Real Lich Hours 42: Approaching Baldur's Gate
Added 2024-09-29 19:30:35 +0000 UTCIn this episode, we get so, so close to Baldur’s Gate, but instead we go to prison.
Other Segments:
Legends and Lore: Orpheus
The Complete Player’s Handbook: Tadpole powers
Combat and Tactics: Elementals, part 1
Comments
I did a 6/6 split fighter/warlock, which gets you that third feat because fighters get their second at level 6 instead of level 8. I had a lot of fun with it!!
Matt
2025-09-26 14:26:45 +0000 UTCMonths late, but if anyone is looking back on this old thread re multiclassing: I have fun multi-classing in two ways. 1) Add more power than one class offers. For your paladin/warlock, taking pact of the blade can let you be a full paladin with access to all armor, and use charisma instead of strength for attacks to max out diplomacy and fighting and add long range spell attacks all with one maxed out stat. 2) Blending roles for ease of use/fun. I didn’t want to drag a rogue around, but giving Shadowheart one level of rogue let her do all the lock picking, stealing, and trap disarming I needed while remaining almost a full cleric. Different fun for different folks!
Pat G.
2025-04-08 02:23:43 +0000 UTCAs a monk it’s really nice to put 2 into thief for more punching 🤜🏾
Mateus Silva
2024-10-15 21:27:06 +0000 UTCHey! I’m a few episodes behind, but I wanted to weight in on multi-classing. I’m about 1200 hours into BG3–which has been my hyper-fixation for a little over a year now—and I’ve done quite a bit of playing around with multi-classing! I think creating builds that synergize really well not only adds cool flavor but can be super OP. My favorite multi-class build I’ve done so far was a tiefling ranger-rogue. I took 3 levels of rogue to specialize into thief, then did the rest ranger and specialized into gloom stalker for the ambusher extra attack at the beginning of a battle. I gave her the Harold crossbow, which inflicts Bane on targets and is acquired in the Zentarim hideout in Act 1. Also gave her the ring that does extra acid damage, the ring that does extra psychic damage when concentrating on a spell (she is almost always concentrating on Hunter’s Mark), the Cloak of Elemental Absorption that absorbs elemental damage and then does 1d6 of that type of damage on the next turn, the Gloves of Archery for +2 damage on ranged weapon attacks, and the Hunter’s Circlet, which does an extra 1d4 damage against marked creatures. Needless to say, she does a ridiculous amount of damage every single turn… like I’d say she averages 50 points of damage every hit. Plus, I gave her a ton of arrows of many targets, so she can bane almost all the enemies on the first round of combat every time. Definitely suggest playing around with builds that use the same main stat(s) (like wisdom, dexterity, etc.) and cannot recommend a ranger-rogue enough. I liked her so much, I even built her in DND Beyond to play in tabletop. Unfortunately, when the second to last major patch came out (Patch 7?) I lost all my save files and 700 hours of gameplay, so I never actually got to finish her playthrough. *shrugs*
Natalie Garro
2024-10-14 15:30:36 +0000 UTCI have a slightly different interpretation of the Netherbrain plan. I don’t think Orpheus freedom was planned or even required to work. In fact when the Netherbrain broke free, Orpheus was still safely chained in the artifact. You don’t have a chance to free him till the Emperor bring your team into artifact when the Netherbrain broke free and everything went south. I think his plan was to send the Emperor to the artifact knowing that under it influence he will break free. And after breaking free he plan to get the Nether stones for himself. And in doing so it would lead to the defeat of one or all Three. And the defeat of just one will be enough for him to eventually break free of his shackles. In fact I am pretty sure during his monologue he mentioned how the defeat of Ketheric would lead to his freedom and the fact we defeat all three and bought the stones to him was just cherry on top. By the way, I love the show but just have a different interpretation of events in this case!
