Paladin Build: Undead Warlord

A true battlefield commander, an ace in support and a potent spellcaster; this is our best attempt at building a Paladin!

A rundown on the flaws of the Paladin class in 5e:

• they’re probably the worst halfcaster in terms of spell list, but probably also the most unique
• they don’t really have any predisposition to deal good damage
• they need strength to multiclass
• their good and interesting features are far and few in between.

A rundown on the perks of Paladin:

• they’re halfcasters with unique spells
• they get access to some of the best no-cost actions through multiclassing
• they get proficiency in heavy armor if you take Paladin from the start
• they’ve got some of the juiciest features in the game.

What we believe our build achieves:

• it leverages Paladin’s spellcasting to the greatest reasonable degree
• it deals anywhere from decent to excellent damage whilst also controlling the battlefield
• it multiclasses with a stat spread which has become the usual for high-op builds
• it squeezes out the most out of the extremely powerful Paladin features.

Character Creation

Race: Earth genasi (Mordenkainen Presents: Monsters of the Multiverse). Monsters of the Multiverse is a very controversial source book, but a couple of its revised races are completely game-changing. The one we will be using for our build is the new earth genasi. It has a few features that synergize very well with Paladin and fill in some of the class’ gaps. Let’s go over the race’s features.

• Darkvision. Not needing lamps is cool.
• Earth Walk. Ignoring difficult terrain really nice, kind of irrelevant once you get a horse though.
• Merge with Stone. Blade ward is only good as a bonus action, which is what you get proficiency bonus/long rest. Pass without trace is an absolutely unhinged spell, it’s the main reason for picking this race. +10 Stealth makes it so your whole party has a very high chance to surprise any enemy in your way.
• Size: Small. Since we are not using any weapons, the disadvantage with heavy weapons is irrelevant for us. Additionally, the size restriction on dimension door is of little concern – since most races now can be small, there’s very few reasons for an optimised character to be Medium.
  • Small size has two main mechanical benefits that we can take advantage of early on.  The first is the ability to use Medium-sized mounts such as the highly affordable mule. This is especially useful for quick movement in confined spaces, and before we get find steed.  The second advantage involves the ability to squeeze into Tiny spaces, beyond the reach of Medium creatures – which we can definitely use to our advantage later.  Some minor other benefits of our smaller size will be mentioned throughout the article where applicable.

Ability Scores: We will be using 27 point buy as usual.

• Strength: 13. We won’t be using strength for anything, but this is unfortunately a multiclassing requirement. Sad.
• Dexterity: 13+1.  This will get us the maximum possible AC benefit from medium armor.
• Constitution: 14. The usual. Decent hp, decent con save. Not anything outstanding.
• Intelligence: 8. Not needed.
• Wisdom: 9. We’ll need this for the resilient (Wisdom) feat down the line.
• Charisma: 15+2. Our casting stat.  This also fuels our Aura of Protection and Channel Divinity features. This is by far our most important stat.

Background: Noble (customised).  The PHB allows us to make custom backgrounds (page 125, not a variant rule) by matching any background feature with two skill proficiencies and two languages or tool proficiencies.

We will be using a customised Noble background with the Retainers variant feature. Three commoners who will serve us have their uses, even though they can’t help in combat. After all, if they do mundane tasks, you don’t have to. If you’ve got access to MTG backgrounds, take Quandrix Student. Otherwise, Noble is technically your best bet, but pick whatever. 

An additional but exceptionally cruel use for the commoners will be mentioned later. For your proficiencies, take Perception and Stealth.  Stealth enables you to surprise enemies more reliably (especially useful with Pass Without Trace), and Perception protects you from getting surprised. Our wisdom is low, so we are still very vulnerable to ambushes.

For our tool proficiencies/languages, we recommend picking Smith’s Tools. This proficiency will allow us to repair metal objects if we have a nice, hot flame. It’s a good way to make a quick buck.  For your second option, you can either choose to take Tinker’s Tools proficiency, or learn a language that you think might come up in your campaign. Tinker’s Tools will allow you to repair any object as long as you have raw material, a very versatile money maker. Alternatively, learning a language that may be important in the campaign can increase the amount of creatures you can affect with Command, on top of whatever narrative benefits knowing the language might give. Our friends at at Tabletop Builds have a great article about tool proficiencies if you would like to learn more.

Level 1 (Clockwork soul sorcerer)

After a careful consideration of all the options, we believe that starting with a level of Sorcerer is the most beneficial. It gives us access to some powerful cantrips and spells that will keep us alive through the lower levels. It also gives us Constitution save proficiency and significantly more useful skill proficiencies.

Like with every decision in a Paladin build, this comes with some significant drawbacks. First, we lose out on ever getting heavy armor proficiency. This does not matter though, as we will be using medium armor as we have enough Dexterity to make it efficient. Second, our Wisdom saves are doomed to be weak for most of the game. There are ways to partially mitigate this though, which we will go over when relevant. Third, we don’t get to start with any armor – unless of course you use starting wealth (you probably should). Luckily, with the tool proficiencies we recommend, this shouldn’t be too much of the problem.

Proficiencies: Arcana, Persuasion. Arcana is one of the most important proficiencies in the game, since it allows us to scribe Spell Scrolls during downtime.  Once again, Tabletop Builds has an article on scribing scrolls. Persuasion is just a generally applicable Charisma-based skill that you can use for whatever you want.

