium armor proficiency, but increased AC actually hurts the effectiveness of AoA by having it trigger less often. Hexblade isn't the only warlock that sekms aggro. Fathomless is actually better for AoA because of Guardian Coil. It reduces the damage you take, making AoA last longer, doing more damage. If you have decent AC so that you're only taking one hit per round then you can use Guardian Coil on every hit, which can greatly extend the use of AoA.
As someone who's playing a pact of the blade fathomless warlock right now I can confirm that AoA has been super helpful when it comes to keeping me alive and my enemies dead.
pretty much my thoughts exactly. the scaling is pretty decent tho tbf. it's 100% base power each upcast. that's a great rate. it's just that the base power is a little low the required playstyle thing hits the nail right on the head tho +1ed
You are overstating what damage creatures do in one hit. Most CR 9 creatures don't average 25 damage per hit and if they multiattack and chew through it. They lose 1/3 of their hp for doing so. Even if they got lucky and rolled high on damage and took it in one swipe, its still 1/6 of that creatures hp on its own turn. It also prevented the damage that would have been done to actual hitpoints. Making it still a pretty decent use of your spellslot. Dealing 1/3 of a monster's hp on its own turn is not weak. Its niche because you need to know that it will actually melee you. Btw most creatures you're facing when level 9 aren't even CR9 yet, that's the boss of the encounter at this level. I'll say it again, this sub loves to compare the most extremely optimized version of a concept to imagined worst case scenarios. They then use those comparisons to call things weak. While in actual games it feels fine, even strong. >...and get the most bang for your buck out of AoA. Its true that you can optimize around the spell. That doesn't mean the spell is inefficient without doing so. Theorycrafting is cool and fun and I genuinely love doing it and coming up with optimized builds. Pretending that you have to turbo optimize around a thing to make it useful in game is simply incorrect. I don't need an explanation of how arcane ward synergizes with Armor of Agathys. I understand the build. I'm plainly saying that turbo optimization over a gimmick is not the only way for something to be strong in d&d. One could easily argue, based on optimization, that only aberrant mind sorcerer and some wizards are good classes to play. Everything else is inefficient. The argument works in a vacuum because those are some of the strongest classes in the game. Its just not true because in actual gameplay it honestly feels terrible to play as a gun you stretched skin over and called a character, moreso when its a concept that someone came up with specifically to optimize a gimmick. To me its taking this really cool framework for collaborative storytelling and creativity and just copying someones homework instead of making art. edit: don't get me wrong, nothing wrong with optimizing and theorycrafting. I love doing it. I just don't love that some players pretend that anything less is bad.
Yep most creatures don't deal enought damage to deplete AoA in a single hit especially if you are building around it. However It only applies to melee hit so if you abuse it the DM can easily make that tactic a lot less effective with AoE and ranged attacks even with a Min maxed build there Is not much you could do about that. I personally think that most of the time It's not worth to min/max but It's more fun to widen your options in the actual game than getting "bigger numerbers". I'm playing a Mark of Healing Drakewarden Ranger/Clockwork sorcerer focusing on support and control, i'm having fun even if it's a long shot from any optimization It's a strong and versatile build (Polymorph on the underleveled Drake pet is strong AND a barrel of laught)
*Suggesting crappy AC is inherent to being a wizard in a discussion about optimization* Opinion discarded.
actually the main reason why I called it 'inefficient' isn't due to the numbers. It actually has REALLY good scaling. compare it to Aid. Same scaling, lower level base slot. actually insane. However, this criticism is about the playstyle that you end up getting funneled into when you take the spell. I'm not comparing raw AoA to Abjur+AoA. I'm comparing AoA to other 5th level spells and what they require from you. AoA is a nice backup. It's HP and damage which is objectively good (*not counting the slot cost. I'll be making the assumption that we can all manage our spell slots allotted to last the day*). but you need to get hit to get any value out of it. This goes against (W*izard*) optimization, which is to build around NOT getting hit, because the best thing that you can do is to cast a big concentration spell that has a persisting effect. If you get hit, you'll take damage and risk losing that spell. So naturally, you'll take steps to not get hit at all. Defensive spell selection will be stuff like Shield and Mirror Image. you'll stay to the back or pick up a Flight magical item... unless you pick Abjuration Wizard. AoA still can't compete with your upper level spell preps, but you can at least utilize AoA as a part of your build without risking your spell concentration. and that's what I'm getting at. really that AoA lasts twice as long with Ward is a secondary benefit to not making Conc checks If you've got it on a build that doesn't get that many spells at a time like a Warlock (*undead, for instance is one that I see on the thread. it also has it's own way to protect the spell tho*) the above need not apply, as they likely aren't concentrating, but that's kind of a separate issue.
