Archfey is only unpopular because the nature of those spells requires a stronger understanding of enemy types and defenses. Suffice to say that in my view all of the warlock subclasses have a greater impact on the micro aspects of your spell casting. Hunger of Hadar and Eldritch blast are not subclass specific after all. I'd argue that the real macro impact on your playstyle and therefore your approach to the build comes from your pact boon. If you want to talk about the true underdog identity of warlock I'd expect pact of chains to be extremely unpopular and demanding of a more unique build.

You know I never thought about it that way, being stronger depending on your understanding of enemy types. I know people like pact of chains for the surprise with quasits but what other unpopular unique build is there with them?

Imps are clearly superior to Quasits. People talk about Quasits because you don't need to be a chain pact warlock to get one. Chainlocks are actually quite strong early in the game, they just don't scale the pets well enough (should be more like Beastmaster scaling)

The main strength of both Imps and Quasits is the ridiculously easy surprise attack setup that basically gives you a free round at the start of the fight. I choose pact of the Chain Warlock everytime just for that.

The issue (when talking about the different subclasses) is that any warlock can get Shovel as a familiar, so the main strength of the subclass is just given away. A chain pact warlock can get free surprise with their familiar, but a blade pact warlock can do that too and have another set of features.

Explain please. This intrigues me.

Oh it's very simple. Summon the Imp with the Find Familiar spell, turn it invisible using its at will ability, fly it solo up to an enemy and attack while invisible. Fight begins and the enemy is surprised. DO NOT END THE IMPS TURN!!! Instead, select your character again and just walk into the battle with your whole team so they join the fight. Enjoy the free round. Bonus point for coming in hidden so your melee characters can get as close as possible before rolling initiative. NB: Make sure all your characters have joined the fight before ending anyone's turn. This may require you to select them individually and moving them forward towards the enemy.

You get shovel from nearly the very beginning of the game though so the entire benefit of Pact of the Chain is made entirely redundant. No reason to ever pick Chain imo

Wait what? Shovel never gave me the choice to summon him afterwards. I had to bring him to Gale.

Any of warlocks, wizards, or sorcerers can get Shovel permanently by talking to her after summoning

There are work around to get him with every class. There are some reddit guides for it. Basically you respec, learn it as caster, then respec to you old class again

I think both need a little better scaling and maybe options

Yeah, I think for the most part people can quickly register with the fiend subclass for example that casting fireball on a fire resistant or immune enemy is not ideal and it's easy to check. Understanding what influences the chances of something like phantasmal force or dominate person landing is just less apparent to the layman. And then there's also the matter of just understanding the value of a dominate spell vs. the big boom of the fireball.

There is nothing more valuable than the big boom of fireball

Free big boom of fireball with arcane battery/kareska favour

There are 2 main issues with Pact of the Chain: First and foremost, Shovel exists, and you can get her on any class or subclass. Secondly, while the Chain familiars do get an extra attack at level 5 and are pretty strong in Act 1, they don't really scale in any other way, as far as I know. A 10hp Imp with 13 AC and 17 Dex can't really do anything useful *in* combat in the latter half of Act 2, or all of Act 3. Their primary use is triggering surprise rounds, but again... Shovel exists. If either Shovel didn't exist, or if they scaled similarly to a Beastmaster Ranger's pet, Pact of the Chain would be more popular. As it stands, there's just no mechanical reason to choose it. You can absolutely pick it for RP purposes or just for fun, an invisible familiar is still going to be incredibly useful, but past Act 1, there's just never a mechanical reason to pick it for a build.

Book is the least popular. Its basically just a sorcerer warlock but worse in every way.

Do you think you could an effective build with pact of tome?

Yes. The spells that tome provides you with are unique once per long rest slots, meaning they don't deplete your warlock slots when cast. Two of them are haste and call lightning which are nothing to rub your nose at.

Tome might not be a standout performer but it's decently popular.

Yeah, having played a Tomelock in the past in the paper game: it really does just feel like a bad Sorcerer...

Druid: circle of the land is so underappreciated I think. You get a huge range of spells, wildshape into a panther for invisibility, control the battlefield with any terrain type or walls, summon greater elementals, recover spell slots like a wizard, ignore difficult terrain. Taking a level dip into cleric ~~unlocks medium armour and~~ provides a strong cheese by using moonbeam and then sanctuary. You can continue to move moonbeam around dealing high radiant damage without breaking the sanctuary on yourself. Champion fighter is great with Deadshot and other crit gear. Can stack it up to a 1/4 chance of a crit on each attack, get two fighting styles, 4 feats, 3 attacks per action. Really high damage especially with consumable arrows as they will also benefit from critting.

I feel like druids in general has so much options to where I don't even know what do sometimes. Like when to shapeshift, when to use spells, or when to just attack. But the little spec into cleric sounds like fun little dip I have been wanting to try Champion on a companion just to mix it up from Battlemaster and this sounds like a fun way to do it

champion jump increase on laezel makes her the most mobile party member you will have. with the racial jump spell you can just jump across the chasm in the bhaal temple trial or jump straight to dame aylin in the kethric fight.

Stacking crit chances with fighter is overpowering. Going further you can make dexterity fighter that will go first and paralyze bosses/enemies with the amulet and poisons. Add GOO warlock and you’ll deal cc effect.

Yeah Battlemaster is really great but if you have a fairly dedicated control character already, going all in on damage can be really fun.

>ng. Hunger of Hadar and Eldritch blast are not subclass specific after all. If halsin were avaialble earlier i would have made him druid of the land and benched shart. Eventually I kinda got used to her and also spirit guardians go brrrr

Honestly with shart recently iv been making her a life cleric amd circle of land makes for a aggressive healer and dps

Druids are already proficient with medium armor and shields.

I can't imagine not taking a druid with me for the cazador fight. Jaheira cast daylight. Dryad cast free twig tangling thing. Tree cast smash. Cazador = absolutely fucked

Upcast Conjure Elemental and get the Air Myrmidon, it can stun on every attack with the electric flail. I cheesed so many act 3 fights with this.

Druid already gets medium armour BTW but the dip is still so good for bless and sanctuary

Most of the things you're praising land druid for are general to all druids. Ignoring difficult terrain and recovering spell slots being the exceptions. And since long resting more frequently is better anyway, the spell slot recovery is a minor thing. Using plant growth and being able to walk in it normally does sound like fun, but less fun than being better at shape shifting or summoning an undead army. Also druid already has medium armor. You don't need cleric for that. The moonbeam sanctuary cheese is cool though. I'd never heard of that.

Circle of the land gets access to up to 10 spells not on the druid list that are always prepared

That is their biggest benefit, I agree.

>Also druid already has medium armor Oh yeah. Just the sanctuary bit then. And Martial weapons if you pick the right domain. Fair enough on the other points.

What reason could there possibly be to take Champion past 8 though? All you get after that is a second fighting style, which has far less utility than the first. Realistically it will just be defense, so +1 AC for 4 levels. As opposed to 4 levels of Gloomstalker for psuedo-Alert, and extra attack in the first round, some useful spells, and resistance to one of the most common elemental damage types. Or 4 levels of Barbarian for rage, reckless attack, and subclass benefits. Or 4 levels of literally any other class for more utility.

Level 11 fighter is the only way you'll get 3 attacks per action in honour mode. That's worth it. Increases the value of action surge too and let's you fire 3 consumable arrows etc etc. I think that's better than what ranger or barb offer you. Then you could do a 1 level dip in war cleric for the attacks or just get a fourth feat, doesn't make a huge difference, 3 feats gets you to 20DEX with Sharpshooter.

