After i tried a 10 Life Cleric / 2 Spore Druid, i could never go back to any other Haste option. Haste for the whole party with no concentration issues, recovered via short rests. True that it´s only available in Act 3 but having just finished my honour run, i´d be lying if i said haste is a must have in a party with a swords mystic scoundrel bard, an EK thrower and an OH monk along with that cleric.

Tavern Brawler Monk

Swords Bard

You can solo the game with these two builds easily

TB Monk is stupid https://www.reddit.com/r/BG3Builds/s/5eRowNnm4G

Light cleric with radiant orb/reverb gear is great support. I personally like a 1 storm sorc/ 2 wiz (div or evo)/9 light cleric build

please remove this build from the game 🙏

It’s an Abjuration Ice Wizard with 2 in Warlock and 1 in Cleric. It is so busted because you cannot die, not even in honor mode. It’s fun to play with but also literally broken.

Agreed. I played all the above builds and found 10/1/1 bard was the most ridiculous.

Fire acuity/scorching ray is great if you LR after every fight, but if not you don't have the sorcery points to twin haste and quicken spell and extend command for more than 1 fight. Not to mention spell slots from scorching ray every round. I hate resting all the time so while this build was good for me, it wasn't great since without the quicken cast you can't build acuity and control in round 1.

10/1/1 will get off 4 sharpshooter bow shots, followed by irresistible control spell all in round 1. It relies much less on haste. And it can do this at least twice per SHORT rest, so 6x+ per long rest, or basically every fight.

Imo the truly broken ones are:

Any sorcerer, but particularly fire acuity sorcerer

TB OH Monk

Smiting Swords bard (10/2 bard palladin). 10/1/1 control swords bard is also top tier.

Full Light cleric w/radiating orbs+reverb build

TB Throw berserker

Ice abjuration wizard

These builds will absolutely yawn and walk their way through honor mode. Incredibly powerful build individually, and make a party out of any 4 of them and youre pretty much set.

Other excellent honor mode picks:

EK thrower

2/8/2 eldritch blaster sorlock

6/6 sorcadin

11/1 lore bard/wizard

8/4 tiger barb/BM fighter bleed/reverb controller

6/4/2 dual crossbows swords bard/rogue/fighter

5/4/3 ranger/rogue/fighter archer build

Full life cleric

Moon Druid control tank

6/6 pally/spore druid minion master tank

6/6 swords bard/BM fighter duelist

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/u/0/d/1HhiUZcQ1gXjvsaJSpvccG_0Jm0fn7lgYaOYdQxuWSQs/htmlview

This document covers some team compositions that are arguably too powerful for honor mode, since they are built to be used in a modded version of the game where late game enemies deal enormous damage, and have hundreds or thousands of health. If you want some more specific build guides, look through u/Prestigious_Juice341 's profile.

Champion fighter in my opinion gets an unnecessarily bad rep, and I actually kinda like it. But gloomstalker assassin with stealthy playstyles already has a 100% crit chance. So if only going 4 levels in fighter then Champion's increased crit chance does not really help you.

EK is cool if you maybe want the friends cantrip and the shield spell. But people interested in this playstyle are ambushing from stealth and not really relying on high AC. No other first level wizard spells are really worth this dip, so all you are getting are some cantrips for out of combat utility with EK on this archer build.

That leaves Battlemaster. What maneuver doesn't really matter. Just pick maneuvers that deal extra damage. Thanks to gloomstalker and assassin giving you 100% crit chance, the extra damage will get doubled. If you start initiative, have an ally in Bhaalist armor in Act 3 then sneak up next to your enemies but stay out of initiative, then they can give nearby enemies vulnerability to piercing damage. The Battlemaster maneuver damage uses the same type of damage as your weapon so this would get doubled again for an overall 4x bonus damage from your maneuvers.