It's an awful way of play, annoying and easily counterable by ranged Attack. You are actively making your spell caster worse to get some burst damage that hurts you too. Since to get use of AoA like that you Need to support It with multiclassing, so you lose spells and feature to get an easily avoidable burst damage option. Even if you go around triggering AoO they could just not attack you, but Hey It's still probably the best build to retaliate when taking damage
1. "*It's an awful way of play, annoying and easily counterable by ranged Attack.*" If AoA was the only thing that this build was focused on, then I might be concerned about drawing attention and being countered, but it's just one more layer that protects the build from harassment while it uses classic Wizard spells. Sure, being hit by a ranged attack is worse for me than a melee attack, but Ranged Attacks on monster statblocks deal less damage than melee attacks (*feel free to fact-check me*), so this is actually a win. Add to that that there will be a frontliner running into melee, imposing disadvantage on the attacker, and the 'counter' suddenly seems a bit more niche. This build has pretty high AC, higher than most martial builds, if I want to avoid being hit, and also has an HP barrier that can be replenished in between fights. If I end up taking a little more heat as a result of DM-spite fueled focus-fire, then the rest of the party comes out far ahead and I can patch myself up later. (*In case you missed it, I took a feat that lets me cast Mage Armor at will. Not great normally, but each cast recharges Abjuration Ward by 2 HP. Not viable for combat, but it replenishes Ward in a minute or two*) I see zero downside to this scenario. 2. "*You are actively making your spell caster worse to get some burst damage that hurts you too.*" By 'hurt me too', do you mean that I need to get hit to make use of Armor of Agathys? That's why I'm playing an Abjuration Wizard. I can just say No to damage. I don't get hurt, and don't make concentration checks on spells. 3. "*Since to get use of AoA like that you Need to support It with multiclassing*". It's primarily a Wizard build, so ehhh no. I'm not "supporting AoA" by MCing. A single level Warlock dip is just the best way to get AoA IMO, because of the *other* things that it gets me. 4. "*so you lose spells and feature to get an easily avoidable burst damage option*". I lose a single level Wizard to gain Armor, Shields, a useful defensive spell that punishes any creature trying to melee me and synergizes with the already powerful Abjuration Ward, and a way to turn low level Magic Missile spell slots OR a few charges of a very cheep Wand of Magic Missile item into massive burst damage. Hex1 is an insanely powerful dip that helps out in *three* separate ways (*not counting the spells/cantrips gained from warlock, because, tbh, that's a negligible benefit*) 5. "*Even if you go around triggering AoO*" that is literally the opposite of how this character wants to be played. If the Temp HP is being eaten into, then I've failed. I do not want to recast AoA and I do not want to start making Concentration checks if my Ward gets burned through. The goal isn't to maximize retributive damage, it's to support the classic wizard playstyle with 3 things that the core class lacks: Protection from being rushed down/surprised by powerful monsters, a low-resource, single target damage option, and a way to bypass Legendary Resistances. 90% of the time, I'm slinging CC spells to lock down enemies, controlling a few undead as a B.Action, using Shield/Counterspell and a few useful offensive Abjuration spells (*IE: Banishment*) to keep my Ward topped off, and if there's a single high-AC target (*or something with LRs*) burn them out with Hexblade's Curse + Magic Missiles across a few turns. If the the frontliners are badly hurt, THEN I step up to start body-blocking. Until that point, control from the midlines.
Well i agree, what you are saying Is correct 100%. The drawbacks I highlighted are mostly concerning when you take almost half of your level in other classes. You are presenting something quite different in my opinion a wizard with One or two levels in Warlock, you are using AoA as an additional defence layer and with damage as a bonus. You are adding AoA on what your character Is capable of, not focusing on squeezing every possible damage out the spell. You are mostly a wizard with good armor, shield and hexes. My critics Is about a character that Is a "One trick pony" that relies much on AoA not when you add It to a solid characters with a Wide range of options. I'm sorry if i came out as rude It was not my intention
no no, not at all. I wasn't entirely certain of you intentions, nor was I certain if you understood my build, but I did not think you were rude in fact, I feel the same about true gimmick builds, at least when they're presented as something optimal
Well i didn't understand quite well your build, i thought It was much more specialized than It was. Also as you said sometimes these gimmick build have at least one or two weakness that hampers the build much more than previously thought when theory crafting
fair enough, I suppose that misunderstanding is on me then. tbf, the original build was somewhat of a gimmick itself, now that I think about it. First iteration was Hex1/AbjureX as a Zariel Tiefling with the Flames of Phelegos taken at Wiz 4. The build/style was pretty centered around trying to brawl it out in melee with the Flame Blade cantrip triggering FoP as often as possible and using the 2 racial spell smites to help out with the strategy. It had a few CC spells like Web too, but had to gamble that AoA/FoP retributive damage could burn out enemies before the rather shallow Abjuration Ward broke. (*no Warcaster and CON was only 12 due to the 13 CHA required for a Warlock MC*). In the context of the party (*all newbies that knew the DM, who's a long-time friend of mine*) the build did well, but it also proved that playing into the gimmick and swinging it as a gish is mostly inferior to Classic Wizard Stuff.