Andrew Leung
2024-10-06 00:20:03 +0000 UTCMy two cents on multiclassing for mechanical benefit. You try to look for benefits that the other class add which out weight the loss of a feat and potentially higher level ability of the primary class. For instance, the way Larian implemented the Sword Bard the ranged flourish can be apply to the same target which is not very balanced but fun nevertheless. However to leverage this broken ability you pick up sharpshooter feat for -5 to hit +10 damage. The -5 to hit is best mitigated with the archery fighting style but bard has no access to the archery fighting style. Fighter class do though and at first level so pick up a fighter level and you get archery fighting style. Is there any feat that will give me a +2 to hit in range weapon. No so I came out ahead. Moreover if I respec and make the fighter level first than I gain constitution save proficiency and which is bit more valuable than Dex save with all the concentration spells that bard get. A second level in fighter gain me action surge which recharge on a short rest. It is an additional set of action even on honor mode (where haste only gives you one additional attack) in the all important first round. The cost will be higher though as it lose me access to 6th level spell slot. On the other hand, a levels in a full spell casting class will not cost you any spell slots but can cost you higher spell level selections with one exception. That exception is the wizard in BG3. In a marked deviation from table top rules, one level of wizard allow you to scribe scrolls from any wizard level providing you have the appropriate spell level slots. So no casting lighting bolt as a fighter 8/wizard 1 but cleric 8/ wizard 1 can do so. One more caveat is that not all spells have scroll for instance there is no scroll of counter spell. And total number of spells prepared is Int mod + wizard level but still a wizard dip can open up spells options for my bard such as shield spell, misty step, summon elemental, and globe of invulnerability. So a power gaming build is bard 10/fighter 1/wizard1. The character can hit hard, can do crowd control and has the skill to be the face of the team. Another aspect that make multi classing less of a trade off in this game is the number of stat replacing items/ potions. For instance glove of dexterity means that ability improvement in dexterity is not necessary. You can abuse strength potion and get nearly as high or higher strength than if you spend all your feat in strength. Although there are certainly good rp reasons not to do that. And the spell acuity items and other spell dc modifying items make your base spell modifier less important. There are definitely less game breaking reason to multi class. For instance you are playing an elf sorcerer and you keep getting plastered by the mean nasties in the game who seem to make bee line for you. Pick up a level of cleric. You now can wear heavy armor and shield and if you have found solace with Pelor the Sun god and is a light cleric than you also have Warding Flare. Not to mention access to sanctuary. I can’t think of a feat that will gain me this level of protection. Finally some classes higher level abilities are just meh and another class early abilities are just better than it. For instance, many people find barbarian’s abilities past level 7 lack luster. A few levels of fighter gain you a fighting style, action surge, and either improve crit chance or combat maneuvers. And a barbarian 8/fighter 4 will not cost you any feats. In any case those are just some of my thoughts on multi classing in BG3. This game is in no way resembles a balanced table top D&D game (and I DM a rather permissive game) but I have found it so fun that I am on my 4th play through!
Andrew Leung
2024-10-05 21:09:44 +0000 UTCIs there an in universe link between displacer beasts and mindflayers? Why can you wild shape into a displacer beast? Rule of cool?
Ben Green
2024-10-05 12:26:48 +0000 UTCY'all remember when the guardians creation prompt was basically "what do you find attractive?"
The Duke of Nebraska
2024-10-03 19:33:54 +0000 UTCOn the topic of multiclassing for non broken build reasons, my tav is based on my actual tabletop character Jonah Quizz, a fighter multiclassed into rogue for better lock picking and trap disarming. It fits his character from a roleplaying perspective as a brutish cad with a taste for robbing the wealthy. Even though I'm playing on tactician, the game isn't as punishing for building sub-optimally as other similar games which is something I really enjoy. P.S. The Fighter class receives a bonus feat at level 6 which I find helps smooth over losing one or two from multiclassing
Fatt Mox
2024-10-03 01:58:56 +0000 UTCFun thing about combining a Paladin with a Cleric is that you get unique dialogue tags like “Paladin of Selune” which is great roleplaying flavor. It replaces the Cleric based dialogue.
Christopher Grunert Pedersen
2024-10-02 20:48:59 +0000 UTCWhile it eventually became a meme-build, during my first playthrough as a monk I realized that Astarion got an additional bonus action and intuited that it would probably be worth losing whatever final level perks monks receive for the opportunity to Ip-Man enemies into misty pulp. Was a satisfying reward for taking a chance with a system I didn’t know very much about!
josswakamo
2024-10-02 18:47:27 +0000 UTCI think the one multi class build that’s better than going pure one class is taking the Rogue into Gloomstalker Ranger.
Griffin Post
2024-10-02 18:21:09 +0000 UTCA little tip for making Warlocks less bland: if you choose pact of the blade, you can become proficient in any weapon whenever you want. So you can always give your Warlock the coolest/most busted weapon you find, and no loot is wasted because you don't have a character that can use is.