Clockwork Magic. Sorcerer subclass spells that can be switched out to transmutation or abjuration spells on the wizard, sorcerer or warlock spell list on gaining a level. We do not consider level 1 to be gaining a level, thus we will stay for now with the default spells. This feature is not yet useful for us, but once we start gaining more Sorcerer levels it will greatly improve our spellcasting versatility.

Restore Balance. As a reaction, we can cancel advantage or disadvantage on rolls an amount of times per long rest equal to our Charisma modifier. We will be using this quite a bit to get rid of enemy magic resistance – especially against our Channel Divinity.

Spells

A spell’s name written in bold indicates that it is added to a spell list at this level. A spell’s name crossed out means it is removed from a spell list. A spell’s name in brackets means that it is a subclass spell that is automatically prepared or learned for free.

Spell Slots

• Level 1: 2 slots

Sorcerer Spells

• Cantrips: Ray of frost, mind sliver, prestidigitation, mold earth
• Level 1: [Protection from evil and good, alarm] shield, sleep

Other Spells

• Cantrips: Blade ward

Spell Descriptions

• Blade Ward. We get this spell from our race.  There’s no use to cast this as an action, but we can cast it as a bonus action a number of times per long rest equal to our proficiency bonus.  This can be a good defensive option in a pinch.
• Ray of Frost. This underappreciated cantrip does underwhelming damage, but slowing enemies by 10 feet makes it worth it.  We can use this to stay safely out of range of the low-level goons we are fighting for the first few levels.
• Mind Sliver. Its low damage is offset by its utility.  Reducing the saving throws of enemies is quite useful for making our allies’ spells land more reliably.  The save reduction is also super important to improve the odds of Control Undead succeeding.  It’s also a good backup cantrip if Ray of Frost won’t do the job.
• Prestidigitation. A miscellaneous cantrip that can do a bit of everything.  Take whatever you want, it’s not too important.
• Mold Earth. This minor terraforming cantrip is best known for making cover on-demand in combat.  It’s always good for at least one person to have this.
• Protection from Evil and Good. This spell is somewhat situational, but is definitely nice to have while handling undead (among other things).
• Alarm. Without Ritual Casting, this spell is completely useless for us.
• Sleep. Although this spell scales poorly past around level 3, it will allow us to remove significant amounts of enemy actions from encounters.  If you are starting at, say, level 3, take Silvery Barbs instead.

Strategy

As a rather basic first-level sorcerer, you are relatively fragile, with only 12 AC (17 with shield) and very low HP. However, you have access to one of the best encounter-ending spells of the level. Use sleep to take the most threatening enemies out of encounters, and use ray of frost to hose down or kite survivors. Remember to use cover if you can to avoid taking damage.

Level 2 (Clockwork soul sorcerer 1, paladin 1)

Proficiencies: Light and Medium armor, Shields, Simple and Martial Weapons.  Unfortunately, this level is really slow, only really getting us armor proficiency.  We should get medium armor and a shield as soon as possible.

Divine Sense. This ability might let you know if any interesting undead or fiends are up ahead, so it’s a decent if situational scouting ability.  It might help you find some of the undead we recommend you use Control Undead on.

Lay on Hands. A small pool of healing.  You can use it as a burst of combat healing if desperate, but you can also use it to top people up out of combat.

Strategy

You are now just an armored version of what you were last level, with no increase in offensive power whatsoever.  You can afford to take more risks now but other than that there’s nothing much to say.

Level 3 (Clockwork soul sorcerer 1, paladin 2)

At this level, we finally gain access to paladin spells.

Divine Smite. The problems with this ability are discussed in-depth in our article about the issues with the paladin class. However, it is worth carrying a rapier to smite with if you absolutely need to deal a “large” amount of damage to a single target and have no other options. Better to have it and not need it than need it and not have it.

Fighting Style: Defense. +1 AC is always welcome, and we can’t effectively use any other fighting style.

Spells

Spell Slots

• Level 1: 3 slots

Paladin Spells

• Level 1: Bless, command, shield of faith, wrathful smite

Sorcerer Spells

• Cantrips: Ray of frost, mind sliver, prestidigitation, mold earth
• Level 1: [Protection from evil and good, alarm] shield, sleep

Other Spells

• Cantrips: Blade ward

Spell Descriptions

• Bless. A general buff spell that boosts the attack rolls and saving throws of our party.  Very nice, especially if party members have Great Weapon Master or Sharpshooter.  This spell is going to be our main cast for the next two levels.
• Command. A great action-denial spell.  Forcing enemies to dash away from you (and your friends not only wastes two of their actions, but it can also trigger opportunity attacks.  This is best when paired with a source of many opportunity attacks, such as another party member’s Conjure Animals.
• Shield of Faith. A situational defensive buff, this spell can help out a party member holding a choke point, such as a doorway.
• Wrathful Smite. If needed, we can stab an enemy with our rapier and give them the Frightened condition, giving them disadvantage on attacks and making them unable to approach us.  This spell does not offer repeat saves.  Instead, enemies who wish to break free must spend their action to make a wisdom check (at disadvantage due to frightening) against our spell save DC.  This is a pretty good single target shutdown spite, despite the uncomfortably close range.

Now, let’s go over a situational preparation you might want to take on days where you don’t expect to need all your main spells:

Ceremony. This spell doesn’t need to be prepared every day, but due to our overabundance of paladin preparations, we can afford to prepare it if we need it. The most important use for this spell is Wedding.  You can use this to marry adult humanoids to each other (note that polygamous marriages including any gender are allowed) granting all involved people a +2 bonus to AC when within 30 feet of each other for a week. This synergizes incredibly well with your Aura of Protection.