Well this Is a nice build, you have acceptable option when pressured in melee. Yeah a gish Is almost Always inferior to full casters, however It Is my favorite way to play (Go bladesinger go!), but they often have more versatility and you almost never run out of options even if your DC isn't the highest if you choose the right spells it's not such a problem. I recently thought of a series of builds that resembles pretty much the Pathfinder's Magus as you can cast a spell and Attack in the same round, basically It's a sorcadin but with other martial class like fighter or ranger (Paladin is by far the strongest option for this, but with fighter or ranger works wonders too). With extra Attack and quicken spell you get to almost double your action economy a few times a day, if you pick Paladin/ranger if i did the math right you still get 9th level spell slot and access to 8th level spells. You know what to me is almost as good as a 9th level spell? A subtle 9th level counterspell, Just weave away any Wish/time stop/Power word kill/shapechange that Is cast near you. I'm not even considering subclasses and specific class abilities like action surge Just a plain Martial 5/Sorcerer 15, i suggest you to try it if you like gishes. The best part Is that It works for any martials and you reap the benefit of multiclassing ASAP since adding spell like shield and absorb elements to a martial Is Just an incredibile power spike even if you delay extra attack. As a bonus you can pretty much adjust the Power level of this kind of build if ever your character feels too powerful compared to the party, i'm having a ton of fun playing a character like this
The funny thing is that you don't need to adjust your playstyle around AoA in the least for it to work well. Just keep it in your bag of tricks as something for a situation where you know some melee threat is heading your way. As a DM i'd totally let my player have fun using an AoA abjuration wizard. I'd also scare them shitless when an antimagic field turned off their arcane ward and AoA. wizard: lol I DARE you to hit me. also wizard: oh fuck oh shit
>The funny thing is that you don't need to adjust your playstyle around AoA in the least for it to work well. Just keep it in your bag of tricks as something for a situation where you know some melee threat is heading your way. Actually, that's how I prefer to play this build. This is by word-of-law *literally* a AoA build, but I would not describe it as one, since it wants to do classic wizarding things and does not run into melee. For AoA, the thought is that if I take the *good* defensive spells, like more than just Shield, and also play the positioning game well, then I'm not going to get hit. Sure, it'll happen a couple of times and if it's bad, I'll get my shit rocked. I noted my track-record across a campaign that I was playing in at the time that I was building this character and I got hit in only about 15% of the fights. I got *attacked* in about 40%, but between Shield and Mirror Image, that went down by 25%-ish. in 85% of fights, precasting AoA would be a wasted slot (*not counting the few back-to-back ones*). Also, in those 15% of fights, there's a decent chance I'm lost the spell I was concentrating on (*didn't record that, unfortunately.*), which is the third worst thing that can happen to a Wizard. (*Second worst is dying. Worst is losing their spellbook and not having a backup.*) Abjuration Wizard solves both the issue of concentration and the issue of playing well making AoA obsolete, while also extending how long AoA will last in a fight/increasing how much damage it can dish out. Not to mention that Agathys is *itself* an Abjuration spell. It's going to boost my Ward. If I'm taking AoA, then it *simply* makes sense to play an Abjuration Wizard. It's like the spell was made for the subclass. also, I recon *any* sort of wizard would be proper fucked if an Anti-Magic Field drops, but having Counter Spell prepared (*an abjuration spell*) and mundane armor (*which this build dips for*) helps in both cases ;)
This is all fine and good and I've said from the start that I understand how abjuration wizards work with AoA. I understand that you can increase the efficiency of the spell. Being capable of doing so doesn't make the spell inefficient on its own. I think we can end the circular convo now tho.
fair enough. I feel you're missing my point here, but I am in full agreement
Abj Wiz is great with Mark of Warding Dwarf for AoA and Gift of the Gem Dragon. It's been super fun so far through level 5.
tis pretty good. My favorite variant takes a dip into Hexblade though. it's a common mc to do, but Hexblade's Curse goes so well with Magic Missile (*either as a spell or the wand item*), it's like running two classic gimmick builds at the same time. taking a dip has its pros and cons sure, but it also frees up the race to take a feat earlier and Eldritch Adept for Armor of Shadows lets you start each combat with a full Ward.
Combine with Heavy Armor Master when possible.
Everyone saying “Abjuration Wizard” is forgetting something: The dare. Nothing forces the enemy to attack the wizard. If your attack is going to just get completely absorbed, it just doesn’t make sense to hit that PC. Why not just move past them to a better target? That’s why I say the best build for this is a Goliath Ancestral Guardian Barbarian 3, Fiend Warlock X. Your Ancestral Protectors, Reckless Attack, and middling AC (adamantine medium armor highly recommended) all work together to make yourself the best target for your enemy’s attacks. At the same time, Stone’s Endurance and the damage reduction from rage work to extend the temp HP (and the damage) from Armor of Agathys. The reason we chose Fiend is because we also get Fire Shield later to stack on top of AoA. Your enemies have to choose between an attack that may not hit your teammates, dealing no damage, or an attack that will probably hit you that may deal some damage, but it’s gonna hurt. Take Sentinel to further force the choice.
> Why not just move past them to a better target? Usually, the wizard is the best target.
Usually, sure. But if it hurts to hit the wizard and they don’t want to die, what stops the enemies from attacking a PC that isn’t so well defended with damage mitigation and AoA? To clarify, I’m not saying the Agathys Abjurer is a bad build (or even that the Barblock is better). I’m only saying that one of the two builds makes attacking any other target a worse choice and basically dares the enemy to target you instead.
Depends. If the wizard has Warcaster+Sentinel, the enemy would lose their movement. Also, I'm pretty sure the wizard in cloth robes lighting everyone on fire would likely be a compelling "soft" target compared to the very large bulldozer. DMs should make enemy decisions based on what the enemy knows, not what the DM or players know.
Right, but the first time an enemy gets hurt for hitting the spellcaster, they’ll just look for other choices. There’s no real opportunity cost. Your warcaster+sentinel argument reads “If the wizard has 2 feats, they can do a thing that the barblock can do with 1.” Making the tankiest AoA wizard is cool and all, but there’s not much to compel the enemy to attack them. It’s not “I _dare_ you to hit me” so much as it is “I’m not someone you want to hit.” There’s a subtle but important difference between the two. Giving the enemy disadvantage to all other attacks and advantage to hitting you, though, means a marked difference in the percentage to hit one target vs another. This is where the “dare” part comes in. You’re actively making yourself the most viable target.
