Ethical use of Warding Bond

[Atech]

So as many know Warding bond is stupidly overpowered and broken when it works from your camp that flows in real time to turn mode combat elsewhere. Not sure if it is even fixed for Honor Mode?

Currently I'm using it on party with Cleric casting it on the tank and it's still very strong if you couple it with any source of damage reduction since it double dips but I believe this still is ethical use even though being still very good.

[Brian_the_Brute]

Have your camp cleric cast hero's feast on the whole party too.

[[4BRS] OakNacht]

Oh yeah we love our ethical spell use. Time and a place for cheese but man, it's crazy what you can get away with. Kinda glad honor mode gets rid of a lot of it...just opens up room for people to figure more cheese out :^)

Dishonorable life hack: Drop multiple potions at your feet and cast magic missile on them. They'll pop one at a time and heal you. Took myself from 10 to 71 hp with one action with medium health potions.


Had a run with Karlach (Bear aspect barbarian) that would cast it on my Fighter origin. Both of us now have resistance to just about everything and the massive HP pool we shared meant neither of use could go down.

Couple that with a life cleric and a support warlock, we made a wall that couldn't be broken.

[Blackdragon]

Originally posted by Atech:

So as many know Warding bond is stupidly overpowered and broken when it works from your camp

It's not, and is working as intended. In fact, that is precisely the way it was used by characters within the game's universe. Also your use of the word "ethical" is ironic, since in the game's story this spell was used by a decidedly un-ethical Dark Justiciar on her husband so that he carries her wounds while she fights the Harpers:

https://bg3.wiki/wiki/True_Love%27s_Embrace

Casting it on another party member is a waste - you're just shuffling HP loss around the party that way. Now, using it on a specially bred for HP mercenary whom I then leave at camp to bear half of my injuries - that was actually a moment of "real free-form D&D role-play" one might normally only find in tabletop gaming.

[Atech]

Originally posted by Blackdragon:

Originally posted by Atech:

So as many know Warding bond is stupidly overpowered and broken when it works from your camp

It's not, and is working as intended. In fact, that is precisely the way it was used by characters within the game's universe. Also your use of the word "ethical" is ironic, since in the game's story this spell was used by a decidedly un-ethical Dark Justiciar on her husband so that he carries her wounds while she fights the Harpers:

?? It's still broken and overpowered

Just what are you smoking

[Mike Garrison]

Originally posted by Atech:

Originally posted by Blackdragon:

It's not, and is working as intended. In fact, that is precisely the way it was used by characters within the game's universe. Also your use of the word "ethical" is ironic, since in the game's story this spell was used by a decidedly un-ethical Dark Justiciar on her husband so that he carries her wounds while she fights the Harpers:

?? It's still broken and overpowered

Just what are you smoking

It's written out in the game that the two linked rings are *designed* to transfer damage from someone who is out fighting to someone who is not. You might think that is OP, and that's your right to your own opinion, but you don't have any right to tell other people they can't have a different opinion -- especially when the other opinion is literally the one that is canon in the game.

[Atech]

Originally posted by Mike Garrison:

Originally posted by Atech:

?? It's still broken and overpowered

Just what are you smoking

It's written out in the game that the two linked rings are *designed* to transfer damage from someone who is out fighting to someone who is not. You might think that is OP, and that's your right to your own opinion, but you don't have any right to tell other people they can't have a different opinion -- especially when the other opinion is literally the one that is canon in the game.

Don't be silly.

Look for youtube. You don't find single serious character building guide for strong characters that utilizes warding bond even though it's obviously insanely strong mechanic and does not cost you anything to use because everyone understands it's broken and overpowered.

I think those rings and "lore" is very poor justification that it's working intended as it's obviously very unbalanced.

[ULTRA]

Consider it a trade for the party being pointlessly locked to 4 characters, no grappling, "detecting presence," no climbing, no swimming, a level cap that's about 3-4 lower than it should be, not being able to send familiars through holes, no variant humans, not being able to talk while wild shaped, and not being able to interject in conversations using other nearby characters

edit: and enemies having infinite short rests

[zero]

im not sure what ethics come into play it.

are you exploiting a system? sure, so what, its a video game, do what you want.

and if you don't want to, just dont.

easy damage reduction is nice, but nothing beats raw power anyway.

[AokiYakumo]

Originally posted by Atech:

So as many know Warding bond is stupidly overpowered and broken when it works from your camp that flows in real time to turn mode combat elsewhere. Not sure if it is even fixed for Honor Mode?

Currently I'm using it on party with Cleric casting it on the tank and it's still very strong if you couple it with any source of damage reduction since it double dips but I believe this still is ethical use even though being still very good.

By itself, Warding Bond's actually mostly okay. I wouldn't necessarily call it broken in and of itself. It's resist all on one target with +1 AC and +1 saves while translating the incoming damage to the target towards the caster. Provided the caster is a support who hides in Sanctuary, what this effectively does is adds the support's HP to the target's HP with a fancy little protective screen. This could be between +20 to +140 depending upon level, CON, and whether or not Tough is on the warder. Pretty good all things considered, but certainly not "broken OP" by itself.

Where it gets STUPID is through multiclassing. A 3 level dip into War CLC on Gale who can be an Abjurer for the ward means he can hold up to 18 ward charges while holding Defender Flail, Absolute's Protector, and Armor of Persistence all with Heavy Armor Master, to get him upwards of DR 21 to DR 24 from an oncoming attack (18 from arcane ward, 1 from the flail & shield, 2 from Armor of Persistence), effectively making him able to soak up to 58 points of damage from an incoming attack while his warded partner can hold something like Helldusk to reduce the damage further by 3 to 6 (or 6 to 13 thanks to resist all).

Why Gale specifically? Well, if he's your Origin, he can get up to 3 extra 3rd level spell slots, and Glyph of Warding exists to help top up your ward charges. This on top of Spellcrux for another extra max level spell slot and Arcane Recovery for an extra 3rd level spell slot, plus access to Shield and Counterspell to help stack the ward even further, make him the best candidate for this build.

[Sonic Titan]

Originally posted by zero:

im not sure what ethics come into play it.

Can you cast it on Scratch or the Owl bear?

[AokiYakumo]

Originally posted by Sonic Titan:

Originally posted by zero:

im not sure what ethics come into play it.

Can you cast it on Scratch or the Owl bear?

Yes, but it loses value on the Owlbear cub because it can't be summoned until the final battle, and only for 1 combat at a time (it leaves after combat end and all buffs it had fall off as a result).

Scratch, however, can be made kinda chonky. That, plus Aid, plus Heroes' Feast, means he effectively has 88 Max HP. Throw a Shield of Thralls on and now he has 108 Max HP effectively.

[Sonic Titan]

Originally posted by AokiYakumo:

Originally posted by Sonic Titan:

Can you cast it on Scratch or the Owl bear?

Yes, but it loses value on the Owlbear cub because it can't be summoned until the final battle, and only for 1 combat at a time (it leaves after combat end and all buffs it had fall off as a result).

Scratch, however, can be made kinda chonky. That, plus Aid, plus Heroes' Feast, means he effectively has 88 Max HP. Throw a Shield of Thralls on and now he has 108 Max HP effectively.

This is obviously where ethics come into play.