The maneuver damage is just a very nice tassel. Most of your damage is coming from 3 attacks with your first action, 2 attacks from action surge, another attack (or 2 attacks on difficulties below honour) from haste or a potion of speed from an ally, another attack (or 2 attacks on difficulties below honour mode) from a bloodlust elixir if you so choose, for somewhere between 6 and 9 attacks in your opening round which all crit. There are other ways to increase this attack number too. Plus you'll probably go first on round 2 due to high Dex and both gloomstalker and assassin giving you initiative boosts for another 3 to 6 attacks which will not guaranteed crit.

Here ya go. See YouTube link at bottom for specifics.

Anything that decides it no longer needs to roll the dice, because everything it does is guaranteed to work.

• Tavern Brawler Monk 8 or 9/rest in Thief Rogue

• Some TB throw builds (usually Eldritch Knight fighter, or berserker barbarian/thief rogue, or a combination of these two ideas. People argue round and round about which is best. They all ignore dice rolls to hit so I don't really care)

• 10/1/1 swords bard. Ranged build that abused ranged slashing flourish and arcane acuity

• 11 fire draconic sorc/1 fiend warlock using hat of fire acuity, scorching ray, and quicken casting an upcasted version of command.

Search the sub for any of the above and you will find tons of discussion. Support to go with these builds include a life or light cleric using the whispering promise ring and Hellrider's Pride gloves. And an abjuration wizard.

Or you could do a gloomstalker 5/assassin 4/Battlemaster fighter 3 build that abuses the stealth system to solo the game

The Fire Acuity Sorlock build was so cracked I had to redo the Hag fight twice to avoid killing her and missing the chance to get the hair. Obviously not Honor Mode, but seriously busted

If you think sneak attack every round is the peak of what a min-maxer can come up with then you haven't seen the post about the people theorycrafting 7 fireballs in a single turn.

FYI, the way the darkness spell and devil’s sight invocation works in the most recent patch of Early Access, you only get advantage on attacks if both you AND your target are inside the area of darkness. Thus it really only supports melee sneak attack builds and dramatically limits the number of potential targets. We’ll see if this changes at launch…

Sure but it also fucks over your companions, and not really busted.

Half orc Devotion paladin 6/ lore bard 6 with polearm mastery

Devotion paladin to add your charisma to saves and attacks.

Polearm mastery for reaction and bonus action attacks for more smite opportunities.

Lore bard for more smite slots, expertise on face skills, jack of all trades for everything else, and additional magical secrets to pick up spirit guardians and counterspell.

Sure you only know up to level 3 spells but you can only smites only scale up to level 4 anyways. And with those bard levels you have a single level 5 spell slot (which should be saved for spirit guardians when you're outnumbered)

I cast magic missile at the darkness!

Nope. Has to be a target you can see.

Pure pact of tome archfey warlock with no supporting classes and all the greatest stats layout and gear you can find.

You'll make it through the game no problems, but you'll have one action per turn, comparitivly mediocre damage and only two spell slots to use per short rest.

Your team will carry the bulk of the effort but will still call you the "you are death itself" which is hilarious coming from a character that just annihilated most of the fights preceding the statement.

Warlock seems to have been designed as a mixer class.

I think arcane trickster is much maligned and probably among the weakest of pure classes.

But it can probably do ok as a skill monkey and using the various scrolls you find. So it can be forced to use whatever scrolls you happen to have on hand either for control or offense. It could actually be quite fun to force you to use different stuff than usual.

Still the fact you get expertise, skills, sneak attack, shield spell and a few decent ish spells can make it still work ok.

Ah, yes, you're right. 3 spell slots. Really powerful ones at that.

You can of course also pile on the scrolls which are free spell slots and you can use spell slot refund and clear abilities to get one or two more uses out of your slots, but I would argue those are better used by your cleric for heavy all day buffs and support minions.

But out of all the classes, warlock is the least amazing as pure high level class having most of the fun stuff granted early and never improved on.

You get 3 eldritch blasts too. I'm running one and with supporting gear and a hex does ok.