William
2024-10-02 16:38:11 +0000 UTCYeah, I'm definitely stealing tons, I just haven't been doing the stealer's friend: Hoarding. -GB
Duckfeed.tv
2024-10-02 00:41:19 +0000 UTCRegarding the discussion around selling armor for a set and then regretting it later: Your advice in a previous episode that “this game is balanced around the assumption that you’ll steal at least a little” really helped me out with this. I started to have a regular route of merchants who I would steal from after every long rest. Just grab any potions, crafting components, minor scrolls, followed by their most expensive armor until they caught me. Then I’d move on to the next. This regularly net me enough money for anything I wanted to really purchase so that I could go full loot goblin and send all equipment with real effects to camp just in case I wanted to try them later. Already planning to have a dedicated thief on my next run as well so thanks for the advice!
Nathan Adair
2024-10-02 00:39:28 +0000 UTCThe tradeoffs for multiclassing aren't that bad. You can still get 3 feats if, for example, you do 8 levels of Monk and 4 levels of thief. It doesn't matter what order you take the levels in you can alternate 1,1,2,2,3,3,4,4 when you hit 4th level in a class you get a feat. Even if you go 9/3 and only get 2 feats what are you missing out on? +2 to an ability score that gives you an extra +1 on a roll? Compared to getting an extra bonus action via Thief for your open palm monk so they can do an extra flurry of blows every turn its no contest. I did a run to get the achievement of taking 1 level in all 12 classes. While my character wasn't the most powerful in the group they could still contribute because each level in a divine caster stacks with other divine same with arcane and in dialogue they often got a massive list of responses 1 for each class :).
Karsomir
2024-10-01 13:44:35 +0000 UTCOh man, the Displacer Beast form carried me thru so many fights! The illusory copies draw agro & deal damage… all of them. Sure they can’t move but they get opportunity attacks, their own turn to attack each, & your HP bar. If you have a way to get extra actions you can put down an overwhelming amount of clones.
Patrick Fahy
2024-10-01 13:40:43 +0000 UTCObnoxious holy warriors are some of my favorite characters to role play in games but I find the Paladin class one dimensional and boring! Their spell list outside of Bless and Shield of Faith sucks and their spells slots might as well just be called smite slots! Cleric is my favorite class in BG3, and the War domain helps facilitate this, but at the end of the day, you are still primarily a spell caster. To solve this I dipped two levels of Paladin for the ability to smite and the fighting style to help bridge the damage gap between cleric and Paladin. The end result was a 10/2 split of cleric and paladin, and a cleric that was capable of hitting roughly as hard as a Paladin with smites while still having access to the superior Cleric spell list. Smites helped make up for the lack of extra attack in the class, and the war priest charges closed that gap entirely when I needed to burst something down. All this is to say multiclassing is a great way to fufill your “class fantasy” if the base class doesn’t fulfill it 100% out of the box! 10/10 would play again!
Borabora
2024-10-01 13:37:07 +0000 UTCIf you have been taking Illithid powers but refuse partial transformation, the narrator talks about how you doubt your own words, The Emperor picks up on it and puts the tadpole in your hand saying your deeds prove you want to transform and you need to make a saving throw to still resist giving in. It was a really cool moment on my first playthrough, making me more suspicious of The Emperor and worry the road I've gone down of smashing cultists like tadpole pinatas so I get more power might be bad for me.
Kerr
2024-10-01 09:22:53 +0000 UTCJust a random tidbit that was unintentionally funny for me, the 1st character I played through was a warlock who I named Orpheus (styled loosely after Dr. Orpheus from Venture Bros.) and found it funny once everyone started talking all about Orpheus that it was also coincidentally my character's name.