Unfortunately, after the week is over, the targets cannot gain this benefit again unless widowed. This can be bypassed by killing one member of the marriage and then having someone cast Revivify on them. Thus, everyone is widowed, and you can remarry them for another week of +2 AC.

The other uses for this spell are far too situational to warrant preparing it. Holy water isn’t needed for too much, and the other bonuses can only be used once per person.

Strategy

By now, sleep should start to be phased out – though you can definitely still use it to take out sizable portions of encounters for a bit longer. Bless is the main spell you want active in combat, prioritizing heavy hitting damage dealers and casters with important concentration spells. Other spells may have uses that come up from time to time too, of course. Keep using ray of frost as a debuffing cantrip to slow down enemies.

Level 4 (Clockwork soul sorcerer 1, oathbreaker paladin 3)

Divine Health. 5e doesn’t have too many diseases, but immunity to them is a free bonus.

Channel Divinity: Control Undead. This is the feature that carries the entire subclass. If an undead with a challenge rating lower than our paladin level fails a Wisdom save, we get to control it for a day (or until we decide to use this Channel Divinity on someone else).

If we really like the undead creature we have gotten from this feature, we can of course force it to make another Wisdom save tomorrow to keep control of it by using the feature again. If we want to increase the reliability of this with mind sliver, bane, and silvery barbs, all of which we’ll eventually get. Restore Balance is also helpful for creatures with Magic Resistance. A friendly eloquence bard is also a big help here, as are additional party members with silvery barbs. Some creatures are deadly enough that it’s probably best that everyone works together to recapture it. Essentially, to take full advantage of this ability, it’s best to have a team that’s willing (and able) to help you.

Another issue that we will face is keeping our controlled undead “alive”.  There’s no guarantee that our minions will be able to make death saving throws, so we should really ensure they never drop to zero. Spells like Mage Armor and Aid will be available to us as proactive measures, though many more high-level concentration-free buff spells like heroes’ feast may eventually become available to other party members. Artillerists and twilight clerics increase the undead’s effective hp a lot as well. Finally, the goodberry spell, especially if cast by someone with at least one level of Life Cleric, is an incredibly potent healing option that works on your undead. If you have a ranger or druid in the party (or any other weird build with access to goodberry), your undead will probably have a lot of staying power. Remember that many healing spells and effects explicitly do not work on the undead, such as Lay on Hands and cure wounds. Avoid those.

Some undead minions, especially early on, are fully capable of surviving as melee meatshields (much better than martials of the same level). They should be used where and when they can turn the tide of a battle – if they take too much unneeded damage, you may have a hard time replacing them.

If you are unable to effectively protect your undead minion in combat, you should be very cautious with it, keeping enemy attention away from it and only exposing it to use its most powerful ability(ies) or to attack with a ranged weapon (or one of your magic stones, which you will get soon) from a safe area.

If you find yourself with multiple undead that you want at your disposal, consider finding ways to “store” uncontrolled undead. Bags of Holding should do the trick – and as most undead don’t need to breathe they should be nice and safe in there. These items may or may not be easily accessible in your campaign though, so plan accordingly.

With some of the basics of the feature out of the way, now you can take a look at several options for minions, which will be detailed at the end of this level’s section and will be updated at later levels.

Channel Divinity: Dreadful Aspect. Once you have an undead under your control, this will be the primary Channel Divinity you will use. A 30-foot frighten (on a failed Wisdom save) that only offers repeat saves if enemies move away from you is a pretty nice debuff. You’ll definitely be using it quite a bit. 

Channel Divinity: Harness Divine Power (Optional). This will allow you to turn your Channel Divinity into an unexpended spell slot of a level of half your proficiency bonus (rounded up). Basically, you use this just before a short rest if you haven’t used your Channel Divinity to get an extra first-level spell slot. This will somewhat help mitigate our spell slot shortage inherent to being a halfcaster.

Spells

Spell Slots

• Level 1: 3 slots

Paladin Spells

• Level 1: [Hellish rebuke, inflict wounds] bless, command, shield of faith, wrathful smite

Sorcerer Spells

• Cantrips: Ray of frost, mind sliver, prestidigitation, mold earth
• Level 1: [Protection from evil and good, alarm] shield, sleep

Other Spells

• Cantrips: Blade ward

Spell Descriptions

• Hellish Rebuke. This spell is not amazing, but if something at low health hits you and you cannot prevent it with Shield, this reaction spell could potentially kill it. It’s not generally the best thing to use, but it might be helpful once or twice. We get this for free from our subclass so it’s not worth complaining about.

• Inflict Wounds. This spell may seem impressive at first since it has the most damage dice of any first-level spell. However, not only does it require you to be in melee for it to work, but its damage is actually not that impressive in the grand scheme of things when hit chance is factored in. This is a terribly inefficient use of your few spell slots, which you can and should use on control spells or protecting yourself. However, later, we will have a use for it.

Undead Minion Options

Skeleton (CR 1/4) – Monster Manual. This monster is not particularly powerful, but it should be relatively common in many campaigns. You can even take control of one produced by a friendly caster through animate dead if you are desperate enough for a minion. Skeletons have a decent ranged attack for their CR (dealing 3.2 damage against 15 AC from a safe distance) and good dexterity, and can also be armed with any magical shortbows you come across. Their defence is extremely low though. All in all, a solid monster for its challenge rating, capable of being somewhat helpful, especially early on.