There is an archievement to win the game by going into every class once without respeccing. That one is easy if you support three meta builds with it but more challenging with weak builds. Its probably a good situating to try and pick that up.

Just play a fighter with all your stats at the same number. No elixirs allowed. Very barebones. Otherwise just play a non-itemised pure build, that’s functional without being overpowered from mechanics and items.

Monk’s up there. Stun punch, ki resonance, choice of necrotic/psychic/radiant damage, lots of good gear, flurry of blows…

I’m not going to be very original, but dual hand crossbow Gloomstalker/Assassin is some very powerful shit.

You can even add 2 lvls fighter for action surge

Okay, I know this is super late, but I wanted to bring up another alternative to this build.

Based on your play style, if you prefer, you can also use Phalar Aluve if you don't want to use the Corscuation Ring. The Boots of Stormy Clamour WILL proc on PA's Shriek. Pair this with the Ring of Spiteful Thunder and you get two immediate broken effects:

• Dazed, which makes enemy spellcasters have disadvantage on you (due to wisdom debuff) and enemy melee units lose their dex bonus to their AC.
• If an enemy is prone when you walk into them, it will RECAST Reverberation.

Also, I haven't confirmed this, but I believe if a Light Cleric casts Guardian of Faith, it will retain similar effects to your gear (so it should cast Radiant Orb within proximity to you).

To me its paladin 5 / warlock 5 / fighter 2. Oath of devotion. 2x CHA on attack with level 3 smites that reset on short rest and some very good 2 handed weapons in the game. 3 attacks per action, full buffed you can get 4 actions turn 1 for like 400ish avarage damage. While your hit rate is insane due to holy weapon.

It's the TB monk.

BUT Swords Bard 6/Thief 3 with hand xbows is 95% of the monk's DPS plus full spellcasting, expertise from two classes, high charisma, and it can play the lute.

Pact of the blade warlock lets you add CHA instead of STR on attack and damage. Sacred weapon from the oath of devotion paladin lets you add CHA on attack.

Gotta say though the build got HEAVILY nerfed as warlock and pala extra attacks dont stack anymore

Stolen from the BG3 Builds channel on the Discord server.

Edit: I did not make the list, get answers from the BG3Builds channel on the Discord. I posted the invite in one of the comments.

A brief explanation of the tier list, giving you some idea of what it does Abbreviations and extra notes can be found below this message. Yes, it is updated to match patch 8!

S+ tier

• Archery Fighters Bow fighter. 3 Attacks. Highest DPR (special arrow), weaponize bonus action with war magic (Eldritch Knight). Can be a hybrid controller with eldritch strike/ acuity + Mystic scoundrel ring and scroll.
• 11/1 Fire Sorlock Stacking acuity with quickened spell using BA, Making its control spell hard to resist. extend command spell from fiend warlock. Fire spell dmg boost.
• Swords bard archers Mystic Scroundel Ring+baseline control spell. Archers & full caster control at once. & magical secret
• Agathys Abjuration Wizard (don't, tedious) The "immortal wizard", Deals cold damage with Armor of Agathys while stays undamaged with the abjuration wizard's arcane ward

S tier

• Grit Gloom Thief Multis Dual Hand crossbow archer, Has 3 BA from rogue thief + helmet of grit, Weaponizing all that BA
• Draconic Sorcs Elemental damage boost, Built-in mage armor, & Fly at high level
• Hunter 11 multis AoE Ranger archer with Volley, area bow dmg
• Melee fighter 11 multis 3 atks melee. with 1 dip in vengdin, hexblade, or war clerics.
• Sorcadin Multis Allrounder melee, Have AoP. Along with sorcerer utilities (spell, metamagic, subclass feature). 7/5 aura of hate.
• Storm Sorcerers Lightning-oriented spellcasters, great AoE. have create water, high mobility
• Gloom Sin Archer Multis 'Sneaky archers'. High initiative, One free attack, And guarantee critical on surprise round
• SSB (Smite Swords Bard) Full caster martial, flourishes. AoE for multi-target smite, & Magical secret
• Smite Bladesinger Full casters martials & utilities
• OH Monk Thief Lots, lots of punch, extra dmg on unarmed atk
• Revorb Lore bard multis Versatile CHA Revorb debuffer
• 10 Giant/2 fighters thrower Elemental cleave thrower -- currently here cause DRS
• Throwzerker Multis Berserker and rogue thief thrower, BA throw
• EK TB Thrower 3 throw/ turn + war magic