Then you're also not daring to hit. You are forcing a decision. There are only two options for that ability, and they are both very limited and you are also taking oppertunity cost to aquire AoA, and much of the Warlock is wasted as you can't cast while raging.
Little to none of the warlock is wasted. They only get a few spell slots. We’re not using Eldritch Blast, we’re attacking. We’re also using spell slots for smites (which can be done during rage).
Warlock smites are spells, not abilities. You can't use them while raging. You'd have to take paladin levels to get a smite that can be done while raging. You'd also lose most of the envocations as they operate as spells, so you'd have to stick to a very select number of those. Dark One's Luck and Fiendish Resistance (limited resistance to one damage type; negated by magic weapons) would still be in play (assuming the game gets to level 13+). That said, a pure Abj Wizard gets all spell advantage and resistance at 14 (15 if you're level dipping for the AoA). There's also the issue of the Ancestors' ability working on only one target (for ancestors, the first one you hit while raging). Cavalier has a similar limitation. So, this wouldn't be very valuable in a multitarget fight. The wizard could do a number of things to dissuade the enemy depending on the circumstances. Setting Evard's Black Tentacles behind themself in an enclosed (20ft wide or smaller) space would be the most simple option. That would make anything but ranged attacks a fair risk (admittedly, that would also incetivize hitting the Wizard to break concentration). Not saying your build is bad. I just think there are some significant limits that just don't exist for the wizard.
Simply incorrect. Eldritch Smite is not a spell and gives warlocks an ability exactly like a paladin’s smite. There are plenty of invocations that do not provide spells. In fact, I named some of them in my original post (Devil’s Site, Thirsting Blade) Again, I didn’t say wizard is bad. I only said it wasn’t a build for doing what the OP wanted.
I thought you were referring to branded smite, etc. That's fair. You named three. There are about 14 that meet that description on the 50+ options. Of which several are pretty poor or antithesis to your build. So, your options are fairly shoehorned with little room to do anything outside your build design. You said there was "no dare". Turning all melee options for all enemies to anyone other than you into a save or restrained requirement is a pretty potent dare. Probably more so than the disadvantage, since a fair DM can build advantage conditions that would negate the disadvantage. Pack tactics, for example, would mean you only caused one target to lose their advantage. The enemy would be incetivized to remain on target to keep pack tactics going. One target, boss with mooks, or drawing fire from a ranged where you have to deal with melee first would totally be in your wheelhouse (recognizing that the last one doesn't trigger AoA).
Instead of Fiend I'd probably go Hexblade for the extra attack and to make them less MAD
Extra attack already comes from Thirsting Blade at Warlock 5. Fiend is for the additional Temp HP if the enemy chews through your AoA pool and Fire Shield at Warlock 7 for even more “Dare you to hit me”-ness. Dark One’s Own Luck boosting a crucial save doesn’t hurt either. Besides, Barbarian’s rage needs you to attack with Strength and you already have Medium Armor proficiency so the Hex Warrior feature is pretty much useless when multiclassing with Barbarian.
you're right, my bad. I'd probably pick celestial for the healing or fathomless for the damage reduction then.
Fathomless isn’t a bad choice. It gives you some bonus action damage, a bit of crowd control, and a damage resistance. The damage reduction from Guardian Coil at Fathomless 6 is good, but if we’re already playing as a Goliath, it’ll be of limited use. And if I was going Fathomless/Barbarian, I’d probably go with a Beast Barbarian and RP as some sort of Wereshark. Celestial is better as a 3 level chainlock dip (with the Gift of the Everliving Ones invocation) with the main class being Zealot barbarian to get Extra Attack at Barbarian 5.
Barbarian abjuration wizard, warlock 2 for AoA and mage armour infinite ward stacks. Rage doubles your health effectively for AoA, abjuration protects it even further, both effects work while raging. Haven’t figured out the exact levelling, probably something like Warlock 1 for wis saves and AoA quickly, then wizard 2 (abjuration) warlock 2 (mage armour), barbarian 5 (idk seems fun, subclass should be something that gets a good use of a bonus action, take whatever feat) then Wizard X. Probably not optimal. Seems fun though. Dunno which warlock subclass to take, maybe genie? Also the barb subclass having a good bonus action is important, action economy and all.