Warhorse Skeleton (CR 1/2) – Monster Manual. This creature is a decently good mount that you can use. Its damage isn’t too terrible either, at 7.5 DPR against 15 AC. While the spell find steed makes it somewhat obsolete, an extra horse is never a bad thing. Besides, you don’t get that until level 7.

Dread Warrior (CR 1) – Tales from the Yawning Portal. This creature is able to pull about the same weight as a typical, unoptimized melee martial of your level, dealing 7.375 DPR against 15 AC. It has a solid amount of HP, an exceptional AC of 18 (much higher than the other undead at this level), and it’s even got Undead Fortitude as a barrier against death. Not bad, especially considering the rather low quality of CR 1 undead.

Specter (CR 1) – Monster Manual. Specters may not seem like much, with their low AC and rather mediocre damage output (6.3 DPR against 15 AC). However, they have a few interesting characteristics that make them solid minions. They resist almost everything, making them a lot tougher for monsters to kill. They are also very fast, with a fly speed of 50 feet. Specters are also incorporeal, allowing them to get into places that might be very difficult to access. All in all, they are decent scouts with some combat potential. Curse of Strahd has a variant of a spectre called a Snow Maiden, which is basically the same thing but immune to cold instead of resistant.

Returned Sentry (CR 1) – Mythic Odysseys of Theros. This basic warrior-type undead has passable survivability, but what is really excels at is damage dealing. With Pack Tactics and a poisoned spear, it’s going to be dealing about 12.364 DPR against creatures with 15 AC. The spear can also be thrown for the same amount of damage. The sentry also has a sling, which deals only a mediocre 3.833 DPR. Turn Resistance does not affect Control Undead – it only targets the specific Turn Undead feature, which we do not have.

Ghast (CR 2) – Monster Manual. Ghasts have rather limited HP and AC, but they do offer debuffing effects to enemies. They can poison enemies in a radius around them (if an enemy succeeds on the save they become immune). Also, they can paralyze the targets of their attacks on a failed Constitution save. Unfortunately, both of these effects have a pitifully low DC. The ghast’s damage isn’t the best either, only 6.35 against 15 AC. However, it’s better than nothing.

Minotaur Skeleton (CR 2) – Monster Manual. This thing is a beast at the current level. It’s got a large reserve of hitpoints, but this is offset by a mediocre AC. It’s decently fast, with a 40 foot movement speed. Its greataxe does a good chunk of damage (11.7 DPR against 15 AC) for a minion, but the main thing we are interested in is the Gore attack after Charging. It’s a real treat. Not only does it deal significant damage (15.2 DPR against 15 AC, more than almost all player characters at this level) but it also has the ability to knock enemies prone and push them back up to 10 feet on a failed DC14 Strength save. Very good, but watch out for Bludgeoning damage.

Ogre Skeleton (CR 2) – Tales from the Yawning Portal. While much less formidable in melee than a Minotaur Skeleton, the Ogre Skeleton has a decent ranged attack – a javelin with a range of 30 feet (long range of 120 feet) that deals 7.5 DPR against AC 15. Unfortunately, its greatclub is not too impressive, dealing only 8.9 DPR in melee, about 58.6% as much as the Minotaur Skeleton. Nevertheless, this undead is probably worth keeping around for a bit if you find one. Ogre Zombie is a direct downgrade that might still be worth keeping in some cases.

Undying Soldier (CR 2) – Eberron: Rising from the Last War. 17 AC and resistance to the most common damage types makes this already above par for defence when it comes to CR2 Undead. On top of that, it’s doing solid DPR either in melee or at close range with thrown spears – 8.15 DPR with the potential to deal way more to Fiends or Undead (19.85 dpr). If your campaign is undead-heavy (hopefully it is), this minion skyrockets in usefulness. As with Returned Sentries, Turn Resistance does not affect Control Undead.

Will-o’-Wisp (CR 2) – Monster Manual. This creature acts like an upgraded specter. It’s got significantly more AC (19 vs 12) and similar resistances. It’s got crazy dexterity (+9) which greatly improves its initiative and stealth capabilities. It can also become invisible as an action whenever you want. As usual, attacking breaks invisibility. It also has the Life Drain feature, which allows it to regain HP by killing a creature at zero health. The best way to use this is as an out-of-combat heal: Take a rat, non-lethally down it with a dagger (or your rapier), then let your Will-o’-Wisp do the rest. There’s also a variant of this monster called a Will-o’-Wells found in Wild Beyond the Witchlight which has the ability to give one creature a d4 once per long rest – this d4 can be added to any save, attack or ability check. Not much but every bit helps.

The biggest issue with the Will-o’-Wisp is its rather low damage, at only 5.4 DPR against 15 AC – though using Invisibility to gain advantage on your first attack is a decent option. Additionally, this undead cannot carry or wear anything, which might be an inconvenience. Overall, Will-o’-Wisps have pretty incredible staying power despite their low damage and are some of the best scouts available to the party at this level.

Strategy

 By this point, you have access to some decently useful minions. Use the extra body on the battlefield to your advantage, but make sure to keep it safe. Your playstyle should complement the undead minion you have access to. You are going to be using most of the same spells as last level, though by now sleep has lost the vast majority of its power. Bless is still your best friend, as is ray of frost. You can also pretend to be a control caster by using Dreadful Aspect from time to time.