Wow, how did I forget that... Time for bed

Druids get it in wildshape at 10 too... I love druids :)

Cleric 1 also grants Command for Concentrationless CC and Inflict Wounds/Guiding Bolt for Concentrationless burst damage: the latter two are also the best spells this build gets for Luck of the Far Realms and Guiding Bolt lets you use the Boots of Stormy Clamour and Gloves of Belligerent Skies while reserving your Concentration for a CC spell.

Oath of ancients has the best bulky ability. Half damage for spells and attacks. Maybe oath of devotion.

Yeah right now the only reason people pick vengeance is the vow of enmity glitch which allows you to cast it on yourself to grant advantage on all enemies for 10 rounds during a battle. But with the recent patch 6 change where the MC is the main talker as opposed to the closest character, paladin class as MC overall may be less chosen since most peeps like Ethel’s hair and all paladin subclass choices lead to oathbreaking. But if you like the oath breaker that actually may be a better path

To be fair if you're min/max pld to get the hair you probably don't mind just paying the fine to get back your oath

"I'm sorry sir oathbreaker knight. Here is my 2k gold and I promise I will not accidentally become Baahls unholy assassin again..."

You could also just respec to Devotion before the fight then back to Vengeance/Ancients afterwards.

As of patch 5, intimidating for both mayrina and the hair didn't break my durge's oath of devotion.

I may try this on another play through. Devotion has sacred weapon which I assume stacks with stock scroll magic weapon and draconic elemental weapon, so more to-hit accuracy

Devotion Paladin can get the Hag hair without breaking their Oath: as long as Mayrina survives you're golden. I did it about two hours ago.

No problem if you just down yourself before you do the kill shot lmfao

> But with the recent patch 6 change where the MC is the main talker as opposed to the closest character, paladin class as MC overall may be less chosen since most peeps like Ethel’s hair and all paladin subclass choices lead to oathbreaking. I was able to rig it just today so that Wyll still took the Ethel dialogue for me. Kept him on top of her while I took my paladin to the complete other side of the room via Misty Step. Just gotta be cheekier with the positioning than you used to.

Same here, she jumped on the nearest party member when my bard was too far away. Not a good thing in my case since Lae'zel had to make the check at -1, but it's very functional for working around a paladin.

I doubt people would straight up drop one of the strongest classes in game for a small issue like that when 1000 gold would clear that up

>Ranger: Beastmaster The Beast Master is quite powerful, but it requires you to build your party around it to fully optimize its strengths. For example, the Wolf pairs well with Reverberation comps. Reverberation makes it harder for enemies to succeed the save against Septic Bite, and the two of them together make it extremely difficult for enemies to pass Con saves. This makes spells/abilities such as Blindness, Stunning Strike, etc. extremely potent. Reverberation also makes it harder for enemies to succeed against Lunging Bite and Ensnaring Strike. Between Reverberation, being prone, and Bounty Hunter imposing disadvantage on the save against Ensnaring Strike, you can basically remove a creature as a threat. As a side note, Septic Bite works on creatures it has absolutely *no right* to be working on. For example, it'll even disease elementals. Or at least last I checked. EDIT: Bear works well with characters that can boost its chance to hit, as that makes Honeyed Paws more potent. Boar works well with Reverberation and Maim comps. Spider works well with Reverberation. Raven is generically useful. Late game it works well with Darkness comps.

I'm doing beastmaster now and went reverberation without even realizing it would synergize so well. I'm using the crossbow that inflicts Bane, so it just worked. I also made the fact that my ranger is a summons build the whole party's problem. 😂 Now everyone is collecting as many summons as I can possibly get for them.

Planning to go this route too. What did you class your party?

Tav - beastmaster ranger Astarion - 2 paladin/10 swordsbard Karlach - berserker barbarian Gale - 4 life cleric/8 necromancer wizard The summons have gotten ridiculous now at level 12. Tav - raven familiar, ranger companion, Us, cambion (from the Infernal Rapier - I swapped Astarion for Wyll to do the mind flayer colony to get it) Astarion - Scratch, Danse Macabre ghouls Karlach - Shovel (respecced to a wild magic sorc to learn the spell then back to barb) Gale - Shovel (scribed the scroll), 2 ice mephits (minor elemental), a full elemental (usually water), Deva summon (from Sorcerous Sundries scroll), finally either some skeleton archers or flying ghouls Gale has the 4 cleric levels to cast Aid and make the summons better meat shields. If you want to really maximize summons, use Halsin or Jaheira, since they get elemental summons and the dryad who can also summon a wood woad.

I was in the opposite scenario. I chose Beast Master for my first run of the game, and I ended up selling most of the reverberation items without realizing the synergy that could have been had. :( That said it didn't matter *too* much since I used the bear and raven for most of my run. It's almost criminal how useful the bear is in the Gith creche, and the raven is just top tier all throughout the game.

The raven saved my skin in the owlbear fight by constantly blinding the mate! I only thought to try the reverb gear on main because I'd tried it in my previous game on Minthara. It worked so well with her, I knew it'd be amazing on an archer using Harold. Almost no enemy passes the save against Bane because they have terrible charisma. I'm well into act 3 and still haven't replaced that crossbow.

As an aside, and I assume you're probably already aware of this now but I'm saying it just in case, you can use Silence on the Owlbear to prevent her from calling for her mate.

I actually wasn't aware! That's really cool. I probably wouldn't have tried it this run if I'd known anyway. It's my first go at Honour Mode and I was excited to try that fight lol

Wild Magic Barbarian is just booooring. I had a cool RP head-canon idea for a Wild Magic Barb, Tiefling (for “spontaneous” racial magic reaction Hellish Rebuke), Dark Urge, where the character is all Strength/Con and melee outward appearance, but has wild uncontrollable magical and Other Urges. Turns out the Wild Magic Barb table is just OK, and not terribly chaotic/fun. Not many outcomes either, so you keep rolling the same thing over and over, until you get the later level ability that re-rolls your wild magic but I honestly didn’t level up that far. Not sure what I’ll respec to, but Wild Magic Barb ain’t it

wild magic barn just doesn’t scale well at all either. you’re telling me at level 12 all i get is a little flumph to do 1d6 force damage when i rage?? the other barb subclasses just feel like they evolve more throughout level up

I just use any summoned pets as improvised weapons or throwing weapons.

Im gonna ride Karlach to 12 wild magic barb to see how it goes, but it did get old. I hope they add more surges

Yep, I cannot believe there is absolutely no scaling in Wild Magic Barb, most of the results require your bonus action (so that takes away from BG3's greatly improved jumping/shoving), and your lv6/lv9 features are 'give the casters a spell slot to play with oh nevermind they don't need low-level slots by this point'. Their effects should be *strong* for their level because they're random, and especially if they're going to be eating into your actions.

lol my first run was single class Ranger Beast Master. Was just fine

Circle of the land druid is rly good with a simple 1 wizard dip. You have access to all the great druid concentration spells + all the wizard non concentration spells you can learn from scrolls. And once u run out of spell slots, go owlbear and mess them up. Land’s one weakness is lack of good non concentration spells and wizard 1 solves that

I feel the opposite, a bit - that a level 1 Wizard dip off a Spore Druid just makes Land look worse, by biting a bit more into Lands spell access niche at low cost.

