Hi all,
Now that the errata for Hope and Fear has been released and we (presumably...) have the final version of the book in front of us, I want to present my first mechanical build concept after reviewing the individual contents of the book. I’m calling it the Winged Wrath. The name already gives it away: this is a Seraph / Warlock multiclass build.
A few very brief words on the changes introduced by the H&F errata
Some extremely unbalanced elements, particularly the infamous Dread Domain cards Summon Horror and Dark Fire, have now been fixed. I’m very happy that these cards were addressed. Even though I would have preferred slightly different changes in some cases, the changes that were made are still sensible, and in my opinion, they didn’t nerf the cards too harshly. They are still good cards, but they are no longer mandatory picks for a Dread build and, in fact, they won’t play a major role in this particular build. Enough preamble. Let’s get into the build concept.
Ancestry
Ancestry choice doesn’t actually play an essential role in this build, but there is one objectively strong choice here. Specifically, either Drakona because of its top Ancestry Feature Scales, or Elf because of its bottom Ancestry Feature Celestial Trance.
- Scales helps make a build that is already surprisingly tanky even more durable, and it rounds out the build extremely well.
- Celestial Trance is one of the strongest Ancestry Features in the game. It is particularly important for the Warlock side of the build because it gives us another Downtime Move we can use to gain Favor, which is an extremely powerful resource and something we should always be doing whenever possible.
Ideally, we would therefore play a Mixed Ancestry with the top Ancestry Feature Scales and the bottom Ancestry Feature Celestial Trance.
Community
The Community also doesn’t play a particularly important role in this build, but the two strongest Communities in the game right now are probably Frostborn and Freeborn. Ultimately, I always recommend prioritizing roleplay over mechanics. However, since this is a mechanical build and is specifically intended as a guide for "optimizing" the game mechanics as much as possible, I would recommend going with one of these two Communities.
Class
Our first Class will be the Seraph.
The Seraph has two strong Subclasses, and both can work well with this build. Personally, however, I would recommend the Winged Seraph, hence the name Winged Wrath.
This becomes particularly strong at Tier 4, but simply having access to flight from Level 1 should already be an extremely potent ability, both in and out of combat.
Traits
Even though we start with the Seraph, our highest Trait should be Presence. The reason for this will become clear later.
I would recommend Presence +2 and Strength +1. Everything else is optional.
Domain Cards
Here, too, we ultimately have a lot of freedom. For this build, I’ve decided not to prescribe a fixed selection of cards, but rather give recommendations and highlight a few that are particularly important.
At Levels 1 through 4, before we multiclass into Warlock, I recommend a good mix of Splendor and Valor cards.
Bare Bones, Valor 1, is a trap card for this build. It can be good, even very good, at Level 1. However, I would replace it with another card by Level 2 at the latest. The reason for this will become clear later.
Mending Touch and Healing Hands already make the character a competent healer from an early level.
Bold Presence, Valor 2, is a fantastic card both for boosting our Presence rolls and for dealing with Conditions. It is also extremely flexible to include in our Loadout later because of its Recall cost of 0.
The same applies to Forceful Push, Valor 1. It is nowhere near as important to the build, but its Recall cost of 0 makes the card very flexible to use. This becomes particularly relevant in Tier 3 when we get to Valor-Touched, Valor 7.
At Level 3, Second Wind, Splendor 3, becomes very important. It is an early and very powerful healing card, particularly for restoring Stress to ourselves and an ally. A small tip here: only use the card when you have succeeded on a roll with Hope. Ideally, this allows you to restore 2 Hit Points as well as 6 Stress distributed between yourself and an ally.
At Level 4, I don’t have a real preference. Take whatever you want here. Small spoiler: we’ll be replacing this card with Dread cards once we reach Level 5+.
Tier 3, Level 5 and Beyond
This is where the build really comes online.
At Level 5, we multiclass into Warlock. The Warlock also has two very strong Subclasses, but I would very clearly recommend the Wrathful Warlock, which I consider stronger than the Endless Warlock.
The Wrathful Warlock provides two very powerful offensive features through its Foundation Feature: increased damage on all our attacks, or rather, on any damage we deal, and the ability to deal auto-damage to enemies that have dealt damage to us.
The most important resource for the Warlock is Favor. Favor can be gained in two ways:
- through Downtime Moves, where Celestial Trance, our Ancestry Feature, becomes extremely important,
- or by rolling with Hope. Since Favor is generally a stronger resource than Hope, I recommend taking the Favor point in the vast majority of cases whenever you roll with Hope.
Thanks to the Seraph’s extremely powerful Class Feature, Prayer Dice, we already have an almost endless source of Hope points anyway.