Limowreck
2024-10-01 00:15:10 +0000 UTCI actually made a note that Monks are a zerai class, but I missed it while recording the episode. Curious. -GB
Duckfeed.tv
2024-09-30 17:09:18 +0000 UTCMulticlassing response. One of my favorite 5e/BG3 builds is the stealth archer, which takes advantage of the ranger subclass Gloomstalker, but doesn't really use any of the ranger class features beyond level 5 (extra attack). You get in for the subclass, grab some of the strong ritual cast spells like enhance leap and long strider, and then hop over to a secondary class with more benefits for the build. Assassin rogue really pairs well, because it's all about buffing surprise rounds, refunds your actions on combat start, and you get the base rogue kit sneak attack. Fighter is a great pairing too, lot of good ranged uses for battle master dice, or the reduced crit range of champion. You also get action surge for additional 'nova strike' first round damage. A lot of casters also enjoy a multiclass to gain access to spells outside of their specific lists, or to gain armor proficiencies. Warlock and Cleric are very popular 1 level 'dips' for this. 5e really front loads the class features so for a lot of martial classes it can be beneficial to divert from your main class to grab some fighter/ranger/rogue goodies. Long response so feel free to edit down for time, but I really get a lot out of the multiclass experience in BG3 so thought I'd jump in.
Alex D
2024-09-30 14:53:01 +0000 UTCMy multiclassing happened kinda by accident. My first run through the game I played with a friend as a warlock. I started a solo game on the side as a wizard going for an ice focused build. When I got to pick a magic school to specialize in I was looking at arcane ward and it made me think of Armor of Agathys (a great defensive warlock spell that also happened to do ice damage). So I looked into if I could get that spell as a wizard. Then I tried multiclassing as a wizard/warlock to grab the spell and see how things interacted. It was fine but I realized that arcane ward could be charged up by casting mage armor (which warlocks could cast for free with the right invocation). I quickly hit peak degeneracy and splashed a single level into cleric to grab create water and grab sanctuary so I could use it as a pause button mid fight to stack arcane ward back up if I got in trouble. It was a bit too fiddly to recommend (and tbh less of a build and more of an exploit that I was abusing) but it was absolutely disgusting to steamroll through all of act one. I was basically doing a victory lap after I finished the main game. Arcane ward tank builds are apparently pretty well known in 5e. I never knew since I mostly roll martial classes at the table and don't really get the chance to experiment that much. However, since this game lets you respec I was more willing to try lots of goofy stuff and I learned that it can lead to some fun and/or broken combos. Still not really for me at the table but I can understand why people have fun with it.
greyrain
2024-09-30 14:50:25 +0000 UTCAs for what I’ve done with multiclassing. Since Paladin stops getting stuff altogether at level 6, I’ve multiclassed into a Storm Sorcerer which synergizes extremely Well with a Vengeance Paladin. The Metamagic makes some of the Paladin’s spell really good, the Storm Sorcerer also grants flight which makes the Paladin even more mobile. It made Tactician into a smooth run, and I’ve felt the same about the Monk/Light Cleric Build I’ve gone with which is also works really well for roleplaying to me. The Light Cleric gets some abilities that can make the Monk untouchable half the time, and Spirit Guardians is cery useful for a character who needs to get up and close.
Christopher Grunert Pedersen
2024-09-30 08:41:51 +0000 UTCI’m also really surprised that Orpheus and his troops aren’t Githzerai, since their outfits and the way they are fighting feels very zerai. Dunno if that was the original intention for the character.
Christopher Grunert Pedersen
2024-09-30 08:04:25 +0000 UTCIf you’ve used your mind flayer powers more than twice, or infected yourself with more than two worms you have to do a check to resist the temptation of becoming a pseudo mind flayer. I like that there is a consequence and to my understanding Patch 7 adds a bit more to it.
Christopher Grunert Pedersen
2024-09-30 07:53:15 +0000 UTCMy favorite thing is Multiclassing sword bard with Rogue, or multiclassing a Storm Sorcerer with a Tempest Cleric, a lot of multiclass builds are pretty useful for the higher difficulties. When you play a Paladin it is ideal to do multiclassing because they kinda stop getting cool shit at level 6.
Christopher Grunert Pedersen
2024-09-30 07:42:34 +0000 UTCThis is how I do an evil playthrough as well, I don’t always pick the evil option all the time to make the main character seem more reasonable.
Christopher Grunert Pedersen
2024-09-30 07:31:58 +0000 UTCEvery time those Gith Monks show up, I had a really hard time. They hit like trucks and are really good at Wis and Dex, making it so hard to turn denial them. As I‘m currently doing my first Honor Run, I‘m seriously afraid of that scene.