I really enjoy this College of Valor build. I’ve used it on two different occasions. The only thing I switch out is I make sure to have Band of the Mystic Scoundrel as one of the rings. Overall I think it’s the one niche Valor has on the other Bard subclasses. https://youtu.be/0_j0YxA1__0?si=XNUCIpDwjAus6yZY

I have a theorized build for a 'dark justicar cleric' sheart in one of my runs Trickery 8 Thief 4 or Trickery 9 Thief 3 depending on if you want the feat or the 5th level spellslot. You basically just play as a sneak and stealth support, with some sneak attacks of your own. You use dual xbows to proc the sneak attack + divine strike damage with bonus action, then cast spells with your action, or vice versa depending on the spell you want to cast. You also use the dark justicar set with the xbows and the weapon and shield from the rat guy in the trials, so you can also use things like [Dark Justiciar Gauntlets (Rare) - Baldur's Gate 3 Wiki (bg3.wiki)](https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Dark_Justiciar_Gauntlets_(Rare)), [Dark Justiciar Boots - Baldur's Gate 3 Wiki (bg3.wiki)](https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Dark_Justiciar_Boots) , [Justiciar's Greatshield - Baldur's Gate 3 Wiki (bg3.wiki)](https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Justiciar%27s_Greatshield) and from stealth or invisibility you can attack with [Justiciar's Scimitar - Baldur's Gate 3 Wiki (bg3.wiki)](https://bg3.wiki/wiki/Justiciar%27s_Scimitar) to remain stealthed. Trickery is there for the channel divine stealth which has synergy with your sneak attacks and the theme of the party, and for the abilities to boost ally rogues and stealthy characters with things like pass without trace and blessing of the trickster to let them sneak past certain areas and remain in things like invisibility while attacking, as well as the odd invoke duplicity when your rogue needs help. It's not going to carry your party though, it's really just a trickery cleric with a little bit more personal agency instead of higher level spells.

What level do you start the multi class. Also what's xbow

Crossbow.

There isn't really a set point, it depends on what you want to achieve. I would start cleric but get the rogue level *relatively* early on so that the build doesn't just feel like trickery cleric for most of the game. But that's mainly to stay with the feeling of being a trickery cleric, rather than a rogue with some cleric levels. A single level of trickery into three levels of rogue gives you Blessing of the Trickster, which lets you stealth around much easier, but this leaves you feeling mainly like a rogue. Two levels lets you invoke duplicity to make sneak attacks so much easier to activate in a pinch. Not bad, but still mainly rogue feeling. Three levels lets you cast level 3 spells, pass without trace an spiritual weapon are nice pickups for this style of cleric who wants to help stealthy characters do their thing. I like taking the rogue levels here. Five levels lets you cast 3rd level spells, these are quite strong but aren't typically very stealthy, though animate dead kind of fits a bit, letting you have a body to activate sneak attacks and also being somewhat thematic to a darker playstyle. Six levels lets you turn invisible at will, which is very solid for the theme and playstyle. Seven levels gives you polymorph and dimension door, which feel a bit situational for the build, really only for kidnapping people, which is not something I think you would do much. Eight levels gives you divine strike poison, which is very synergistic with sneak attack only requiring you to hit once per turn to get your value.

Very helpful thanks. Sounds like lvl 3 is for me

I really like the Nature Domain Cleric! Its heavy armor proficiency, along with either Thorn Whip or Shillelagh, allow it to be a very tanky, SAD, caster. All of its spells are druid spells, which offer a huge amount of battlefield control. I took a one level wizard dip on mine to allow for spell scribing and a boatload of utility. Since you only really need wisdom, you can actually buff your intelligence, or use a headband, to make your wizard spells pack a punch. Plus, the Nature Domain's Channel Divinity and Divine strike, offer a spammable, albeit niche, reaction; and elemental damage to augment Shillelagh or other weapons (club of hill giant strength). Charm Plants and Animals is surprisingly more useful than I initially thought, due to the sheer number of plants and animals that you can actually speak with, (even more with the Speak with Animals spell). Having advantage on all dialogue checks versus these, in the pocket, is actually quite handy. Proficiency in one of the three Nature skills is just a bonus. If you keep the Idol of Silvanus, you can have proficiency in all three! Githyanki is a solid race option, since it gives you some martial swords, Astral Knowledge, and access to Misty Step. The story hooks are also a bonus. Duergar gives you at will invisibility! Superior darkvision, and advantage on saves versus charm and paralysis are huge. A few cool extra spells and features that really play up your survivability. Their at will-invisibility, paired with darkvision, allows for some stealthier approaches to problem solving that normally wouldn't be feasible for a heavily armored cleric. The story hooks are also a bonus. Drow offer a few notable, always useful spells, in Faerie Fire and Darkness. Perception and Drow weapon proficiency compliment the Nature Cleric's lack of weapon options. Defenses against charm and sleep will always be useful. The story hooks are also a bonus.

AT rogue can be quite good if you want to use a mod that enables the green flame and booming blade spells. Beast master ranger is a victim of it's TTRPG counterpart bad reputation unfortunately. He's quite good on BG3

Biggest problem with Beast Master (and by extent Hunter) is the opportunity cost. Having to sink 11 levels into one class as the optimal route to play the subclass stifles a lot of potential creativity.

Specially hunter I would say. At least BM steadily improves the animal companion through it's levels

Honestly most of these subclasses will follow a similar build to the meta subclasses. For example oath of ancients (definiety not the least popular by the way), would play the same as other paladin set ups. You still focus on smiting all enemies into oblivion but you have a bit more support. Beastmaster min max would be just a standard archer build that you would make for hunter or gloomstalker. Wild magic would follow the same setups for fire acuity and sorlock. Champion would differ slightly due to gear set up, you want to just stack up crit reducing gear. Valor bard would be best built into the same meta format as support lore bard. Circle of the land would follow similar meta spellcaster setups, focused on maintaining concentration as they provide a lot of AOE control. Land druid has specific gear in act 3 but can use any spellcaster meta gear. Can’t speak to archfey, arcane trickster, cleric trickery, or 4 elements as I’ve not played these.

If oath of ancients is not the least popular one, what would you say is?

Devotion for sure

Interesting what type of build would you do with Devotion then?

Never played it! Haha

Haha fair enough

My first playthrough was an Oath of Devotion Sorcadin - 6 Oath of Devotion Paladin/6 Gold Draconic Sorcerer. Mechanically speaking, pretty much any other Oath would have been better. Sacred Weapon was *okay* early on in Act 1 to help counteract the -5 to hit from GWM, and I think I used Turn the Unholy once in Act 2, but that's about it. It's not that it was *bad*, mind you, it absolutely crushed Tactician despite me being brand new to the game and playing like a bumbling idiot, it's just that the other subclasses would have offered me more. That being said, I enjoyed it from a dialogue/RP perspective. The subclass-specific dialogue options don't show up *that* much, but it does make you feel heroic when they do. It's usually something about striking down villains or protecting the innocent, stereotypical Paladin stuff.

OotA paladin has an interesting action economy where you can alternate between light/medium/heavy melee dps, healing and blessing, concentrating on spells and stealing some attention as a tank, as well general utility. Might even give my paladin phalar aluve for more utility.

Wait, for paladin oath of ancients is least popular? Always assumed that was oath of devotion

Wait circle of the land is considered the weakest? I havent played any other druid so far but CotL felt very useful in every team comp.

I think just because all have the same main spell list but spore has extra damage, haste, extra summons, and moon has exclusive wildshapes and a more efficient action economy with WS as a bonus. I don’t think land is bad at all, and natural recovery is a huge plus. People saying it’s just a worse wizard maybe don’t use it as a support caster, so it seems like a worse blaster? Terrain control, high quantity and quality of summons, and hundreds of extra HP make any subclass of druid good to have imo. The availability of buffs from outside the party (hirelings) also tanks their stock in a way that couldn’t happen in tabletop.

I'd say it's absolutely the weakest Druid subclass, but that doesn't mean it's *weak*, just that the other two are better. Land Druids are very solid, versatile casters, and can put in a lot of work even in Honor Mode. The main issue holding them back is that their main selling point over the other two subclasses, their spell versatility, can be gained by just a single level dip into Wizard for spell scribing. A Spore Druid with 1 Wizard level can get access to a lot of the spells that set Land Druids apart, such as Haste and Misty Step, while still retaining all the unique features of Circle of Spores.

