4x Polearm Masters Is Really Powerful

[Pan Darius Cassandra]

Like...really powerful.

You are almost guaranteed to get bonus action strikes on top of reaction strikes as well every round.

I'm playing an Eldritch Knight, Barbarian, War Cleric and Bladelock, all Polearm Masters, and ahmahgawd does it slap. Mix in a little knockback so after you hit them with Sentinel you can knock them away and do it over and over.

[GloriousZote]

Eldritch Knight is terrible tho, switch it out for one of the other fighter subclasses, there's enough scrolls to not need inherent weak spells.

[Reflex18]

How did you setup your bladelock?

[Lil Grandpa]

Polearm master actually works now?

[Pan Darius Cassandra]

Originally posted by (Poot) Lil Grandpa:

Polearm master actually works now?

It works for me, but it's kinda wonky when something leap attacks you because you'll get a prompt before the creature even reached you. Once I got the prompt from Dror Ragzlin who was nowhere near my character.

[Pan Darius Cassandra]

Originally posted by GloriousZote:

Eldritch Knight is terrible tho, switch it out for one of the other fighter subclasses, there's enough scrolls to not need inherent weak spells.

I wanted to test out a variety of martial classes to see which one was the best Polearm Master and I made my 1/2-orc hireling into the EK (Shadowheart is War Cleric, Karlach Berserker, and MC Bladelock) for Thunderwave because I want to test out PAM/Sentinel with lots of knockback.

Originally posted by Reflex18:

How did you setup your bladelock?

I mean, they're only lvl 4 so far, so I've only taken Pact of the Blade and Polearm Master so far. Didn't take EB, but grabbed Thinderwave and Agathys. Was thinking about Hunger of Hadar for my concentration and because knockback synergizes well.

[WeenerTuck813]

I know it’s not bg3,
But I watched a video of someone who did a Hexblade warlock and took repelling blast, Sentinel, and Warcaster and they took a Polearm.

So when someone entered their extended reach they got a reaction attack, and Warcaster let them Eldritch Blast. Then repelling blast knocks the target back. Then Sentinel immobilizes them…so like 1v1 literally your opponent can’t get to you like ever

[FunkyMonkey]

Originally posted by WeenerTuck813:

I know it’s not bg3,
But I watched a video of someone who did a Hexblade warlock and took repelling blast, Sentinel, and Warcaster and they took a Polearm.

So when someone entered their extended reach they got a reaction attack, and Warcaster let them Eldritch Blast. Then repelling blast knocks the target back. Then Sentinel immobilizes them…so like 1v1 literally your opponent can’t get to you like ever

I'm surprised you can use Eldritch blast with War caster. I thought you can't use multi-target spells with War caster and Eldritch blast can target multiple targets, at least at higher levels.

[Pan Darius Cassandra]

Originally posted by FunkyMonkey:

Originally posted by WeenerTuck813:

I know it’s not bg3,
But I watched a video of someone who did a Hexblade warlock and took repelling blast, Sentinel, and Warcaster and they took a Polearm.

So when someone entered their extended reach they got a reaction attack, and Warcaster let them Eldritch Blast. Then repelling blast knocks the target back. Then Sentinel immobilizes them…so like 1v1 literally your opponent can’t get to you like ever

I'm surprised you can use Eldritch blast with War caster. I thought you can't use multi-target spells with War caster and Eldritch blast can target multiple targets, at least at higher levels.

Eldritch Blast allows you to target one creature with all of it's beams if you choose.

War Caster simply states that the cantrip must only target that creature, not that it couldn't target other creatures in theory.

So as long as all of your beams target the one creature, it's legit.

[FunkyMonkey]

Originally posted by Pan Darius Loveless:

Originally posted by FunkyMonkey:

I'm surprised you can use Eldritch blast with War caster. I thought you can't use multi-target spells with War caster and Eldritch blast can target multiple targets, at least at higher levels.

Eldritch Blast allows you to target one creature with all of it's beams if you choose.

War Caster simply states that the cantrip must only target that creature, not that it couldn't target other creatures in theory.

So as long as all of your beams target the one creature, it's legit.

I had assumed that it would exclude any spells that target multiple enemies, even if you could only target one.

[WeenerTuck813]

Source: Player's Handbook

Prerequisite: The ability to cast at least one spell

You have practiced casting spells in the midst of combat, learning techniques that grant you the following benefits:

You have advantage on Constitution saving throws that you make to maintain your concentration on a spell when you take damage.
You can perform the somatic components of spells even when you have weapons or a shield in one or both hands.
When a hostile creature's movement provokes an opportunity attack from you,

***you can use your reaction to cast a spell at the creature, rather than making an opportunity attack. The spell must have a casting time of 1 action and must target only that creature.***

Verbiage works for that build in theory - I was curious so I checked just now

[Pan Darius Cassandra]

Originally posted by FunkyMonkey:

Originally posted by Pan Darius Loveless:

Eldritch Blast allows you to target one creature with all of it's beams if you choose.

War Caster simply states that the cantrip must only target that creature, not that it couldn't target other creatures in theory.

So as long as all of your beams target the one creature, it's legit.

I had assumed that it would exclude any spells that target multiple enemies, even if you could only target one.

I know, but what did I just explain?

Just read the spell description for EB and the entry for the War Caster feat.

It's a technical loophole and some DM's wouldn't allow it based on the fact that you are merely metagaming RAW based on hyperliteral intepretations, while others allow it because they are hyperliteral interpretationists.

What's even weirder than that is the AOO provoked by PAM doesn't explicitly state that you have to attack with the weapon you're wielding (just that you have to be wielding a polearm to provoke an AOO in the first place).

Under normal conditions, the game presumes that your weapon is the only thing you could attack with, but then War Caster lets you cast a cantrip as an AOO whenever one is provoked.

So you get an AOO just because you are holding a polearm, doing nothing with it, and then cast a spell, but somehow this is due to the fact you are holding tbe polearm?

That's the strangest part of tbe combo to me, but it's RAW...

[jonnin]

How are you getting much out of PAM, its like 1d4 for the 'offhand'. Compare to a monk dip who gets 2x hits on offhands that add 10+ str bonus and 10+ to hit?

[stun]

Originally posted by GloriousZote:

Eldritch Knight is terrible tho

Eldritch knight is the best class in the game if you don't have a returning weapon

[Cthulhu]

everytime you say you are having fun whit some build/strategy/setup there are 100 that come to say they can build something stronger only to let other know they are better than you (in their minds), those are the same who complain when a fix, a rebalance or a particular implementation will destroy their stupid op strategies :)

[pascal.difolco]

Pffr, 4x naked monks just roll over the game