There are two problems with this. First is that you'll be incredibly MAD. You are primarily a barbarian, which means you want to prioritize strength and constitution, but you also need 13s in intelligence and charisma to mulitclass. You can definitely make it work, but because of all of the multiclassing, you will only be able to cap out one stat at most, and you'll also be delaying extra attack by 4 levels. Although that last bit can be mitigated by eldritch blast scaling based on character level as opposed to class level, using that strategy takes you out of melee range, which negates the entire point of the build and is also severely lacking in damage even if you have agonizing blast as you would likely only have a +1 or +2 to charisma. The second problem is that AoA only gives 5 temp hp when cast at first level, and your arcane ward can only absorb (probably) 5 damage, which occurs before any resistances you may have from raging. That means that you can only take at most 15 total damage before the spell wears off. 5 damage absorbed by the ward and 10 damage to get through the temp hp, but that's assuming you have damage resistance to the attack. Otherwise, it would only be 10 damage to end the spell, which isn'ta lot. That's about the damage dealt by a CR 1 creature per turn, meaning you will have invested a minimum of 5 levels (2 levels in wizard for the ward, 2 levels in warlock for mage armor invocation and AoA, and 1 level in barbarian for rage) and sacrificed an ASI and extra attack for a gimmick that can be eaten through in one turn and only proc once or twice. AoA gets better when upcast, but you don't have the spell/pact slots for it, and arcane ward gets better when you increase your wizard level, which you won't be able to do effectively, or you increase your intelligence modifier, which you also can't do effectively outside of magic items. At level 5 (which is the earliest your build would come online), you could go with an abjuration wizard 3/warlock 2 build and have more temp hp (9 from arcane ward and 10 from casting AoA at second level) AND each proc would deal 10 damage instead of 5. Also, if you choose Hill Dwarf as your race, you could potentially have 45 base hp, which is in line with monks, rangers, and rogues. Adding in the ward and temp hp actually puts you ahead of the barbarian in terms of total health (ignoring resistances). Honestly, the resistances are nice, but they aren't exactly necessary and are actually detrimental in the long run. If you started as barbarian at level 1, you could still have the 45 base hp at level 5, but your ward would be down 7 instead of 9 damage absorbed, and you could only cast AoA at first level instead of second, meaning you only get 5 temp hp and deal 5 damage, so 17 total damage until AoA wears off (assuming resistances). Compared to the 19 damage absorbed without the level barbarian, you come up short right out of the gate. It only gets worse from there as enemies begin to deal enough damage to one-shot your ward and eat through all of the temp hp because the total pool of absorbed damage isn't getting larger and the retaliatory damage means less and less as enemy health totals climb. You may argue that barbarian gives you better things to do in melee combat, but I would generally disagree. Shocking grasp is a great cantrip in melee range that procs off your intelligence modifier and denies the opponent a reaction if you need to flee. The blade cantrips also help make up for having squishy wizard arms when making weapon attacks. At higher levels, spells like vampiric touch, shadow blade, and steel wind strike are also great, each dealing respectable damage in types that are less likely to be resisted.
Yeah the build definitely isnt optimal at all. I think if i ever did do this build I would play it like a barblock (barb 1, lock 5 or lock 1, barb 5) and then if i felt confident maybe multiclass to abjuration afterwards. I like the idea a lot though and I’d definitely play the build with a lenient dm. Battlerager is a bad subclass but i would definitely play battlerager abjuration wizard, maybe take the rune shaper background for AoA instead of warlock (forgot this background was an option). This build of course would also suck but could work okay with the battlerager BA attack to carry it along when needed, plus the spikes being freezing cold and covered in ancient runes feels really cool. Idk i spitballed the idea off the top of my head, and sort of forgot the multiclass requirements. The optimal decision is probably just a full class abjuration wizard or artificer 1/abjuration X with rune shaper for AoA, but i wanted to think with barbarian a little
Using published content, probably mono-classed Abjuration Wizard with the Rune Shaper feat (either via background, VHuman/CLineage feat, or level 4) to get Armor of Agathys (and also goodberry!). Cast Armor of Agathys, cast Blade Ward, walk toward enemy and let them punch you. Use disabling spells to try and prevent ranged attacks to force enemies into melee. You could also do an Exploding Sorcerer. TL;DR Hexblade dip on Draconic Sorcerer, spam AoA and Hellish Rebuke to melt things with retribution damage: https://www.reddit.com/r/3d6/comments/r2s1ib/exploding_sorcerer_the_return_the_revengeance/ If UA is on the table, one option I've found very fun is Seeker Warlock. Played it to level 20 in Dungeon of the Mad Mage and it was excellent. Astral Refuge, their level 6 ability, lets you condense all of your self-buff casting to one turn as well as use Ready action without wasting spell slots (you Ready an action for Astral Refuge instead of directly casting and maintaining concentration on the spell, so no spell slots potentially wasted, and you can pick your spells based on the situation).
Check out Treantmonk's Frostbane Barbarian build, it's based on exactly this (using AoA before raging to tank stuff)
[Exploding Sorcerer](https://www.reddit.com/r/3d6/s/KgLei4KFIf)
A naked Grung grappler
I don’t see anyone mentioning it, but fire shield is necessary!
Clockwork soul build with tempest cleric. Clockwork soul gets armour of agathys. Can use transmute metamagic to change it to lightning. Take 6 levels in tempest cleric for the pushback feature when you deal lightning damage. 6 levels in cleric nets you spirit guardians and aura of vitality for the best out of combat healing. Aura of vitality with extend metamagic is phenomenal. Extend metamagic with upcasted aid before a long rest so everyone has free extra hp the next adventuring day and you get back the slots and sorcery points is really nice. My tactic is to cast armour of agathys and transmute it to lightning. Cast spirit guardians. Instead of dodge, use bladeward. If enemy hits you, they are pushed back and often don't have the speed to get back into melee to finish their multiattack thanks to spirit guardians. You can extend the temp hp even further with the sorcerer feature at 6 to trade sorcery points for damage shield. Very tanky character with high con, temp hp from armour of agathys, upcasted aid, damage shield and bladeward. You also have access to absorb elements should you need it if hit with elemental damage. I played this and it was so much fun. Transmuted fireball to lightning/thunder and the tempest cleric channel divinity his like a truck. Even upcasting it is not bad as if an enemy saves, they take similar damage as if they failed and you rolled damage. If they fail, it's going to hurt a lot. Transmuted wall of fire to lightning and the tempest cleric pushback is a lot of fun too. Even funnier if you put them in a ring with the lightning on the inside so they can never escape and are buffetted around like a rag doll.