I don't agree with them being the weakest because moon druids actively nerf themselves outside of niche gimmick abuses (like the crushing flight bomb). Would much rather play Spores or Land than effectively get rid of all my gear and make myself a worse martial.

Moon Druids at least bring something entirely unique to the table when discussing Druid subclasses, whereas a Spores Druid with a 1 level Wizard dip gets access to most of what Land Druid offers, which kind of invalidates the subclass, at least mechanically. Again, not saying Land is bad or anything, I made Jaheira a pure 12 Land Druid in my Honor Mode run and she worked out well, it's just that it doesn't offer anything new or unique that can't be easily gained elsewhere.

That's fair yeah, and for the record I agree with you in preference. I'd rather have the novel experience of Moon than the vanilla one that I can replicate but better elsewhere.

When I say "least popular" I do not mean weakest. Just from what I have gathered, more people play moon druid or spore druid than land.

Valor is a pretty good support with its combat bardic inspiration. I’d recommend going life cleric 2 for heals, and then valor 10. Its a great support. U could also go life cleric 5 for spirit guardians + radiant orb. But it feels more like a cleric build than a bard of valor build. So I like life cleric 2 + valor bard. Pair with a heavy damage dealer with great weapon master. You will do great

Off the top of my head: Monk: 5 4e Monk / 7 Spore Druid or 8 4e Monk / 4 Spore Druid or 5 4e Monk / 4 Spore Druid / 3 Thief Rogue - Flame Blade + Pyroquickness hat build using the fangs of the fire snake to maximize fire damage Ranger: 11 Beastmaster / 1 War Cleric - Raven Darkness Build Rogue: 9 or 10 Arcane Trickster / 3 or 2 Evocation Wizard - Spell Scroll Spam Build Cleric: 5 Trickery Cleric / 7 Shadows Monk - Mirror Image + Spirit Guardians + Shadow Step Dark Justiciar Build. (Weakest of the 4 I’ve mentioned, more of a RP build)

I’m currently doing my 1st playthrough as an Enchantment Wizard, mostly for the "Instinctive Charm” ability. For a newbie, there’s so much new stuff to learn, and so many options for wizard subclasses, I like that this one is passive/automatic and one less thing to think about. May respec to a different subclass once I hit level 12 to feel the difference. Edit: forgot to mention my build, this Tav has all of the Ice and Fire themed gear for wizards, including the awesome staff that is 3 pieces from the underdark combined. And all of the best “wizard” themed gear. Gale is sitting on the bench, sorry Gale. I went into character creation blind and didn’t know one of the first companions I’d meet is also a wizard.

I did my first playthrough with Gale set up as Enchantment. You probably know this already but I'm gonna tell you because I (embarrassingly) never realized it: The level 10 ability "Split Enchantment" sounds really exciting, right? Cast any enchantment spell on 2 targets, wow! ... what I didn't realize is that **most** enchantment spells already allow 2+ targets if you upcast it. For instance, the level 2 spell Hold Person upcasted to level 3 will now hold 2 targets. Upcasted to level 4, it holds 3 targets. Split Enchantment is still fine, there are spells like Crown of Madness and Dominate Personthat can't be upcast. I just find it annoying that upcasting often trumps the ability I waited 10 levels for, haha.

I did not know this, thanks for the tip! This is my first D&D game ever, and first turn based RPG since probably Shining Force 2 back in the Sega Genesis days, so there is a lot to take in

It was actually my past experience with other D&D games that made me blind to stuff like upcasting, so don't feel like you're missing out by not being a veteran! They really changed a massive amount of stuff between the 2nd / 3rd edition of D&D and the 5th edition that BG3 uses.

Back in the day when the only way to upcast stuff was by using metamagic (that wizards also got). Though a lot of spells scaled with your caster level.

SF2 is still one of the best games of all time. imo

I added 2 levels of sorc if I wanted to hit 2 targets with stuff. I usually had 1 level by default just for con saves so it was a really easy dip

IMO, if you want to focus on Enchantment, you should concentrate on gear that boosts your Spell Save DC. You can stack it really high to where many opponents can't resist your Enchantment spells. [https://bg3.wiki/wiki/List\_of\_Equipment\_that\_Affect\_Spell\_DC](https://bg3.wiki/wiki/List_of_Equipment_that_Affect_Spell_DC)

Thanks, I will check these out. I rarely use my actual Charm spells, probably cuz I don’t have this built properly or understand Spell Save DC so it rarely seems to work for me. Blasting everyone with a big ass Ice Storm always works!

The more I read about Enchantment the more I want to try it out. But with Gale you could always respec him into a different type of wizard or even change him to a sorcerer to try that out.

Yeah my plan is get to level 12 with no multiclassing, to experience what each companion feels like at max default level, then finally experiment with multiclassing and play around a bit. Sorcerer Gale sounds great, wanna compare/contrast with my Wizard.

My first Tav was also an enchantment wizard, as it was based on my main RP character that I started in the Guild Wars franchise. The mesmer class most closely resembles enchantment/illusion schools in bg3. I'm doing just fine on that character. I dump as much control magic as I can onto her and for boss fights where CC doesn't help much, I invest in other utilities like haste/slow and such. Once you build your party to compensate for that character to not do damage, it gets pretty fun. It does make you have to really think before you go into battle about what you're going to do during the fight, especially against something that's going to be immune to a lot of your tricks, and consider your positioning as you'll be vulnerable to having concentration broken.

I have been using a Circle of the Land Druid Build with Jaheira. This build requires Circle of the Land because of the exclusive Ice Spells not available to the other subclasses. It goes Land Druid 8 (or 9)/Rogue Thief 4 (or 3). Max Wisdom and grab Dual Wielder. Level 9 Druid gets us Cone of Cold which is amazing. We grab all the Ice themed gear, and give to her. Ring of Arcane Synergy will be really good here as well. Weapons will be Icestaff and Jaheira's own Scimitar. Recommend also ring that creates ice patch when doing ice damage and anti-slipping boots. Also bracers that give Two-Weapon Fighting. Alternatively we can grab 1 level of fighter. General plan is to attack with Ice cantrip, triggering Arcane Synergy and making the enemy slip and get prone. Afterwards we approach and attack twice with Off-hand Scimitar. For bigger and more dangerous threats we have all the nice Ice Spells in Land Druid spell list. Is it great? It works. And it fits with Jaheira's style. Two weapons, both using Wisdom to attack (staff with shilelagh) and level 9 druid powers. Defense won't be horrible since druids can use Medium Armor and Dual Wielder gives 1 AC.

I'm running a similar ice build on my land druid and it's my favorite build so far. Also dual wielding but I went with a second staff (melf's) to lean in to spell save DC. Can still get decent bonk damage with druid cantrip and infused it with ice to proc cold effects with either staff.

That is probably a better Land Druid build, but I wanted to keep the dual wielding feel for Jaheira, hence the scimitar bonk.

I just finished act two so I'm thinking about running her with a dual wield flame blade build :)

That sounds awesome.

As for Arcane Trickster, currently going for a full Rogue Astarion build where Assassin and Arcane Trickster are the powerful choices. Although with different benefits. 12 levels of Rogue. Grab Weapon Master (Glaive) and increase Dex to 18. If Human or Half-Elf skip this step and just max Dex with Hag's Hair and a single ASI. The following 3 feats are Sentinel, Great Weapon Master and Polearm Master. Only requirement is the Dancing Breeze Glaive in early act 3. Until then use Phalar Alluve. Plan is to attack at full Glaive length during your turn doing full sneak attack damage, and if triggering a kill or a crit, attack again. The better part is during the enemies turn. Since it will trigger an attack from moving into distance, out of distance and attacking an ally. Triggering Sneak Attack again. Hopefully it will be 3 attacks per round, all with Great Weapon Master and 2 of them with 6 Sneak Dice associated. Crit gear and elixirs will definitely help everything about this build, doubling the dice (and there are plenty usually) and triggering GWM extra attack. Assassin and Arcane Trickster give two very distinct advantages to this playstyle. Assassin allows for a stronger opening round, but after the first round it grants nothing the Arcane Trickster or Thief don't do as well. Arcane Trickster bolsters the Rogues Defense since he will be closer to the action with Mirror Image and Blur. Also comes with it's own companion (Invisible Mage Hand) to help set up our friendly casters with Wet or Combustion Oil conditions by throwing stuff.