A tier

• Revorb Tempest Cleric Revorb debuffer, also lightning casters
• Revorb Light Cleric Support & utilities, Revorb debuffer
• Draconic Sorlocks 2-10 sorc blaster with warlock invocation
• Pure Paladin (or with 1 hexblade dip) Melee paladin, Auras, IDS.
• GWM Hunter 12 Melee Melee AoE ranger
• Devo/Veng Loredin Melee paladin. having AoP and Magical secrets
• Starvocation DMG spellcaster, harmless evo spells, star druids BA & CON
• Bladelock 12 Melee, Lifedrinker & warlock Invocations, shadowblades

B tier

• Revorb Tiger Barb AoE melee revorb debuffer + maim
• Land Druid Blaster Spellcasting druid. stack multiple difficult terrains, Can have repelling blast with 2 lock
• Divwiz Multis Divination Wizard can reroll dice, used for CC.
• Beastmaster Ranger w/ useful summons. Can be either melee or ranged.
• Moon Druid (Casting+WS) Wildshape + spellcast (spike growth)
• GWM Blade Lockadin 7-5 Melee paladins, Pact of Blade
• Grit-fish Champion Melee Helmet of grit + gear that reduce critical threshold (?)

C tier

• GWM Shadow Monk 12
• Spore Druid
• Grit Melee Gloom 12
• Wolf+Ancients GWM
• Grit+TWF BarbThief Multis
• Moon Druid (WS Only)
• Ranged Lockadin Support Multis
• RHands+Clamor Life Clerics

D tier

• Wild Magic Barb
• Berserker Barb

E tier

• Eagle Stallion Barbarian 12
• TB W4E/ Drunkenmaster Monk Thief

F tier

• Bear Barbarian 12
• Glamour Bard
• Pure Rogues

W (Wild)

• Wild Magic Sorcerer

There's message limit, so i can just do it till B.

The only reason a team would be lacking anything with a moon Druid on the team is literally because there is a moon Druid on the team. Drop the Druid for a bard or cleric and you now automatically have a more well rounded party comp. I love the flavor of druids, and back in EA they were arguably my favorite class, but they fall way short of other support classes now, especially after patch 8. You literally have to do twice the work with a Druid to get half the combat or support efficiency of a cleric or bard, and the biggest culprits are way too many concentration spells, a mediocre spell list, no form of extra attack, and being locked out of casting while you are wild shaped.

11/1 sorlock is still broken.

12ek is my personal favourite though. Don’t have to constantly long rest to get spell slots back like Sorlock and does insane DPR while having just as much control capability as sword bard or Sorlock.

Plus I just enjoy Titanstring bow. Get it at the start of Act 1 and just started killing everything

For one, gloomstalker assassin relies on surprise rounds. It cant hold up as well in forced fights or against alert enemies. Pure fighter is one of the most sustainable classes in the game. Three attacks, every round, the entire fight, every fight, all day. Furthermore, eldritch knights get a fun little ability called eldritch strike, which is applied on every successful weapon hit and means any spell save that fighter forces on the affected enemies is at disadvantage.

This lets you do two main things.

First, it builds any effect that procs on applying statuses, and is guaranteed as long as you hit, meaning easy procs for those items.

Second, it works with the arrow many targets, as its a weapon attack. Fling three of those suckers and the entire horde is stricken with eldritch inertia and if youve got the helm, you have maxed acuity.