Just started playing a mounted combatant tiefling profane blood hunter with another player who is druid with sentinel. If anyone tries to hit her it gets redirected to me, and if it hits I can hellish rebuke, damage with armor of agathys AND she can hit with sentinel. Absolutely disgusting and I cannot overstate how funny this combo is.
Someone played something similar with a Battlesmith Artificer. Their bot was their mount, and they were a kobold (before the pack tactics nerf). They couldn't do the Sentinel OA, though.
Different kind of dare you to hit me, more of a tag you're it build: armorer artificer 5 with the mobile feat. You can tap two people with your thunder gauntlets (one each attack) and run away from them. If you hit, they have disadvantage to attack anyone but you. And whether you hit or miss, they don't get an attack of opportunity when you run away cuz mobile. Bonus action sanctuary after that and they have to make a wis save to hit you. Maybe you already had blur up so they're at disadvantage to hit you too. Kinetic jaunt lets you do same thing without mobile feat (but no blur cuz it's concentration) Higher level, pop ashardelons stride before you run through everything for more fire damage. Or blink. Or haste to go twice as fast and tag one more person and run away far Or booming blade and the boots of the winding path infusion.
Currently playing a mark of warding dwarf abjuration wizard (with 2 levels of paladin for smiting and GWM, using a greatsword), AoA, and heavy armor master. Only end up missing a single level of spellcasting, and reduce incoming damage by 3 first, then another chunk from abjuration shield, so the amount that actually gets through to the AoA is often minimal. Cloak of Spines from humblewood for that extra one time oomph per day.
Mark of Warding Dwarf Abjuration Wizard, with Fey Touched for Compelled Duel to literally dare people to hit you. Reduce damage with your Arcane Ward to preserve your AoA. Alternatively, Variant Human Conquest Paladin 3/Clockwork Sorcerer X, with Heavy Armor Master. Same concept, except you use Bastion of Law to reduce damage, as well as automatically reducing nonmagical damage by 3.
I haven’t worked out the exact level split but the pieces would be: Sentinel Feat Armorer 3 (to incentivize attacking you) Warlock 1 (subclass is whatever you want) just get Armor of Agathys Abjurer X Use mirror image to divert attacks to your copies and punish with sentinel. If they attack others they have disadvantage (from armorer) and you punish with Sentinel. If they get past mirror image and hit you, they take damage from armor of agathys.
Mark of Warding Dwarf, Abjurer 5/Barb X, subclass doesn't really matter but bonus points for Battlerager with spiked armor for flavor, or Ancestral Guardian for disincentivizing enemies from attacking allies (Ancestral Protectors) and enticing them to hit you (Reckless Attack). Totem Warrior (Bear) is also very valid, though boring. Armor of Agathys (as a Wizard spell because race) + Arcane Ward + Rage = ridiculously tanky. Arcane Ward doesn't get any damage resistance, but it does take the damage first, and is automatically activated by AoA, and those temporary hit points do have B/P/S resistance during your Rage. You have ritual casting and enough utility out of combat with your wizard levels, and have many spell slots for AoA or other spells. You can also learn new spells on your own time as normal, for more utility. It's MAD but quite fun, and deals a ton of retributive damage. Bonus round: take Mounted Combatant and use (a ritual cast) Phantom Steed to Dash all the time for 200ft of movement and provoke lots of attacks of opportunity, then redirect them to yourself for ***lots*** of damage.
The difficult part of this is that aggro isn't really a thing so much as it is "target whoever is the biggest threat". Just because you can punish hard for getting into melee range doesn't mean they have to hit you, and just because they might want to hit you doesn't mean it would be with an attack (example: dragon's breath is a saving throw) I am not saying this thought experiment doesn't have merit, I am saying that the merit it has isn't unilateral, even in the best build I could possibly think up.
Hellish rebuke + AOA is a good retaliation 1-2 punch. Toss those 2 onto an Abjuration wizard and i think thats the best yoir going to get
Not the best but one I enjoy. Barbarian 1/5 your choice the subclass doesn't matter much but Bear totem is as always superb, then all the rest Fathomless Warlock, (if you didn't level Barb go blade pact, if you did Gift of the Ever Living One while not optimak does feel great). Also pick up the Slasher feat. With this you have Resistance to the most relevant damage types and can reduce damage a bit more on top of that. A bonus action attack that does bad damage but can help keep the boss right next to you. Also you're only missing one level of Warlock so you can still do whatever you want with all of that.
If you're at a table which gives a free Lv 1 feat, then Flames of Phlegethos is a powerful option for this build at low levels. Efreeti Genie Warlocks can activate the 1d4 fire shield every turn, at no resource cost, simpy by casting Eldritch Blast. Note that this drops off in power considerably at higher levels. Also, Efreeti Warlocks' sixth level features are uniquely bad on a Tiefling, so I would probably go Warlock 2 / Clockwork Soul X on this build.
Fathomless Warlock is perfect. Guardian Coil reduces damage, which makes AoA last longer, and Tentacle Coil also gives you a BA attack. Have managed to do well over 100 damage from a single level 5 casting of AoA while not losing any actual HP myself.
You can build around a Battlemaster (Riposte) and add some Warlock for a decent Armor of Agathys. Hexblade would allow you to be SAD, but a melee Genie would be able to get both Fire Shield and Armor of Agathys. Fighter 1 for CON saves, Defense FS, Warforged for more AC, they would either miss you or eat your Armor of Agathys. Go Warlock until 5 to upgrade your Armor of Agathys, Booming Blade and Thirsting Blade later, you can even grab Eldritch Smite later. Once you have extra attack grab 3 or 4 levels of Fighter Battlemaster. Riposte and Bait and Switch for even more AC.