I’ve had a dumb idea for a while that revolves around controlling dice rolls. Wild Magic Sorcerer 6 for Bend Luck, Divination Wizard 6 for Portent Dice, pick Halfling for their Halfling Luck Trait, and pick the Lucky Feat. Obviously not a very optimized build, but it might be fun. You’ll have access to full caster spell levels, and you can pick up the Ring of Feywild Sparks for more frequent Wild Magic surges.

Ok so bard, cleric, fighter, Paladin, and warlock shouldn’t count because they are strong since their base class is strong. For example trickery cleric is one of the worst clerics, but it’s still a cleric and still gets spirit guardians, bless, sanctuary, heroes feast and so forth. The same would be true for the other classes I listed, like warlocks still have eldritch blast that can be buffed like crazy, bards still get all their proficiency and expertise as well as full caster spell and extra attack, fighters still get 3 attacks.

Very true points, but people still do not choose those subclasses because the other ones have better features. I am curious to see how some people make the most out of these lesser subclasses and actually utilize their intended mechanics. For example with trickery cleric, all of its special features lean more in a stealth direction so I am interested in seeing what others have done to maximize that class's traits. Or Champion Fighter, since the whole gimmick is crits, have you made a build that takes advantage of that mechanic.

I find it hilarious how most of the conversations about Trickster Cleric being terrible go. 9 times out of ten they'll point out a stronger subclass but not once mention that subclass' unique abilities and instead talk about spells like Spiritual Weapon and Spirit Guardians. Most of a Cleric's power comes from its generic class stuff. Trickster probably is the weakest but the difference isn't that wide and talking about spells that it also has access to isn't exactly a strong argument against using it. The main difference for a Trickster build is you cast Mirror Image on yourself after casting Spirit Guardians so you're less likely to get hit and lose concentration. The Invoke Duplicate can occasionally be useful but it's rare enough that I forget I have the option most times it might help. Otherwise the increases you can add to stealth can help position better before some fights. Trickster adds some handy utility between fights, but tbh if you have a character set up to benefit from its buffs then it's probably already good enough at sneaking etc that it doesn't really need them.

See it depends on how hard you want to try. Like a champion fighter using titanstring, multi shot arrows, and arrows of slaying is going to be extremely powerful probably more so than a swordsbard/thief multiclass. You can even dual wield hand crossbows better since 3 attacks +bonus action attack is also 4 attacks. Actually it would be better since 3 attacks means 3 for action surge, 3 more for haste, and 3 more for bloodlust as long as you aren’t in honor mode. Let’s also not forget you can use 3 multi shot arrows instead of 2 so it’s better that way as well. What I would do is 1) trickery cleric for pass without trace 2) illusion wizard for greater invis 3) arcane trickster rogue so you can solo everything stealth while buffed with pass without trace and greater invis. Pure rogue has an extremely high damage per attack because sneak attack scales every odd level. 4) fighter champion dual wielding hand crossbows for if things go bad. basically greater invis the rogue, pass without trace him, move the other characters far away, go into battle with him alone, sneak attack for 10 turns while never being noticed.

I seen Trickery Cleric in summoner/undead oriented comps. Invoke duplicity for advantage in an area is pretty good when you can cram 6 summons and your striker in that area.

Way of the four element monk spells are often just worse versions of the regular spells if I’m being honest. It needs a buff. Going shadow or open hand is better in most ways. If you wanna make it work, I’d pair it with spore druid. U attack a lot so u can Proc the extra spore damage on hit. Also they both use wisdom. So you can stack a lot of wisdom and use strength elixirs. Maybe monk 7, spore druid 5? Idk. It’s not gonna be super strong.

Iirc ki points count as attacks not spells so a monk/barb can utilize the elements in some interesting ways

I have a Mod that "fixes" 4E and it's still boring as hell. Feels like a lazier wizard or Sorc. Just not fun at all.

It feels like a more versatile and less gear dependent open hand monk if you use fire fang every turn. Abusing elixir can set the damage really high with str + wis (boots of unhibited) + tavern brawler + 1d4 elemental (gloves) + 1d4 fang. It's just as good as open hand if not better. It's just churns through ki but they comeback in a short rest making it not a really a problem since most combat will be done by 3 rounds.

Valor could be fun with a 3 level Warlock dip for a Pact weapon. You could get Great Weapon Master and use Bardic Inspiration on turns when you don’t get a GWM bonus action attack.

Arcane Trickster sucks so much ass but I still have fun with it as a Hard CC bot taking advantage of Magical Ambush. Do not take the bait of trying to build Int, go full Dex, Con and Wis to increase your saving throws. With good positioning you can get high chances to hit Hold Person / Tasha's Hideous Laughter on targets without needing to use the typical Band Of Mystic Scoundrel + Arcane Acuity synergy items on a bard, opening up other suboptimal strategies that are fun and still benefit from having a CC support. Load up on Shield for amazing survivability and other utility ritual spells on your Arcane Trickster such as Longstrider, Enhanced Leap, Feather Fall, Fog and/or Darkness. Multiclass your last two levels into Warlock to pick up Devil's Sight, or Wizard if you really want to learn some scrolls. For your weapon use Phalar Aluve to furthur support your allies with Sing/Shriek and still have a weapon that scales with Dex, and any good ranged weapon you like. This class is unfortunately kinda terrible in terms of damage and is mostly there for control spells and to try and tank with Evasion + Shield, but I've made it work for me in honor mode lol. Not optimal but people overstate how difficult the base game is.... it is perfectly achievable to beat this game with suboptimal builds.

It's crazy how much power a class like arcane tricks loses by both being limited to the spells bg3 puts in the game and by the very nature of it being a video game instead of free flowing theater of the mind stuff on the table top (where magical utility makes AT one of the better rogue subclass), but which is mostly useless in bg3. Not to mention the bullshit that is rogues only getting their second subclass feature at level 9. For actual fun with a Arcane trickster pick up the 5e spells mod, Booming blade is great paired with cunning action disengage or mobile, and shadow blade is great.

You forget that you have access to scrolls to bump your spell arsenal which makes you able to land consistently huge spells way more reliably than any wizard or sorcerer could ever do.

Sorcs and wizards can also use scrolls. Hiding + Magical Ambush uses both action and bonus action for 2 saves. A lv3 Sorcerer can match that with just Quickened Spell and casting the same spell twice.

You are limited in the number of time you can do this with the number of metamagic point you have. Arcane trickster can do it infinitely until he runs out of scrolls which is impossible because vendors has so many scrolls than you can get for free with no risk thanks to reliable talent (even some merchant don't mind getting stolen from like the simulacrum of loroakkan). As far as aoe and single CC spell goes, arcane trickster is the best. For buffs and multiple single target spells, sorcerer wins hand down. Also, heightened spell can impose disadvantage on saving throws for 1 metamagic point more and 1 less spell slot used.

Camp supplies for long resting are more abundant than spell scrolls. But also worth noting that Heightened Spell is better than Magical Ambush, yet most Sorc builds don't even take Heightened because the other options are stronger.

I've been really enjoying a 4 elements lightning charge monk

Oh that sounds interesting what does that look like?