C. Guese
2024-09-30 04:34:45 +0000 UTCA note for the Orpheus story: Gith was born with the ability to ignore the mind flayers control and free others (she was betrayed by Vlaakith after Gith had free her people in the deal with Tiamat to get the help of red dragons to continue the fight to eradicate the illithid). Vlaakith says that she has the same power, but she's lying - it is genetic and not a spell or item, and was inherited by her son Orpheus. She has not killed him because she might need that power again. That he has this power and she doesn't, not so much that he is secretly still alive, is what will cause the rift and civil war within the Githyanki.
Timothy Post
2024-09-30 00:55:15 +0000 UTCI just had the exact soapbox experience today. I was not loving Dustbunny’s Paladin so I wanted to switch to bard but Crud had already sold a bunch of cool bard gear to Ethel who I then ran out of town
Richard Cochnar
2024-09-30 00:40:05 +0000 UTCOn a different topic, regarding Gary's comments about playing through as an 'evil' Dark Urge and occasional eye-rolling at some of the edgier dialogue choices provided or actions available - something I appreciated when playing my own evil Dark Urge was the freedom to define what that meant to me. I don't normally get too deep into roleplaying my own character's state of mind, but a cartoonishly evil murder machine didn't feel satisfying, so my Dark Urge was instead a manipulative and self-serving kind of evil, who often did 'good' things to cozy up to characters or factions before eventually betraying them when I'd gotten whatever I needed. My Dark Urge ultimately had an interesting dynamic of frequently fighting off his violent intrusive thoughts so they didn't screw up whatever con he was working on at a given moment, and I decided that even though I was gunning for an evil ending, my Durge would refuse to bend his knee to any other power and so would still reject the Urge. It even lead to an unintended symmetry with Astarion's character arc, with us both seeking power so that we could never be controlled again. All of that is a roundabout way of saying that I appreciate that the game allows nuances of how to express morality in a playthrough, rather than a dialogue tree with blue and red options for good and evil, and how it allowed me to experience one of the few evil playthroughs in a videogame that felt satisfying to me instead of cartoonishly evil (though I'm glad that option exists as well, for people who are more Orrin-pilled).
Jordan Parfitt
2024-09-29 22:42:28 +0000 UTCTwo comments this episode, one about my own multiclass experience and another about 'evil' playthrough stuff that I'll list separately: I was very skeptical about multiclassing on my first playthrough, especially as someone with zero actual D&D experience, and I definitely think it's a risky proposition for a first playthrough, because to really get the most of it you need to know exactly what you're sacrificing and gaining, but on my second playthrough (going up to tactician mode) it really added a lot of depth and made things a lot easier. I ended up stumbling into the popular 'two hand-crossbow' style build for my Tav (although mine's likely not optimized), as a LV 7 Thief/ LV 5 Gloom Stalker, with the cornerstone of my build being the combination of the Sharpshooter All-In feat (flat +10 damage on every hit in exchange for lower accuracy) and the Risky Ring (advantage on attack rolls). The advantage more than cancels out the accuracy loss, and with bonus actions and Gloom Stalker ambush stuff I start every fight by firing off around 5 attacks with huge damage, which lets me just pick who I want to delete at the start of a round, and later rounds still give me 4 attacks per turn. I don't think multiclassing is always the right path for a character (that second playthrough ended with a party of two multiclassed characters and two pure classes) but I do think it has a lot of potential, and the loss of a feat is ultimately not a huge risk, since you essentially trade a feat for whatever class feature you wanted to add, like an additional attack or gaining a fighting style or bonus action or some other class feature, which used right can be just as or more potent than a feat. Similarly, some classes are more front-loaded than others, so losing, say, my level 8 and above Rogue abilities, while still a loss, is a worthwhile trade to gaining dual wield bonuses for my crossbows and an extra regular attack. I'd really enjoy seeing Larian go back to something like Divinity Original Sin 2's somewhat classless system, where basically every character ends up becoming a multiclass stew - obviously not workable in an adaptation of D&D 5E rules but something that really made that game shine in terms of build expression.
Jordan Parfitt
2024-09-29 22:25:52 +0000 UTCHopefully a fun perspective on multiclassing - I was playing through with my wife and allowing her full control of everything, decisions, companions, etc. As such, I was allowed one turn per round of combat and one character to roam as in the world! Multiclassing Bard and Rogue managed to keep the playthrough interesting as I continued to find ways to synthesize the two.
Corva Cobb
2024-09-29 21:53:29 +0000 UTC