Tier One Summary

In this tier, you’re literally a fullcaster. If you’re lucky, you might also have a well built martial under your control. You’re right on par with the other flagship-esque builds at this point and you’re only about to get even better.

Level 5 (Clockwork soul sorcerer 1, oathbreaker paladin 4)

Feat: Fey Touched (Gift of Alacrity, +1 CHA). This feat is one of the major power boosts we get at this level. Not only does it round out our Charisma to 18, but it also gives us access to arguably the strongest level 1 spell in the game (as well as a pretty decent level 2 spell). We will go over this more in-depth in the Spells section.

If someone else in the party already has gift of alacrity, this feat loses some of its value, but it still offers some very powerful options. You can take silvery barbs with it, which will greatly improve your ability to capture and retain undead, among other things. If that’s not available, dissonant whispers is a decent third pick, but at that point, you might as well go Telekinetic for a cool bonus action, but this will conflict with magic stone in the future.

Channel Divinity Upgrade. At this level, not only does the maximum spell slot level creatable with Harness Divine Power increase to level 2, but you can now take control of undead with a CR of 3.

Meld With Stone Upgrade. You gain access to the pass without trace spell from your race, one of the most powerful spells in the whole game. See the Spells section for a greater explanation of this spell. Not only do we get one free casting of this spell per long rest, but we can also use spell slots to cast it.

Spells

A “+1” in parentheses next to a spell indicates that the spell can be cast once without expending a spell slot per long rest.

Spell Slots

• Level 1: 4 slots
• Level 2: 2 slots

Paladin Spells

• Level 1: [Hellish rebuke, inflict wounds] bless, command, shield of faith, wrathful smite, detect magic, heroism

Sorcerer Spells

• Cantrips: Ray of frost, mind sliver, prestidigitation, mold earth
• Level 1: [Protection from evil and good, alarm] shield, sleep

Other Spells

• Cantrips: Blade ward
• Level 1: Gift of alacrity (+1)
• Level 2: Misty step (+1), pass without trace (+1)

Spell Descriptions

• Detect Magic. Since we lack ritual casting, we can’t use this very well for efficient magic item searching, but if we really need the spell’s effect, it may be worth the spell slot. This spell is probably the most generally useful spell that we can’t yet afford.
• Heroism. This spell isn’t too useful, but maybe someone needs Frightened immunity and a small amount of temporary HP every turn. You never know. Note that this spell does not end the Frightened condition on the target, only prevents them from being affected in the first place.
• Gift of Alacrity. A 1d8 initiative boost to any of you and any of your buddies that you can cast at the end of a long rest. On top of that, you get a free casting of it once per day. This is comparable to Alert in terms of initiative bonus, except you can use it on anyone you like. Winning initiative is crucial as acting before enemies effectively means you have an extra turn compared to them. It gives your entire party a much better chance to survive any encounter.
• Misty Step. Quite self-explanatory. Misty step is a way to get out of trouble or into safety once per long rest. We advise you not to cast it with your slots, unless you really need to. You get this for free from Fey Touched.

• Pass Without Trace. In short, it’s just a +10 stealth bonus for all your buddies. Stealth just happens to grant the most powerful tactical advantage in the game, surprise.
  • When determining surprise, the lowest stealth roll in the party is used. Assuming the least stealthy person in your party has a zero in stealth (a very conservative assumption), the minimum party stealth roll is a 1. But with pass without trace, this increases to an 11, enough to surprise many enemies even with terrible rolls. If every character has at least +2 Dexterity and Stealth proficiency (which you should aim for in every build; +2 Dexterity gets you the most out of medium armor and Stealth proficiency is easy to get from your background), the party’s minimum stealth roll with pass without trace is a 16 currently, and this scales with the party’s proficiency bonus. This is MUCH higher than the passive perception of most monsters, virtually guaranteeing surprise (thus an extra turn) in the majority of encounters.
  • Additionally, you can use your very high minimum Stealth to hide behind any cover, and almost automatically succeed in your check to do so. Being untargetable is just a perk of being hidden. The creature simply doesn’t know you’re there, therefore it can’t really reasonably attack you. The stealth bonus of pass without trace makes this benefit really easy to get.

Undead Minion Options

Brain in a Jar (CR 3) – Van Richten’s Guide to Ravenloft.

This undead has a decent amount of hit points but has low AC. It has a pretty terrible speed of only 10 feet, but it can fly. Its Dexterity however is an abysmal -4. This may cause you a lot of problems if you are trying to use pass without trace.

However, it makes up for these shortcomings with incredible offensive power. It has access to chill touch, allowing it to deal 8.775 DPR against AC 15. 

Additionally, it has a powerful Mind Blast ability with a recharge of 5-6, that deals 3d8+4 psychic damage in a 60-foot cone on a failed DC14 Intelligence save (dealing no damage to those who pass). It also stuns creatures who fail the save for a minute, but it offers repeat saves to break the effect. This is an extraordinarily powerful shutdown ability that costs virtually nothing to use.

    If that wasn’t good enough, it has access to decent control spells (none of them are standout picks for player characters, but getting them for free on top of your own casting is great!) It’s got 3 uses of hold person per day, which may come in handy. Additionally, it has one use per day of compulsion, hold monster, sleep (upcast to third level) and Tasha’s hideous laughter. While none of these spells are insanely powerful, they can definitely help significantly reduce the threat of many encounters.