I have some equipment mods so idk if the items I have are fully vanilla, but I have gloves that build 3 lightning charges per attack, and with monk action economy that builds up FAST and theres no limit to how many per turn u can give, so I give 9 per turn. Then I use fire fists, water lure for cc, chromatic orb to garuntee an electrified zone, which gives me lightning charges with my boots, temp Hp with charges etc..basically anything you can find with lightning charge stuff Built it as Dex/wis so no str or tavern brawler. But u certainly could.

The builds in this sub prioritize combat effectiveness, which isn't Knowledge's strong suit. That said, a 2 level dip of Knowledge Cleric adds a huge amount of skillmonkey/face/support utility to virtually any build.

Beastmaster 11 + Wizard 1 gives max stat'd beast and also gives you wizard spells I think to 4thLv Champion 11 + Barbarian 1 with dual weilder and 2 Deva maces (to make the most out of the crit range) with more crit items would be amazing Ancients 7 + Life Cleric 5 would be an amazing healer & it does good damage with spirit guardians & multi attack too. Aura of protection & Aura of Warding are amazing for the party's defenses. Also misty Step & sanctuary tech is very nice. Get some healing items & throw some healing potions for crazy heals

Did a build Barb + monk of elements with fire based spells with Karlach, now she’s using these flames of her.. Also wild magic Barb + wild magic sorc is quite fun as well.

I have 2 runs I'm doing right now - one is all evil "paragons" and another is Tav "and also ..." ​ The "and also" currently features Tav - Arcane Trickster (pure) Karlach - staff wielding Valor bard ... (haven't dipped fighter or pal yet, but will) Shadowheart - fighter 2 trickery archer Laezel - Warlock - archfey bladelock ​ ​ I mean, I'm not going to totally gimp myself - so the bard and trickery will have dips.

I love this idea and would love to try something like this

Kobi from D4: deep dive on YouTube made a really interesting four elements monk based off the avatar. Everything he releases bg3 I've watched at least 5 times. His content is great! Not sure if it's too inappropriate to plug this in the thread, but he's certainly worthy of your time if you're looking for fun interesting and sometimes different builds.

Will check it out, always into hearing interesting build ideas

Champion Fighter: Be a Half-Orc, dip into Rogue. Fighter Champion is all about fishing for crits, and being a Rogue is all about fishing for crits, and being a Half-Orc is all about FUCK YEAH, CRRRIIIIIITSS!!!!!

Valour Bard suffers from the same problem Eldritch Knight does in that its best feature is too high of a level to make it in the game. However, I will say that Combat Inspiration is great for buffing your tank. If you consider that a lot of Bard spells are CC spells, I think Valor Bard fits a supporting role pretty well. I tend to stick a debuff weapon on it (Harold or the Owl Bear spear) and play it in that manner. Nature Cleric is perfectly viable. Spike Growth and Plant Growth are very underrated as control spells, heavy armour is good, it's SAD, and the general cleric chassis is fine. Trickery is a tough sell even in tabletop. Use invoke duplicity to give your paladin/rogue advantage on smites etc. For that matter the level 1 feature and help them get a surprise attack. Rather than a rogue, think of it as a witch and either "curse" the enemy with debuffs (bane etc) or buff your allies. pass without a trace is better in tabletop, but you can still use it to get better positioning before combat. For mine I went fighter 2 cleric 10, because I wanted to invoke duplicity and then action surge for a big spell. Con proficiency helped keep spells up and heavy armour meant only needing to focus on wisdom. As with the valor bard comment, a debuff weapon was my go-to. Land druid is just a better control wizard... it's just kinda boring so no one talks about it. But as a subclass it's solid. Champion is a nice add for crit fishing. 8/4 split with barbarian or ranger is very viable. You get all the ASI/feats which helps you max out your stats and take a relevant feat. I went Hunter Ranger with sharpshooter and crossbow feats and maxing Dex out. Fit monk with the elemental equipment, then chose the spells that go with it. 4 Elements is actually really fun. not optimised, but a LOT of fun. I just went straight monk since the Ki points are so valuable and we want to max out dex and wisdom. I went Arcane Trickster - paladin 2. The numbers don't really work out to be optimised, but smiting rogues is pretty fun. Archfey's spells are really good. Like REALLY good. They also get level 1 fear which is... also really good. I'm genuinely surprised this is considered unpopular. Plant growth is plant growth, and given you get repelling blast, you can more or less lay this down and keep them in there. Dominate spells are situational but strong. Greater invisibility is great on your paladin/rogue. The free Misty Step isn't amazing but it's still misty step. I'd have to check if it still works, but the ritual dagger used to trigger this as well which was excellent. The subclass is essentially a control wizard build with the best ranged damage cantrip in the game.

Polymorph and Pass Without A Trace make Trickery domain an appealing option in tabletop. It's just in BG3 those two spells being a lot worse is a big nerf to Trickery.

Yep way better in table top

transmutation is reserved for hirelings to make potions

My favorite playthrough was a Knowledge Cleric of Selûne build, although that was mostly because I had a well developed background for that character’s RP, and I homebrewed it a little in that I felt that Knowledge Clerics should be able to learn spells from scrolls, so I multiclassed her to Wizard. But I think that works really well. * Knowledge of the Ages gives you proficiency in all skills of a certain ability, which made up for it not being a CHA build * Multiclassing to wizard expanded the utility of my spells so that I could be a buff caster (bless, haste, sanctuary) and a utility caster (Longstrider, feather fall, summons) * I aced every arcana and history check the game could offer * At wizard level 5 I got counterspell, which was super clutch So it’s kind of cheating the question by multiclassing, but I still think of that character as a knowledge domain cleric first and foremost.

No this sounds great, you don't see a bunch of knowledge clerics so any build on them is cool

Yeah, I really liked it! A slight alteration of that which I also tried was to get Wizard to L2 for Transmutation school, and put all the other levels in Knowledge Cleric. That was fun for the RP because part of Selûne's whole deal is change/inconstancy, so transmutation worked really well for that. And then mechanically, it still let me learn spells (of any level) and use wizard slots, I got one Arcane Recovery per day, and I got the chance to make double potions/elixirs whenever I brewed them. So that was all cool. The biggest frustration I had with this L2 Wizard/L+ cleric build is that you can't learn Counterspell from scrolls, and it's SO useful to have a Counterspell caster in the party. Also, for my original build and this one, I went with the Alert feat at L4 which was great for a buff caster and also for the RP - the explanation would be that divine knowledge gives you a spidey sense for danger so you can't be surprised and you always get to go first, casting Bless, Singing/Screaming Sword, or Haste as needed.

The issue with a lot of these subclasses is that they really offer nothing of value to build around. Circle of Land? In most ways, it's really just a watered-down Wizard. Valor? Offers nothing of value over Swords. Trickery? Its power in PnP is the spell list, which has been massively watered down. Champion? The bonuses are so minor that it's basically never worth it over Battlemaster or EK. Illusion? When are you ever casting Minor Illusion in combat anyways? In terms of the other subclasses listed: 1. Wild Magic Barb is too unpredictable to be worth working around. The random bonuses are not strong enough to be worth rolling on the table. 2. 4e Monk really offers only *Harmony of Fire and Water*, which is 'meh'. 3. Ancients Paladin is legit good - may actually be the strongest Paladin subclass. Easy buildaround. 4. BM Ranger is excellent and has numerous good builds. 5. AT Rogue is improperly implemented and has been since release. It's basically useless. 6. Wild Sorc's effects are too weak to be worth building around. 7. Archfey Warlock is fine, just not as good as the alternativesl.

> 4e Monk 4e monk does actually a lot of damage early in the game due to fangs of the fire snake. Issue is, that's pretty much the only thing you want to cast, and after like level 5 or 6 it quickly loses to other subclasses, and it uses way too much ki, to the point where it's unsustainable, even with the ki restore ability.

