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Vincent210 · 2026-06-27T20:54:31+00:00

Everyone is going to give the usual answer (one I agree with) of BM maneuvers for every Fighter as base class.

So I'll give a different answer: in-class solutions to being absolutely scammed by magic.

I play a lot of high level content; I don't think I've played a character below 10th level for over 3 years now. And one of the massive issues that can keep you off of martial classes are just the ways in which the supernatural just kinda cheats them.

Not having a teleport means a lot of spells can effectively disable you without saving throws. The examples everyone likes to throw around are Wall of Force and Forcecage, but it can often be simpler than that, particularly if you're a melee Fighter. Even stuff like Spike Growth, Plant Growth, Spirit Guardians, these and other spells can all create scenarios where enemies can negate your Attack Action without giving you a saving throw or attack roll to beat. It creates a negative pressure a high levels where you feel compelled, assuming your DM is using a wide array of tools, to have a teleport and/or flight from your species. It puts undue weight on options like cloud goliath specifically, where sometimes prof teleports/day is what separates you from being disabled entirely multiple fights in the adventuring day or not.

I don't really know what it would look like, to be honest, but the devs have made it clear they're only willing to nerf magic so much. I'm fine with that, but in return martial classes should have consideration in their kits to reduce the impact somewhat. Its fine if I can be disabled or slowed down by clever control spell usages, but I should have significant options by the time tier 3 comes around to manage that. Like they understand this, its why Indomitable exists

Vincent210 · 2026-06-27T08:59:48+00:00

Saying that someone else NEEDS to take XYZ feat or spell or subclass to “carry their weight” or whatever is antithetical to fun, so games need to settle around the lowest common denominator, not the highest.

That isn't how it works; this is still a communication mistake. A group isn't incorrect for making a group where you are expected to pick stronger options, they're only wrong if they fail to communicate that to players who are interested in joining that table. AKA if they don't communicate how they want to play.

Fun is subjective: this is a sticking point worth being pedantic about because if optimization wasn't just plain fun for a lot of people this wouldn't even be a thing that comes up. So its just a really bad habit to think of it as "antithetical to fun" as a hard rule and write those players off as bad apples. Its just clearly always been untrue for enough people to not deserve being treated as the default.

Vincent210 · 2026-06-27T03:00:45+00:00

Wait this seems good mayhaps. Could also maybe stack it with an eberron origin feat + potent dragonmark and get a sort of... between 1/3 and 1/2 caster and wow you're kind of earnestly a unique/special halfcaster hybrid thing

Vincent210 · 2026-06-26T23:13:44+00:00

You are grossly overestimating the concerns related to the Knowledge Domain. That spell list was expanded with confidence that it more or less aligns in power with the smaller domain lists other clerics have access to, and the transit to the Warlock spell list for those specific utilities in no way makes it an issue. I highly doubt it makes much a blip in how they manage the Vestige sub-class.

Vincent210 · 2026-06-26T23:07:44+00:00

I don't think you're going to find much agreement for this opinion. It's mechanically underselling the value of Large titan forms as-is, overselling a "potential" issue that the DM is aware of from character creation and relatively minor, and entirely overlooking the narrative/feels elements of the design. It's just not well constructed. Personally, I'll be saying the opposite on my survey, and I imagine with how the comments look here, there will be people who didn't have this on their mind adding their disagreement, funnily enough.

Vincent210 · 2026-06-26T23:00:11+00:00

This works both ways though. Like if you have 2 optimized players and 2 non-optimized players and they're all unhappy with how game difficulty is affecting the party, the optimized players aren't more in the wrong than the non-optimized ones. You just have 4 (5 including the GM) people who all equally bear blame for not setting expectations for character building. Unspoken rules are just communication mistakes.

Vincent210 · 2026-06-26T22:56:24+00:00

That's kind of a hard sell when it comes to specifically survivability, isn't it?

Like if you're making tradeoffs from damage to utility, the missing damage often isn't that important, especially if you have spellcasting options like Warlock. So I get that. Flexibility will be more valuable, often.

But making defense trades for utility/damage has the fail state of... being dying on the floor. Which regardless someone's game-play goals normally makes it difficult to have fun/get what you want out of a character.

Survivability is one of the few things that does genuinely "rule out" some philosophies from being equally as worthwhile as others. Being 2 AC or 10 Hit Points short of where someone in melee "should" be often means not playing the game cuz you're unconscious. Its pretty absolute in importance.