    Finally, Detect Sentience is a great scouting tool, as it will always let you know the exact location of any creatures with 3 or more intelligence within 300 feet. This information can let you easily map dungeons, find or avoid encounters, or more.

    This monster is one of the most powerful available to you at this level, but you will need to find workarounds to its movement and low stealth. Having it ride a mount can deal with the first problem, but the second problem is a bit harder to deal with. Having a friend cast guidance and affect it with Emboldening Bond is a partial solution, but that is still not reliable enough to have it work with pass without trace. A proper solution for keeping low-Dexterity undead from preventing surprise will be explained in the Wight section.

Girallon Zombie (CR 3) – Tomb of Annihilation. The survivability of this summon is decent at best, but it can deal some big damage in a very short time with its 5 attacks (20.775 DPR against AC15). It even has an ability to help it close the distance between it and our enemies. Nice.

Karrnathi Undead Soldier (CR 3) – Eberron: Rising from the Last War. This very resilient creature has decently high AC (17) and the Parry reaction, effectively giving it 20 AC while in melee. Its health is high, and it’s even got Undead Fortitude to protect it further. Also, its damage is nothing to scoff at. With 3 multiattack, Pack Tactics and decent strength, it is capable of dealing relatively high DPR (19.26 against 15 AC) with its longsword in melee. At range, it’s still quite decent, dealing about 15.941 DPR with its longbow. A free martial is always nice.

Mummy (CR 3) – Monster Manual. The mummy’s low AC and speed are partially mitigated by its high hit points and its resistance to nonmagical physical damage. Although its damage output is rather low and melee-only (12.15 DPR against 15 AC), it can use Dreadful Glare as part of the same action. Dreadful Glare has a rather low saving throw associated with it (DC 11 Wisdom), but offers some useful effects. A target that fails the save is frightened for a round, and a target that fails by 5 or more is additionally paralyzed for the same duration. Unfortunately, a creature that succeeds the save becomes immune to this effect in the future. Mummies are a decent option with their limited at-will action denial, but not really ideal.

Wight/ Tomb Dwarf (CR 3) – Monster Manual/ Tomb of Annihilation. Wights are a relatively common undead, with a very powerful ability. Outside of this ability though, they are not very powerful. They have nice survivability, with average AC and HP but resistance to non-silvered nonmagical weapon attacks. Their damage is mediocre though compared to many other options, at only 8.05 DPR in melee or 6.95 DPR at range, against 15 AC. The Tomb Dwarf is almost identical to Wights.

    What makes wights special though is their ability to turn any humanoids they kill with Life Drain into zombies that they control after 24 hours. They can keep up to 12 zombies under control, which means you can have up to 13 total minions. Zombies are slow and weak, but with sufficient numbers, they can overwhelm enemies. They only do 2.2 DPR against AC 15 each though, but they can take other actions, such as throwing Magic Stones, Helping, or Grappling.

    Zombies have a very low Dexterity which hinders their ability to work with Pass Without Trace – potentially reducing your entire party’s effectiveness. The only real way to solve this is to not initiate the encounter with your zombies, and to bring them in later. It’s a bit cheeky, but if the zombies are not initially involved in the combat (bring them in round 2), there’s no reason for them for their stealth to be taken into account! Simply keep them in a separate but nearby area initially. Alternatively, a less dubious solution is to store all your zombies in a Bag of Holding and then have your wight or someone’s familiar or an unseen servant dump them all on the ground on the first round of combat.

    There’s also no reason you can’t have your zombies do other things outside of combat if this isn’t viable. For example, you can use them as a labour force if that appeals to you. You can also use them for other menial tasks elsewhere while you are fighting, or use them as a security force for your camp. There’s no range limit on the wight’s control ability – and as long as you retain control of the wight, you retain control of the zombies by proxy (unlike a normal caster who needs to regularly recast Animate Dead to maintain control)

    You do need a source of (preferably weak) humanoids to turn into zombies. You can have your wight kill random commoners (including your retainers that you started with if absolutely needed) to collect zombies, or you can have it kill some weakened enemy humanoids. Just make sure to not expose your wight to too much danger, or all of this will be in vain.

    If you cannot rely on these strategies for zombie accumulation and use, then you may not be able to fully use the wight to its full potential, and it will just be a rather weak martial minion. But with enough creativity and planning, the wight can completely define your playstyle.

Deathlock Wight (CR 3) – Monsters of the Multiverse / Mordenkainen’s Tome of Foes. We are breaking the alphabetical listing here since it is important to understand the Wight first. This monster is a straight-up upgrade to the already incredible Wight, except for its lower HP. Due to having Mage Armor at will, its AC is actually higher than the base Wight by 1. It also resists silvered attacks, unlike the Wight. Its longsword and longbow are replaced by Grave Bolt, which is a ranged spell attack that deals 14.1 DPR against AC 15. The older Mordenkainen’s Tome of Foes version has a significantly weaker Grave Bolt, dealing only 8.7 DPR but with twice the range. Make sure to find a way to mitigate Sunlight Sensitivity if you plan on using this outdoors.

Both the old Deathlock Wight and the MPMM reprint both have access to some powerful spellcasting options. First, it’s got at-will mage armor. Unlike normal warlocks, it lacks the self-only restriction. Use this to increase the AC of every other minion or summon your party has available, from familiars to Conjure Animals. Additionally, it’s got at-will detect magic and disguise self, which have their uses. It’s also got 1/LR fear, which is an extremely powerful control spell capable of crippling large groups of enemies. 1/LR hold person isn’t too incredible, but hey it’s free. Finally, the MTF version has one use of misty step per long rest, which really does not make up for the significantly weaker Grave Bolt.