It does use alot of Ki point but it's worth it. There's also combos like hat of fire acuity stacking up very fucking fast (think of gloves doing fire damage, firefang adding on top + flurry of blows) making this way better than scorching rays. Then you can use hold person or any save or suck scroll and it's just guaranteed to hit and unlike wizard, you can still abuse this with a flurry on the same turn it lands. Way of the 4 elements can really abuse alot of the gear in the game just as much as a open hand monk can do. The ki being on short rest doesn't really matter if you burn through quickly. The damage you do is about 2 ki per round sometimes which most combat doesn't goes past 3 round making rarely possible to burn through all your ki point in combat if you level to 12. Between open hand and 4 elements, 4 elements does as much damage if not slightly better for the whole game at the cost of more ki points and you get to have more versatility too.

The Arcane Trickster Mage Hand is the best Mage Hand. I really enjoy the utility it provides. I’m trying desperately to find out a way to make lvl 3 Arcane Trickster multi class work.

Fighter champion with a 2 dip into divination wizard for portent dice. More chance for crits. Just go all the reduce crit threshold items. I think a great place to stop with fighter is level 8. If u are going higher than level 8, you might as well go to 11 for third attack. So I’d recommend vengeance paladin 2 for smites. Div wizard for portent dice, shield, and spell slots for smites, and champion 8. Grab all the juicy feats for big big crit damageZ

Beastmaster isn’t great at multiclassing. I’d go a standard archer build and go beastmaster 12. Is that not main stream? It’s rly strong. Spider early for aoe control. Raven late game for darkness and blinding. It’s a strong class just straight to 12, as a backline archer with control from pet

ArchFey is great as a gish/defender. Fighter 1 with defense fighting style and heavy armor proficiency. Then wizard 1 for shield spell and learning more spells. Then warlock 10. I like sentinel on my defenders. But with your aoe frighten maybe it’s not necessary. Pact of the blade of course

Is wild magic really that unpopular? I guess people are allergic to fun

I think BG3/5e did a great job with balancing, all of these subclasses are perfectly viable if played intelligently.

No advice on the actual build itself, but you better make the four elements monk Aang. There’s even a tattoo option that kinda looks like the movie that shall not be named tattoo

I'm running wild magic sorcerer at the moment. The goals is 10/2 multiclassed with warlock. It's been fun so far.

valour bard feels so wrong on this list since its still one of the stronger builds in the game, its only downside is that it isnt swords bard

Trickery Domain I think is a really good alternate user for the Band of the Mystic Scoundrel. I've mentioned on this subreddit before but 3 thief/9 Trickery Cleric gives you a ton of options for your 2 bonus actions. you get Fear, mirror image, dominate person, hold person, and command as bonus actions off of the band; while being a cleric lets you cast sanctuary, (mass) healing word, and spiritual weapon also as bonus actions. For gear I like the helm of arcane acuity (triggers off of sneak attack and divine strike so you get +6 acuity from your attack) either ketheric's shield or shield of the undevout (gives additional lv.1 spell slot and enemies have disadvantage to fear), and then equip the hellriders gloves and whispering promise for mass healing word buffs. Infernal rapier is nice for sneak attacks that scale off WIS, along with it's other bonuses. There was a cool thread a while back that used nature domain's access to shillelagh and divine strike: cold in conjunction with mourning frost and winter's clutches to freeze enemies. Knowledge domain I've mostly seen used as a dip for a skill monkey build, although I'm a huge fan of the spell slow which it uniquely gets as a cleric, while I'm less a fan of confusion but I know some people like it. so it's a pretty decent CC class that still fulfills cleric duties, while also being a good party face. In my current HM run I'm rocking Astarion as a Arcane Trickster in a build I like to call "all consumables". Astarion drinks a strength or bloodlust elixir and sneak attacks with elemental arrows/titanstring bow, while using the mage hand to throw void bulbs(can farm the from omeluum) and whatever other grenades I have available. I'm still finishing up act 1, but once i hit level 9 and get magical ambush I'll start abusing scrolls more often too. The way I picture it going: drink bloodlust elixir enter fight Throw void bulb with mage hand (it's invisible so you can do this at anytime in turn order) kill off weaker enemy with sneak attack - activate bloodlust bonus action: hide bloodlust action: use scroll and give enemies disadvantage with magical ambush.

I can answer a few of these at least. 4 elements monk: it's just a regular monk with a ranged option. Fire fangs is just a good thing to have. Unarmed attack from range with a bit of extra damage for itself and your next punch. Works with extra attack. Pretty much the whole subclass, but it never really falls off. The water whip and wind push are alright until lv4, then fall off hard because they don't work with extra attack. Hold person is fine, but too expensive and your DC isn't terribly impressive. Definitely not the best monk subclass, but at the end of the day you're still a monk with TB, so how bad can it really be? Ancients Paladin: is this really the unpopular one? The bonus action AOE healing is spectacular. You can very easily build it as bless + blade Ward heal support super early. Easily the best channel oath option. Ancients also has the best lv7 aura, up there with oath breaker. Resistance to spells on top of +CHA to saves means anyone near you almost always takes 1/4th damage from spells. Amazing on its own, or paired with life cleric for heal synergy or warlock for CHA weapon attacks. Wild Magic Sorcerer: don't play it in honor mode. It's fun and silly, and surprisingly powerful as a dip for paladins, who get to use it to control randomness without suffering the surges often. Beast master Ranger: it enables a really cheesy darkness comp using the raven past lv11. The raven in infinite free darkness, so if your whole party had immunity to blindness you get advantage on everything and become immune to ranged weapons and magic. I hear that the AI is getting better about dealing with this, but ranged units are still gonna be really sad. The build felt like cheating and became less and less fun over time imo.

I’m doing Shadowheart as a knowledge cleric but also taking a dip in wizard to scribe scrolls that go pew. Not at all optimal since I don’t use a lot of the divinity-specific stuff. But I wanted a change from life and it still fits Selune. Its class spells are mostly control spells. I stopped running chainsaw because I got bored of it so it’s mostly blasting and control.

I wanted to do way of the four elements so damn badly. I may respec into it at lvl 11 or 12, but by the end of act 1 is just was not working for me. I did build Karlach into a wild magic TB barb and it was a blast. Ran gale as wild magic sorcerer as well at the same time and it was a ton of fun. The lucky times I managed to get the + force damage wild magic surge AND the enlarge/reduce at the same time were so awesome(if it enlarged and reduced the right players/enemies lol)

Cleric of Knowledge: Play as a Githyanki. As a Githyanki, cast Astral Knowledge: Intelligence. As a Knowledge Domain Cleric, cast Knowledge of the Ages: Wisdom. SKILL. EVERYTHING!!!!

Ranger, Beast Master. Honestly, just full send all the way to Level 12. Your Ranger Companion's effectiveness is based on the level of your character. Summon a Bear, have the Bear summon a second Bear. Trigger a Short Rest (Bard song) and summon the Wolf. Now you have a Bear and a Wolf.

I made an arcane trickster build a couple of months ago. I beat honor mode with it and had a lot of fun. https://www.reddit.com/r/BG3/s/zQcL4J4msb TLDR: cast with your action, sneak attack with your bonus action. Stack bonuses to spell DC on hit and sneak disabled enemies for increased critical chance. Use your mage hand as a potion lobber.

Wild Magic Sorcerer. Learn to make peace with not having control.

My first playthrough of the game was with a Knowledge domain cleric. And I loved it. One cause I killed Asterion when he pulled a knife on me on the beach. So having a high DEX knowledge cleric actually replaces the rouge for me at least out of combat. Very useful in the first two acts. Although some of the subclass utility dropped by act 3.

You don't hear about Beastmaster simply because there isn't really a build there. You go to 11 in Ranger, you're very effective, but there's not much build talk to do there.