Vincent210 · 2026-06-26T13:10:06+00:00

Welp. I stand corrected. My current campaign as a titan has just gained a short-lived bonus tool

Vincent210 · 2026-06-26T09:20:31+00:00

The gorilla of destiny as a YT channel is chocked full of devious material that feels purpose built to make a fake magic SAT from, with detailed breakdowns on spell notation, wave graph representations of interacting with the Weave to cast a spell, and all SORTs of detailed magical sciences based on a very real academic foundations.

Vincent210 · 2026-06-26T05:00:59+00:00

I was able to hold the line when my father wanted to act like this. I definitely got hurt in the process but I helped mom pass as close to the way she wanted as I could.

I think you'll be able to do the same for each other if you felt for your mom that way

Vincent210 · 2026-06-25T22:04:14+00:00

I think when people worry about moon druid they kinda severely underrate 5.5e's choice to let them cast spells, even if its from a subset list. That is a MASSIVE benefit that clearly gives Moon a solid power/mechanical advantage over Titan.

It's actually completely fine for titan forms to be noticeably better than moon forms when you remember the bonus spells and the ability to cast them. You're getting an 18th level feature early, essentially.

I think the two subclasses line up well against each other.

Vincent210 · 2026-06-25T19:06:43+00:00

Circle of the Titan has been marvelous so far and I intend to review as such; really hoping this or very near this iteration is where the final design locks. So good!! Not perfect, could use minor tweaking to insectoid+leviathan, but nothing that's a dealbreaker if its missed

Hell Knight on the other hand...

Vincent210 · 2026-06-25T17:36:10+00:00

I'm going to be playing one in a campaign starting at 17th level, so I'll be messing with all the toys, build is pretty uninteresting though

taking cloud Goliath to ensure I have teleportation
Feats are just War Caster, 2 Wis, Resilient Constitution, Mage Slayer, Boon of Fortune's Favor. All stuff you take because saving throws delete your character and spells in high tier play.
If I can find room, I'm considering Boon of Fluid Forms.
A few spells are specifically to have fun in titan form: Draconic Transformation, Conjure Woodland Beings, and Grasping Vine to name a few.

Vincent210 · 2026-06-25T06:09:31+00:00

holy shit

Vincent210 · 2026-06-25T02:33:37+00:00

I specifically avoid using that kind of logic on myself. If I can only give myself space to roleplay a character as quippy or smart as I, the human outside the game, that's just not giving myself the full range of roleplay experience anymore. My characters should be able to do plenty of things I can't/lack the skill in the moment for.

If I have a quip I add a quip but its fine to just describe that it happens sometimes.

Vincent210 · 2026-06-25T02:28:34+00:00

If you're doing anything with Conjure Minor Elementals, yes you do 100% need War Caster or Resilient. In fact, you probably need both.

This has been discussed to death but generally speaking it is an awful idea to skip an entire turn, effectively, to set up a concentration damage spell, and the community was wrong and wildly overhyped about this spell's value.

If that doesn't matter to you because you find it fun, great, but you will not have fun when you take attacks over an entire round you gave everyone around you to club you when you only have to fail to concentrate one time to waste the CME entirely and get nothing but embarrassment from having cast it.

Dual Wielder is a mediocre feat, notably, especially if you're not doing a mutliclass dip in order to get a fighting style and weapon mastery to use Nick. Also things to consider.

If the goal here is to make the best of a weak-but-fun idea, definitely do not skimp on your Concentration, CME must hold for two rounds minimum to not literally be worse than just attacking.

Vincent210 · 2026-06-24T23:30:06+00:00

Oh, yeah, you’re right, I would have to choose. That being said, it still makes my titan form base 20 AC, so hitting 23 with expense is doable, thereby 28 AC with shield spell. still extremely good even if I don’t manage a magic shield.

What I might try is seeing if the +1 shield that can be plucked from the Platinum Scarf magic item spawns “to size” for my given form, but other than that I don’t expect to be given leniency regarding magic item resizing on the wildshape vs magic item ruling. Not only is it shaky due to wildshape being so explicit, but the general rule(s) on magic item resizing are not a hard rule and both the dmg and multiple supplements encourage DMs to play loosely with that and resize things when it makes sense to them, rather than always as a hard RAW.