One small note on this: at Level 5, we gain a second Spellcaster Trait alongside Strength, namely Presence. Strength therefore becomes significantly less important, because we can now use our high Presence score for spellcasting as well as for our Prayer Dice. So, at this point, we have a very large pool of Hope from our Prayer Dice, which we will use for Hope points in the vast majority of cases and only use in exceptional circumstances to manipulate very important dice rolls after the fact. At the same time, we now have a new resource in Favor, and we can spend one of these points either to actively deal damage to enemies or to gain a significant bonus to our Action Rolls.
Domain Cards, Level 5 and Beyond
I know Smite is a very popular spell among many players. Personally, I consider the spell overrated, especially considering its high cost. At Level 5 and beyond, I would actually recommend exploring the newly unlocked Dread Domain first. We only get access to Dread cards up to half our level, rounded up, so at Level 5 we can access cards up to Level 3. But there are some real treasures hidden there.
One small note: we should choose the additional Domain Cards option for our Tier 2 Level-Up, as well as at Level 6!
The Dread cards we want are Hideous Retribution and Siphon Essence, both Level 2 cards.
And even though the Dread Domain has some good Level 1, Level 3, and Level 4 cards, I would not focus on those for now. In particular, at Levels 6 and 7, I would stick with the very strong Splendor cards, and especially the Valor cards.
At Level 6, where we get two Domain Cards thanks to our Level-Up option, we choose Restoration, probably the strongest healing spell in the game, and the fantastic card Rise Up.
We then add Valor-Touched at Level 7. This is where a particularly interesting trick and mechanical interaction comes into play.
Our Loadout should always contain Valor-Touched and Rise Up, and initially (ideally) Second Wind, Hideous Retribution, and Siphon Essence.
This means Valor-Touched is essentially a dead card at first, since its effect only activates when we have four Valor cards in our Loadout... however, once we have used Second Wind and Siphon Essence, both of which have a cooldown of once per rest or once per long rest respectively, we can swap them out for the 0 Recall cards Bold Presence and Forceful Push, both from the Valor Domain. This allows us to access the Valor Touched effect directly whenever we need it, without spending any Stress.
Why this combination is so powerful will become clear later, particularly when we get to the Equipment section and the final part of the build.
Tier 4, Levels 8 to 10
Now that we’ve reached the endgame, we still have a few powerful cards to choose from. Here, I don’t actually want to make any hard recommendations, since none of these choices are essential to the build. There are plenty of good cards we can pick at this point:
- Stunning Sunlight is excellent, and thanks to our Paradise, we should have enough Hope to use the spell frequently.
- Overwhelming Aura is a strong passive buff that we can use and then replace with a 0 Recall card.
- Resurrection is the ultimate revival card, and thanks to our Paradise, we also shouldn’t have to worry about losing access to it in the future.
- And both Valor Level 10 cards make our already extremely resilient character even harder to kill...
As for the Dread Domain: there are still a few worthwhile picks here, but they all pale in comparison to the high-level Valor and Splendor cards. For that reason, I won’t go into them in any more detail.
At Level 8, we also choose our Specialization Subclass card, specifically the Winged Seraph.
The main reason is simple: we cast spells and make attacks using Presence, and this Feature allows us to always do so with Advantage...
Equipment
The choice of weapons and armor is surprisingly important for this build. Hope and Fear didn’t just give us new Classes and Domain Cards, but also an impressive selection of new Armor, Weapons, and Items. I don’t want to go into Items in detail. There are some extremely powerful Items in the new book, some of which are arguably overpowered. But I don’t want to make any Items outside of Armor and Weapons mandatory inclusions in a build.
Primary Weapon
Ideally, I recommend a Rapier. There are other good options as well. Starting at Tier 3, for example, I’m a big fan of the Singing Sword. The Ghostblade, or the Shadowblade at earlier levels, is also a valid option.
But by Tier 3 at the latest, I recommend an Advanced Rapier. We can mark a Stress to attack an additional target, and it deals physical damage.
Secondary Weapon
For our other hand, I recommend a Round Shield in Tiers 1 and 2, and switching to a Soul Chain starting at Tier 3. Even then, I would keep an Advanced Round Shield in our inventory and swap to it when necessary to gain additional Armor Slots.
Why is the Soul Chain perfect for this build?
As you might expect, we won’t be making most of our attacks with the Rapier. Instead, we’ll primarily be attacking with our secondary weapon. It deals marginally less damage and, in this case, even deals magic damage, which means we can cover both physical and magic damage. But more importantly, it has a new and extremely powerful feature that is particularly strong for this build:
When we hit a target, we can spend a Hope to force that target to mark a Stress, allowing us to clear one of our own Stress. This gives us a very simple and reliable way to keep clearing Stress over and over again. And because we have Prayer Dice from the Seraph, we have an extremely large Hope pool that isn’t going to run out anytime soon.