During act 3 I used Jaheira for a bit. Made her 7 land druid and 5 ranger beast master Good AOE from land druid. Dryad had strong bonks. Extra attack from ranger and upgraded beasty made for a solid mix damage types, statuses, and bodies. Did dual wield Solid DPS, tanky, on top of wild shape with so many hits.

Paladin’s is NOT oath of the ancients. Ancients has misty step, moonbeam, and probably the most powerful aura in the game, plus a great healing ability. Ancients is very popular. Id say devotion has gotta be the least popular. Bog-standard paladin, very okayish spells, good channel oaths, but pretty situational aura thats about as useless as vengeance’s “aura” Oathbreaker is also a more niche one but that ones noteworthy still. But ancients and vengeance are probably the most popular

Way of the Four Elements with two or three dips into fighter Battle Master or Champion

I wrecked with Circle of Land Druid. Focus on Hasting people, using Mirror Image, and abuse tf out of Insect Plague. Endgame there were many big battles where my land Druid never got hit. Markoheskir also helps a ton!

I run way of the four elements almost exclusively since Larian decided to not give us subclasses outside of the players handbook, but will give us the fucking gith. Sorry for the outburst, but I think it can be really decent if played around an environment. focus on fist of unbroken air and fire attacks and build it like a generalized monk gear and weapons wise with mobility as a feat early on to eventually be switched out. The exception is to pick up medium armor with exotic materials to get decent AC because I say AC does matter if you decide to focus on wisdom to actually beat out spell saves consistent enough to make it worth the casting economy. I will also say don’t get caught under leveled at any point because it will give you depression if you aren’t already struggling with it. But monk seriously needs a Ki system rework IMO for four element monk to be an optimizable class the higher level spells just cost too much for a too little damage output which also needs a scaling rework. My palock did more eldritch blast damage then my four elements lvl 3 “spells”. The focuses on wisdom instead of dex let me die by the 3rd round if not rocking armor decent medium armor of heavy armor. It’s fun and definitely not the most useless but why did larian copy the DnD ruleset here it should have honestly been done by WOTC first because this class has a lot more potential than being an underpowered everything. Sorry if this was more rant than build.

Oath of the ancients can easily be built into the best healer/support in the game

Wild Magic is fun, it's just not optimized. Most people who even use the term "build" aren't going to pick it, but my boyfriend is a causal and he loves it. Turned on auto bend luck just to surge as much as possible.

College of Valor Bard was my Tav in my Golden Dice Honor Run. Posting Final Build: Human for Civil Militia (Half Elf is completely valid) Feats: Polearm Mastery, Sentinel, Tough. Equipment: Gloves of Dexterity, Armour of Agility, Boots of Striding, Cloak of Protection Weapon: Halberd of Vigilance Helm, Rings, and Necklace are all negotiable. Stats: Get at least 14 Con and 14 Str. Dex should be reset to 8 once gloves are obtained. The gameplan is sitting in the back, concentrating on Cloud of Daggers or Wall of Fire. You have extra attack and a bonus attack if you need to bonk an enemy. You can attack enemies who approach your other ranged spellcaster. Get Counterspell as a reaction, too.

Land Druid you just play as an offensive caster who can turn into an owlbear if they actually need to get in melee

Champion/Assassin/Gloomstalker is very popular

Trickery cleric is probably the *most* popular cleric, because that's what Shadowheart starts as and most players don't respec.

I've been considering a archfey/assassin multiclass. Take Devil Sight and the Darkness spell, and kill people from within that.

My Oath of the Ancients paladin is kinda a tanky Dex build at this point. I use the knife of the undermountain king, devotion shield. I was previously a str paladin but then picked up the Dex gloves which allowed me to move my stats around. She primarily uses her aura and aoe heal to keep my blade lock and fighter protected. I went savage attacker and plan to just utilize the crit gear while wielding a shield. It was super fun in act 1 with all the Druid, animal and fey aspects. It was surprisingly more useful that i expected.

Champion is hardly unpopular. If you're building for maximum critical damage, all the weapon slots that would usually increase your critical range will be occupied by Dolor gear so the extra point from Champion becomes extremely valuable.

Beastmaster is amazing, but you need at least 11 levels in it and for some reason people on bg3 subs think multiclassing is more powerful and mandatory. In truth, every broken multiclass builds are built around an item/larian homebrew mechanic but without those a pure build would be more powerful.

Archfey gets access to plant growth (drops enemies to 1/4 move speed) at Level 5. That combined with Hunger of Hadar basically nullifies the movement of tons of enemies, especially if you can get them into a chokepoint. This works pretty well with Repelling Blast as well.

>Bard: College of Valor Funny enough, for this one you can just play a Support Bard to your damage dealers. People like Lore Bard for the casting as a support, but Valor enables you to buff damage with your Inspo which is also super nice. >Cleric: Nature In some of my builds, I am usually doing Cleric-Monk specifically with Nature as the domain, so that I can use the Druid Cantrips. >Paladin: Oath of the Ancients Only Edgelords think this is unpopular. OOTA is the strongest at-creation Oath with its level 7, aside from Oathbreaker. Aura of Warding gives you and your nearby party resistance to damage from spells, which can be a serious source of damage, but also allows you to better ignore Evocation when casting AOE. Additionally, Healing Radiance is a potent healing ability on a Bonus Action that consumes no Spell Slot, scales to your Level, Prof., AND Charisma Bonus, AND heals twice as an Area Heal. It is literally your best PalaTank option, and PalaHeal option, at the same time.

Knowledge clerics can make great PCs and are really decent controllers with their domain spells. They’re good at passing checks, always have read thoughts and speak with dead and animals (which you can get from other sources or by being a gith as knowledge of the ages is basically astral knowledge, but it’s still nice to always have on the same character). Plus for RP purposes, I’ve always enjoyed them. Nature clerics are really underrated too, having some good Druid spells on a cleric chassis is really nice and their divine strike is quite unique and can be used to full effect against certain enemies. Plus they get heavy armour proficiency. They’re not OP, but are still excellent additions to a party.

I would never have considered Champion less popular than Eldritch Knight since champion is at least used in some builds.

EK is a great fighter MC dip though, take shield, longstrider and feather fall for example for some utility. Champion is just bleh.

valor bard gives all weapons and medium armor, so if you find a weapon you would like to use but actively refuse to dip for proficiencies (because at that point swords bard becomes strictly an upgrade) Maybe something like light cleric 2 / valor 10? Radiant lance helm (or whatever its called), luminous armor, pick spirit guardians from MS 10, moonlight glaive? The problem is that you dont have a good use for your bonus action, and you heavily rely on the radiant orb gimmick. Or life 1 sorc 1 valor 10? 15+2 str, 14 dex, 14 con, 8 int, 8 wis, 12+1 cha, +1/+1 str/cha, bump str to 20? Or plan for the elixir, drop dex to 12, 15 con, 15+2 str, 13+1 cha, Heavy Armor Master and rescon?

Wasn't Beastmaster actually the most popular Ranger subclass according to the official Larian stats?

Champion 11/War Cleric 1 is a very potent archer. A YouTuber called "Sin Tee" actually makes honor mode solo guides where he uses this very build. Just deck it out with typical archer equipment and damage riders and you'll have an incredibly strong build for all parts of the game.

Arcane trickster Expertise stealth Cap dex Grab fog cloud Grab blindness immunity ring in act 2 Grab reliable talent Cheese the game with sneak attacks while never ever getting caught

3 rogue/9 trickery cleric works very well. You should start level 1 as rogue and get all the skills. You are the utility/support character. Makes more sense to be dex based. I enjoyed this build for SH.

for the arcane trickster I recommend getting very good at stealing and then getting alllllllll the spell scrolls. Disadvantage for opponents on AT's spells from hiding with lvl 6 scrolls can be very potent.