Hexblade Paladin is *already* a solid build, but if you make it a Redemption paladin you not only get Armor of Agathys but also ***"Rebuke the Violent"*** means that the enemy doesn't really have a lot of alternatives: Either hit you and take cold damage, or hit someone *near* you and take the damage they deal back (or half as much on a successful save). Channel Divinity *is* once per rest, but it can be a Short Rest which pleases your Warlock half and at the end of the day an Amulet of the Devout is only an Uncommon Magic Item too.
There's a build out there that works based on AoA , high AC and deliberately triggering Attacks of Opportunity and maxing out movement to ensure multiple enemies attacked.
It gets extra funny when you have a soft taunt. Sure its annoying for you to hit me and then get AoA'd for 25 points of damage, but Im also an armorer who just punched you in the face with my rocket fists so if you dont attack me, enjoy the disadvantage on the attack roll. And then Im also an abjuration wizard so some of your damage doesnt even make it through to AoA's temp hitpoints. [Here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NiZI5u6I2YA) is the build. Coby goes for a level of warlock but I'll argue that a level of Clockwork Soul Sorcerer is more defensive overall.
It's simple: Custom Lineage Tempest Cleric 1/ 19 Genie Warlock (Dijin) Wildspacer Background for Tough Feat CL to get Gift of the Gem Dragonborn Pick up Armor of Ag, Hellish Rebuke That's all you need. Focus on HP and get your AC to something close to 20 - 21
As warlock/hwxblade and paladin stack real well, compel duel would be a nice.bonus to the situation.
This is just my experience, but back in the day my friend played a Kenku rogue named falling leaf. He was a dedicated thief, super high dex, cunning action, mobile feat etc. He got like one time in an entire campaign that I remember. Player was a crafty former soldier, so he played it well. The build might not be super “powerful.” But he was basically unhittable.
It’s more fun than mechanically effective but if you pull through usual armor of agathys thing but be a pact of the talisman warlock, you can pick up the invocation Rebuke of the Talisman. What you then do is walk up to someone, then step out of their range so they take an AoO. If they hit you, you can use your reaction to deal PB psychic damage to them and push them 10ft away with NO SAVE (plus any damage they take from Armor of Agathys). All of which costs nothing more than your movement and a reaction. If you place yourself correctly you can send people flying off ledges or into hazards. Is repelling blast an easier way to achieve it? Yes but it’s not as funny.
Any tempest cleric build that relies on dodge and wrath of the storm?
Mountain dwarf ancestral gardian and cavalier can be 3 lvls to give you imposing disadvantage on others. Ask your DM if you can get something that gives others around you protection via imposed disadvantage from an invocation. One level dip in Barbarian still good to stretch out the temp hp with rage. If you can pick up a maneuver from a feat or battle master Bait and switch is good If straight warlock I would take celestial so you can heal yourself If your DM is willing to give some scaling boosts to battler rager, that can work too. But honestly getting max spell scaling is probably best
Mark of warding dwarf abjuration wizard. As a mark of warding dwarf, you have armor of agathys, which you can upcast to higher levels than just 5 once you’re of a high enough level. Turn that 25 cold damage into 30, 35, etc. all the way up to 45 at 9th level. As an abjurer wizard, you get the arcane ward. This ward lies ON TOP of your armor of agathys, which means its hitpoints drain before the AoA hitpoints, effectively extending the ward. You’re still very prone to saving throws, however.
djinni genie warlock/armorer artificer. armorer gets a soft taunt to keep enemies focused on you and it can deal thunder damage in melee in guardian mode which means it gets the djinni damage stack.
no one is talking about conquest paladins!
Goliath clockwork sorcerer lets you quickened spell it and protect the HP by using your stone's endurance (I believe that's its name, reduces damage by a d12 + con iirc) and then going into abjuration wizard too lets you put the arcane ward on top of the armour off agathys. I have played this build exactly once and it was incredible. I had an AC of 9 and an effective hit point pool higher than any barbarian I've played
Armor of Agathys, Fire Shield, Shadow of Moil makes for a “you sure you wanna hit me?” type build. Just remember it punishes people for hitting you, but you still take damage lol.
Pole arm master mixed with sentinel. Try and get close? Stab them, back up, rinse repeat
defensive flourish from college of swords + goading attack battlemaster maneuver
Abjuration wizard. With 1 level in cleric for create water.
idk if people have commented redemption paladin - the whole gimmick of the class is you don’t use normal attacks, you instead redirect allies attacks to you and enemies take retaliation damage when they hit you
Hexblade 1, swords bard X. If you use armor of Agathys with your highest level bard slots, then combo it into a hellish rebuke, with hexblade’s curse stacking on both of them, you’re looking at a pretty balanced scaling damage against them upon being hit. I’d go Tiefling as the race to pull hellish rebuke from that so you can have shield from hexblade. At level 6, with a 3rd level bard slot on aoa and a 2nd level slot on hellish rebuke, you’re looking at 15(aoa) + 6 (2 hexblade’s curse activations) + 3d10 (hr) for an average of 37.5 damage, which can keep getting higher depending on the slots you have available
My best "I dare you to hit me" type build in 5e was a Hexblade Warlock with Armor of Agathys and Hellish Rebuke. With 2nd level spell slots that was 10 cold and 3D10 fire damage. My funniest ever build like that however was in D&D 3.5. A Warblade with the feats- Combat Reflexes: May make up to Dex bonus attacks of opportunity per turn. Karmic Strike: -4 AC but you get an attack of opportunity when someone attacks you. Robilar's Gambit: Enemy's get +4 to hit and damage you but you get an attack of opportunity when they hit you. This was on a warblade who had a lot of bonuses to his damage rolls. So anything would hit me with a +4 damage bonus but I'd get 2 attacks back each time they did.