Finally, it’s got access to the same zombie creation mechanic as the typical Wight. All in all, this is comparable in power to the Brain in a Jar, but likely more common and easier to get.

Strategy

Your primary purpose is to keep pass without trace active. Don’t be afraid of dodging if you are at any risk of losing concentration! Ray of frost, command, and Dreadful Aspect are your main combat actions, debuffing and whittling away at enemies. If the situation calls for it, you can drop concentration on pass without trace to cast bless, but keep in mind your limited spell slots. The majority of your damage contribution will likely come from an undead minion that you control, so make sure to keep it alive!

Level 6 (Clockwork soul sorcerer 1, oathbreaker paladin 4, undead warlock 1)

Pact Magic. This grants us slots that recharge on a short rest. They will mostly be used for shield. One of them will be used on bane every day though.

Form of Dread. This is the premier feature of undead warlocks. Immunity to the Frightened condition and temporary hit points are decent defensive buffs. The potential to Frighten enemies every turn on a hit is the big boon here. It pairs perfectly with the optimal strategy of using ranged attacks and walking backwards. This will steal one of your melee enemies’ turns about once every two rounds by making them unable to move towards you.

Spells

Spell Slots

• Level 1: 4 slots, 1 pact slot
• Level 2: 2 slots

Paladin Spells

• Level 1: [Hellish rebuke, inflict wounds] bless, command, shield of faith, wrathful smite, detect magic, heroism

Sorcerer Spells

• Cantrips: Ray of frost, mind sliver, prestidigitation, mold earth
• Level 1: [Protection from evil and good, alarm] shield, sleep

Warlock Spells

• Cantrips: Eldritch blast, magic stone
• Level 1: Bane, expeditious retreat

Other Spells

• Cantrips: Blade ward
• Level 1: Gift of alacrity (+1)
• Level 2: Misty step (+1), pass without trace (+1)

Spell Descriptions

• Eldritch blast. Nothing special now, but will be used later on as an upgrade to Magic Stone attacks.
• Magic Stone. The cantrip that’s going to be used the most now along with ray of frost. Magic stone gives your melee-focused summons a way to somewhat work at range. Next level, it’s also going to provide you with a valid way to use your Extra Attack and something to fill up your steed’s action economy.
• Bane. This spell’s main use will be to assist in taking control of undead that you want, including “recapturing” undead when your Channel Divinity runs out. Using this as an actual debuff in combat is probably not a good idea in most cases.
• Expeditious Retreat. A somewhat cheap way to get you out of a sticky situation and a possible emergency spell for when you need to run. The level 1 warlock spell list is quite sparse.

Undead Minion Options

Nothing new this level; our Channel Divinity scales with paladin level only.

Strategy

You can now increase the ranged effectiveness of many of your summons with magic stone, providing a secondary damage option. Form of Dread increases your ability to control enemies, and it pairs decently well with ray of frost (or, for now, base eldritch blast). Your primary purpose is still to concentrate on pass without trace.

Level 7 (Clockwork soul sorcerer 1, oathbreaker paladin 5, undead warlock 1)

Extra Attack. You get to attack twice with magic stones now if you need that extra bit of damage or you’ve got Form of Dread up.

Channel Divinity Upgrade. This is probably the biggest buff to your undead options to date. All the CR4s (except Plague Spreading Zombie) are better than most of your other options. We’ll just list the monsters that really stand out.

Spells

Spell Slots

• Level 1: 4 slots, 1 pact slot
• Level 2: 2 slots

Paladin Spells

• Level 1: [Hellish rebuke, inflict wounds] bless, command, shield of faith, wrathful smite, detect magic, heroism
• Level 2: [Crown of madness, darkness] find steed, aid, locate object, lesser restoration

Sorcerer Spells

• Cantrips: Ray of frost, mind sliver, prestidigitation, mold earth
• Level 1: [Protection from evil and good, alarm] shield, sleep

Warlock Spells

• Cantrips: Eldritch blast, magic stone
• Level 1: Bane, expeditious retreat

Other Spells

• Cantrips: Blade ward
• Level 1: Gift of alacrity (+1)
• Level 2: Misty step (+1), pass without trace (+1)

Spell Descriptions

• Crown of Madness. Don’t use.
• Find Steed. You get a Warhorse at the cost of a 2nd level slot. Cast it at the end of the day or during downtime. The warhorse listens to your commands, so one of the best uses is just making it attack with your magic stones, then run behind cover. If you need to kill someone quick however, the Warhorse can be commanded to attack for an average of 11.911 dpr against 16 ac or 19.845 if already prone.
• Aid. Emergency heal up to three teammates or cast it at the end of your long rest for 5 extra hit points.
• Locate Object. Use this to locate objects. Pretty simple. It’s really good utility, but still situational, due to being a 2nd level slot to cast. Once again Tabletop Builds has an article detailing the many possible uses of this spell.
• Lesser Restoration. Emergency cast when a party member is subjected to a deadly condition. You won’t cast this often.

Undead Minion Options

Banshee/Dryad Spirit/Lonelywood Banshee (CR 4) – Monster Manual/Descent into Avernus/Icewind Dale: Rime of the Frostmaiden. Hover flight, lots of damage resistances and immunities and lots of condition immunities. Its raw damage is pitifully low though, and only works in melee. At least the Lonelywood Banshee has a ranged attack. However, this monster has many non-damage abilities that are worth talking about – abilities that make Banshees one of the most offensively powerful creatures at its challenge rating.