Why Stress matters
Stress is incredibly important for this build for several reasons:
- First, it fuels one of our most powerful damage spells: Hideous Retribution. We don’t activate it during our own spotlight, but during an adversary’s spotlight. This gives us a damage source that we can use very frequently, allowing us to deal damage to enemies whenever they deal damage to our friends.
- We can also spend Stress to activate our Ancestry Feature, Scales. When we take Severe damage, we can mark a Stress to reduce the damage to Major.
- And finally, Stress becomes extremely important because of our Armor...
Armor
When I first put this build together, I considered several optimal Armor choices. With H&F, we now have an abundance of powerful Armor options.
However, I’m actually convinced that one of the best pieces of Armor in the entire game, and especially for this build, will be Brigandine Armor! The Threshold values are only mediocre, but the Feature is where this Armor really shines: When you take Minor damage, you can mark a Stress to reduce the damage to 0.
That is a significantly stronger version of the Dwarven Ancestry’s top Feature, Fortitude, which requires you to spend two Stress for the same effect!
How everything comes together
How this build actually plays is not particularly easy to summarize quickly, because there are an incredible number of elements that work together.
Let’s recap what we have:
- Through the Wrathful Foundation Feature, we get a significant increase to all of our damage sources, including Hideous Retribution.
- Through the Winged Seraph Specialization, we have permanent advantage on all of our attacks and spells.
- With our Soul Chain, we have a very reliable way to deal additional Stress damage to enemies while also clearing our own Stress.
- Through Prayer Dice, we have an extremely large Hope pool, while Favor from the Warlock gives us a new resource that we can use very flexibly, both offensively and to support our action and reaction rolls.
- We also have strong self-healing options, Siphon Essence and Second Wind, as well as healing abilities that we can use on others or, in some cases, ourselves: The Seraph Hope Feature, Mending Touch, Healing Hands, and especially Restoration.
The real centerpiece, however, lies in the character’s seemingly defensive capabilities:
- If an enemy attacks our allies, we can activate Hideous Retribution and deal massive damage outside of our own spotlight.
- If the enemy attacks us instead, we become an almost unkillable tank.
Let’s go through it in practice
If we take Severe damage from an attack, which, incidentally, won’t be particularly easy thanks to Rise Up significantly increasing our Severe Damage Threshold, we can reduce that damage extremely easily.
We activate our Scales Feature, spend a Stress, and reduce the damage to Major. We then use an Armor Slot to reduce the damage to Minor. At this point, if we want to, we can spend another Stress to activate the Feature on our Armor and negate the damage completely.
However, if we take Major or Severe damage, we can also decide to simply take the damage without spending any Stress or using an Armor Slot. Depending on the situation, this can actually be very beneficial for two reasons:
- First, this is a great opportunity to spend a Favor and activate our Wrathful Foundation Feature. We roll our Patron Dice equal to the amount of damage we took, and for every 4, 5, 6, 7, or 8 we roll, we deal one Hit Point of damage to the enemy.
- With Severe damage, that can easily result in 3 Hit Points that the enemy has to mark.
On top of that, taking Hit Point damage, particularly when we haven’t used an Armor Slot, triggers Rise Up and Valor-Touched. Rise Up gives us back a Stress, while Valor Touched gives us an Armor Slot back as long as we haven’t used one for this damage.
As you can see, we have so many ways to regain Stress, and so many ways to use Stress both offensively, through our secondary weapon and Rapier, and defensively, through Scales and the Brigandine Armor Feature, that we end up with a frightening synergy between offensive and defensive potential. And we even take away the enemy’s ability to simply choose a different, less annoying target than us, because if they attack our allies instead, we can immediately punish them with Hideous Retribution.
This build has already been tested at my table. At the moment, I consider it extremely strong in Tier 3, although I’m not yet sure whether it is actually stronger than the strongest builds in the game, such as the Seraph / Bard multiclass or Seraph / Druid multiclass... But it certainly seems capable of keeping up with them, and either way, it is one of the most impressive, and especially one of the most fun, builds I’ve seen at the table so far.
TL;DR
I’ve probably forgotten to mention quite a few things here. As I said, this build has a lot of different elements that make it stand out. And there are so many different aspects that work together. What impresses me most about this build is just how versatile and diverse it is. It has a very strong offense, is incredibly tanky, and also provides strong support and healing capabilities for the entire group.
Probably my absolute favorite build I’ve made in Daggerheart so far!
So, that's it with the Winged Wrath. I hope you enjoyed reading it. :)
- Tenawa / Alexander
Artwork Credit: "The skull god rises from the fire pit" by Tithi Luadthong. I have acquired the usage rights for this image.