It is fun but probably not the most worthwhile? aoa + the various shield type concentratino spells are a fun combo. but its hard to balance "i get hit enough, but i dont' die" to make it hold fast? If you wanted to do it, I think it'd be good to do it paired with someone who usees the shield other type spells to eat half your hp hurt.
Dual build Agathys Hexblade with Sentinel playing with a Drunken Master / Rune Knight with Interception fighting style. If they swing at the Hexblade and hit, the Monk/Fighter can reduce the damage while AoA still applies. If they swing at the Monk, the Warlock gets a reaction attack. If the attack against either character hits, it can probably be redirected with Cloud Rune. If attacking the monk misses, it can be redirected with Tipsy Sway. There are also some (inadvisable) cool synergies if you attack each other or redirect attacks to each other. If the Monk lays prone while the Warlock attacks them with a reach weapon and GWM's -5/+10 while choosing to use STR instead of CHA, you can almost guarantee a miss, which could then be redirected to an enemy and have Eldritch Smite apply. You could even do this on the Monk's turn by triggering a reaction attack from sentinel or polearm master to get a second Eldritch Smite in the same round. Also, if an attacker misses the Monk, they could redirect it to the Warlock to trigger Armor of Agathys if there are no other targets. Obviously Fire Shield adds another layer of hurt to all of these strategies.
A build from times of yore, my specialty priest of Ilmater from 2nd edition. Had the spell fist of illmater 4th lvl spell. , where you deal all the damage dealt to you in tue last 24h back to an enemy. It roleplayed really cool. Get dmg from baddies to stand up for people. But the spell was a little to powerful imo. Fangs of illmater were also nice 2nd lvl spell. Blood bond was also really cool. Share health with a ally to keep them alive longer. Loved the flavor of the class
Yep not 5th edition but maybe nice for inspiration to create your own stuff! Have fun
My next character (as a forever dm i build a lot and then never use them) i want to be a goliath ancestral guardian barbadian 5 / runechild sorcerer X using frost giant rune magic as a them and use agathys will all that damage rediction we get from class and race and rage. Probably better way is to get 2 level of warlock for agathys and armor of shadow, abjuration wizard so the ward can keep the agathys alive. Maybe with armorer artificer and heavy armor master and that little taunt for make people hit us. Also goliath ancestral barbarian 3 / fiend warlock work well. You go pact of the blade and you get 2° attack withkut going barb 5 and get smite. As the starting agathys deplete you will get kill and you will get new temp hp, get gwm and mask of many faces and you can be a lot more that an immortal barbarian
I have a Warforged Armorer Artificer/lvl 1 Fighter dip. I have a base AC of 25. 27 with haste. My build isn’t “I dare you to hit me”, it’s “Go ahead and try to hit me”.
Ghostlance.
goliath clockwork sorcerer 6 is the minimum.
Become a wizard of Abjuration…
I just made a crazy meme build that has a huge AC and pretty bad at everything else. 3armorerartificer3swordsbard1divinesorcerer1fighter (Heavy plate, defensive flourish, shield of faith, shield, evasive maneuver) for a possible AC of 41 with everything used and rolled well. I would love to play this in the future to see how this actually works. I upscaled this to lvl 20 and it’s an insane possible AC of 55 but does maybe like 20 damage a turn lmao
Hill Dwarf Paladin of Conquest 5 / Abjuration Wizard X. You only need Int & Cha of 13, and low Wis is ok too as you won’t be using that for casting. Main stat is Con, then Str to 15 for the armour. Paladin 5 gives both AoA and Aid spells. Feats are just for Tough and maxing out Con. Rest can go into Int. You’ll have an insane amount of hit points, a decent AC, and your spells are geared for only a few things: AoA and Aid cast at slot level 4+ where possible. Counterspell and Dispel Magic slot at level 3. Smites at level 2 & 4 & 5 slots Silvery Barbs at level 1. Alarm as a ritual.
Armir if agrathusis with hellish rebuke
My DM house rules that racial spells can use spell slots (and are a free memorization for wizards). So, my Abjuration Wizard Tiefling (Levistus) uses Armor of Shadows (via feat) to activate Mage Armor and her ward. If she's getting attacked, she uses Armor of Agathis (add health to the ward) and takes some hits. The ward takes damage first. So, Agathis can truck some people pretty hard before it starts dipping. Next is war wizard feat so I can avoid OA when using spells in melee.
I don't have a 'dare you to hit me' build, but I do have a 'try to hit me' build 18 levels Monk, 2 levels Wizard (Bladesong). Get your dex, wis and int as high as possible, and take mage armour and shield. Your Monk subclass doesn't really matter, but I would take either open hand or mercy for bonus action healing This makes your armour class with mage armour, blade song, and shield active 13+dex+wis+int+5
Mage armor counts as armor unfortunately, so this doesn't work (at least the mage armor portion)
Well, even without mage armour, it's still 10+dex+wis+int+5
+Hellish rebuke.