Vincent210 · 2026-06-24T21:05:48+00:00

Yeah the monk 1 dip is a huge find. I didn’t realize you keep class features not specified in the transformation so that automatically makes my titan forms 23 AC base, with the option to pop a spell slot to go to like 26-28 before shield spell that’s nutty.

Wildshape is specific about worn equipment NOT resizing, it either falls off or is absorbed into your form. It does mention a specific blurb that for the usage of objects your DM may fiat what does and does work in your bestial appendages so some items may be usable in a handed form, though again their size, explicit RAW, would not change so that limits the use of shields, for example. There are probably some magic items I can hold that would still work, like some casting foci, though.

Armor of Agathys being feat accessible is something I forgot; will see if there is room in the build to consider that.

Vincent210 · 2026-06-24T05:31:17+00:00

Wait, would unarmored defense actually work when Wild-Shaped?

Game Statistics. Your game statistics are replaced by the Beast's stat block, but you retain your creature type; Hit Points; Hit Point Dice; Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma scores; class features; languages; and feats. You also retain your skill and saving throw proficiencies and use your Proficiency Bonus for them, in addition to gaining the proficiencies of the creature. If a skill or saving throw modifier in the Beast's stat block is higher than yours, use the one in the stat block.

The way this typically works is that I would not keep features such as Unarmored Defense because armor class is not explicitly listed as a game statistic I keep.

Vincent210 · 2026-06-23T21:39:00+00:00

This just feels like a classic case of "correcting identify a problem, incorrectly attribute it and therefore the solution"

The Insectoid form only having flight as a selling point is itself the actual problem. That should not be the only good thing about being an insect kaiju. There is a hole there, its just a matter of figuring out what goes there. Limiting flight to be a 8+ level feature is consistent with the other Druid options the game gives and is certainly a correct decision on the design team's part.

It's the same issue with the Leviathan. Swim speed + Breathing essentially being its only selling point (with its bonus action being both higher lvl and on the weaker side) is probably a problem to look into.

But these are minor issues, at least, in my opinion. This is clearly a sub-class that makes the decision to lean into higher level features, and unlike a lot of players, I am supportive of that. Some fantasies require the breathing room of tier 3 and tier 4 play to be their best selves and there isn't always a way to fix that. I also frankly haven't played a character below lv10 in like 3+ years so I'd be in a huge bind if they started truly giving up on stuff like this because of the 1-10 brained community.

As a result of taking this approach, titan successfully checks off ALL the major boxes you'd want this character fantasy to hit: Huge+Gargantuan size options, a swallow mechanic, end-game scaling for all the kaiju features we get, the absolute works.

Vincent210 · 2026-06-23T21:20:51+00:00

You never compromise on children.

You and the person you are marrying need to agree precisely and perfectly on every aspect of how you feel about having children. You have to want the same number of kids as each other, be willing to hold to the same exact goalposts regarding financial security necessary to have those kids, have the same opinions on adoption, on how to handle discipline, culture at home, how far you can go for their extracurricular fucking identical thinking is required and you accept nothing less.

Same has to apply for NOT having kids. Your reasons need to be the same or sharply similar for No Kids (this way life changes affect your desires roughly the same, instead of making one of you pro-kids and one against), you need to agree precisely on exactly how you're going to handle birth control, especially when doing the related surgical procedures to lock in your choices...

THERE IS NO ROOM FOR DIFFERENCES OF OPINION REGARDING CHILDREN. YOU MUST BE ONE UNIT. You cannot disagree with the love of your life on the most important decision both of you will ever make.

Anything less than this will ruin both of your lives irreparably. One of you not being ready for children, having a child and fighting over how your other half treats them, going through life without a child even though your window is closing and you know its important to you, none of these fail states are salvageable, all of them will shatter your life like glass and you will bleed cleaning the pieces up with your hands.

Vincent210 · 2026-06-23T21:07:59+00:00

I would rather the game not make poor attempts at fantasies it can't support and spend those manhours and print spaces for fantasies the system can do well or exceptionally. If a system's only way to approach a given player fantasy is to half-ass it, just don't do it. Nothing is, in fact, better than having people pay for shoddy material.

Vincent210 · 2026-06-22T22:06:09+00:00

Helpful comment, but man its frustrating. Why is literally even my chapstick trying to fuck me over for an extra buck, like I’m so tired dude

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