With max acuity and everyone getting disadvantage, you get to whip out stupid shit like a scroll of hypnotic pattern for example, immediately stunning the entire enemy lineup.

You also get to do funny single target stuff, like preventing orin from getting a single turn cus you bolted her down with inertia and a hold monster, and your acuity makes the save so high that with the inertia’s disadvantage, any boss that cant just, legendary resistance out of it, becomes a joke.

Plus you get shit like shield and if youre feeling particularly funny, thunderwave or gust of wind, and four whole feats

I think when it comes to the 3 big archery builds (swords bard, gloomstalker, & EK), it comes down to preference. All of three of them are over-powered and often use similar gear combos. Just depends on what playstyle you want to follow. All can crush honor mode pretty easily. It's like Fire Draconic Sorcerer vs Storm Sorcerer, both are really powerful and it just depends on what you want.

5/4/3 wants you to use Surprise so that you get 1st turn kills. Realistically, what this means is you have meta knowledge to know where each encounter is so you can just shoot and surprise the enemies- usually skipping dialogue.

What you typically want to team this with is more Dex-focused teammates so that the enemies basically never get to go. If you don't have teammates who mesh with this well, you don't really gain all the benefits of 5/4/3's initiation as much as you'd want to.

Not to say it isn't strong, it just has a specific niche, which is "Alpha Strike" as it's called.

But EK is just consistent. As you said, it has 3 attacks every turn instead of 5/4/3's first turn, so if you can't end the battle in one round your DPR doesn't just plummet. You have a slew of scrolls you can use to influence the battlefield outside of just raw damage.

IMO it's kinda like Skyrim. No one denies stealth archer's existence, it's just kinda one dimensional, even if it's strong. You're skipping the battle interactions to just blast through things as quickly as possible.

They’re both great builds. The gloomstalker multiclass has much less control and special arrow abuse than the Ek. I’d prefer the gloomstalker for a solo run though as the high stealth interaction with greater invis is busted. And it comes online much quicker

Arguably the biggest advantage. Everyone prone and debuffed. Then sword bard stacks acuity and controls. Gloomstalker puts extra damage on the heavy.

You also overlooked Eldritch Strike. By level 11 you'd be in Act 3 with multiple gears and items that fully utilize this debuff making EK a support class WITHOUT sacrificing damage.

fighters with 19 attacks,

not just because it's strong but because it's straight up silly, it's just pure fighter

Level 2 warlock for EB + AB. Level 2 fighter for action surge. Level 8 sorc for quickened spell. So you blast blast blast then you blast blast blast then you blast blast blast and if you hasted yourself you can also blast blast blast.

Give Astarion the cloak that releases a smoke bomb on disengage.

Walk up to somebody, switch to turn based, bonus action disengage, sneak attack.

Since you're both blind, the DC to remain hidden is usually only 2 or 3, so you don't even enter combat.

Kill anybody without them fighting back.

For melee clockwork soul Gish based on armor of agathys. For ranged eldritch knight archer with fey touched for hex spell. For spell caster a divining wizard. And twilight and peace clerics get most of the rest.

Totally depends on the level. You level 2? Straight up Moon Druid. Level 11+? Artificer 1 / Chronurgust 10+ is pretty busted.

Takes a while to really come online but paladin 2/ Swords bard X seems like a ton of fun. Heavy armor plus defensive flourish give you some pretty good AC, plus dual wielding and smites can get you some significant damage.

Sharp Shooter, Crossbow Expert Fighter Samurai with a Heavy Crossbow:

Bonus Action advantage on all attacks->Advantage offsets the -5 penalty for +10 damage on all hits you can win with Sharpshooter->Crossbow Expert lets you ignore the loading quality so you can attack with Heavy Crossbow in all your extra attacks->Action Surge for good measure= Medieval Minigun Build.

BTW i'm still new to DnD, first idea that came to me without multi-classing.

Moon Druid 10 bear totem barbarian 8 fighter 2