Horrifying Visage is a powerful AoE frighten ability that can be used at-will. Unfortunately, a creature that succeeds the save or breaks free from the condition becomes immune to the effect. It affects ALL creatures within 60 feet of the Banshee though, though, likely including you and your friends. This can be bypassed by having the banshee use Horrifying Visage on the party out of combat until everyone succeeds the save.

Once per long rest, Banshees and its variants also get to use Wail. This ability is incredibly powerful. Any creature within 30 feet of the Banshee that fails a Constitution save (DC13) instantly gets reduced to zero hit points. Provided your teammates have Silvery Barbs, Mind Sliver, Unsettling Words or other saving throw debuffs, this can be absolutely devastating to your enemies, possibly even solving the encounter before they even act.

If this wasn’t enough, Banshees know the general location of any living creature within 5 miles of themselves. This is absolutely amazing for mapping out dungeons, castles or anything really. This is an incredibly powerful creature. Combined with Incorporeal Movement, you have nearly unmatched scouting potential, which is a common theme with the best minions.

Deathlock (CR 4) – Mordenkainen’s Tome of Foes. Deathlocks are decently useful casters. You’re basically getting the spellcasting equivalent of a stunted 5th level warlock (including the short rest slot recharge) with the survivability of a Wight. As resourceless DPR options, Deathlocks get eldritch blast (6.6 DPR against 16 AC) and chill touch (5.4 DPR against 16 AC). This is not very good, but it is hardly the reason we want this minion.

The spells (most notably hunger of hadar) on the default and Great Old One variants are good, but not as good as the spells the Fey and Fiend variants get. The Fiend and Fey variants have some really nice spells, however. The Fiend has the best options, in fireball and command, upcast to 3rd level. The Fey variant has hypnotic pattern, which is somewhat hindered by the lackluster concentration protection of this creature. Deathlocks also have access to at-will mage armor, which they can use to improve the AC of your party’s other summons like familiars and conjured animals with no resource cost.

Flameskull (CR 4) – Monster Manual. Flameskulls are caster undeads with a powerful selection of spells including shield and fireball. They also have hover flight. Their defenses are decent as well – despite their low AC and HP, they have some valuable elemental resistances and immunities and of course the shield spell. Additionally, Flameskulls are permanent. By that we mean that they regain all their HP within an hour if they die. They still remain the same creature and so they don’t regain their spell slots.

When it comes to offence, Flameskulls are decent. They get one fireball per day, two flaming spheres per day and 2 attacks per round (12.6 dpr against 16ac). They deal really decent fire damage. But that’s about it. Still worth keeping around in most cases.

Ghost (CR 4) – Monster Manual. Ghosts are very interesting undead. First of all, they have the same defensive features as Banshees. Secondly, they also get Horrifying Visage, except the enemies don’t have disadvantage on ending the condition, but are aged an average of 25 years on a really bad roll instead. It’s objectively worse until Tier 4 gameplay comes around and we can use it to age-up some True Polymorphed dragons. Third, they have access to a powerful but somewhat limited Possession ability, which has some interesting uses.

Ghosts can possess any humanoid, regardless of size, CR, or alignment. While possessing someone, the ghost is untargettable. Any humanoid can just be stolen by you for personal use. Just like you can capture undead, you can now capture humanoids, including powerful casters. Depending on who you can snag, you can get all sorts of neat abilities, but unfortunately this is not sustainable. You can keep the body in limbo though, by dropping the creature to 0 hp with non-lethal attacks before possessing it. Every time it’s about to die, have a familiar stabilise it. Every time it’s about to regain hp due to stabilising rules, hit it and then stabilise it again. Right before Control Undead is up, have the Ghost exit the body and kill the creature, as it’d be useless to you for the next 24 hours anyway.

The ghost can also see into and enter the Ethereal Plane, which can be a useful scouting ability and also an emergency action to take if the ghost is at risk of dying within a round.

Strategy

You aren’t terribly different from last level in terms of playstyle, though you now have more options in general: Magic stone with Extra Attack to deal more damage than ray of frost, find steed to put another body on the battlefield (whether as a mount or a combat summon), and several powerful undead to control and turn into minions.

Level 8 (Clockwork soul sorcerer 1, oathbreaker paladin 6, undead warlock 1)

Aura of Protection. CONGRATULATIONS, you got the main Paladin feature! +4 to yours and your buddies’ saves. Obviously, this is huge.

Channel Divinity Upgrade. You get access to CR 5 Undead. Most of them are actually pretty underwhelming, but there are a couple really fun options.

Spells

Spell Slots

• Level 1: 4 slots, 1 pact slot
• Level 2: 3 slots

Paladin Spells

• Level 1: [Hellish rebuke, inflict wounds] bless, command, detect magic
• Level 2: [Crown of madness, darkness] find steed, aid, locate object, lesser restoration

Sorcerer Spells

• Cantrips: Ray of frost, mind sliver, prestidigitation, mold earth
• Level 1: [Protection from evil and good, alarm] shield, sleep

Warlock Spells

• Cantrips: Eldritch blast, magic stone
• Level 1: Bane, expeditious retreat

Other Spells

• Cantrips: Blade ward
• Level 1: Gift of alacrity (+1)
• Level 2: Misty step (+1), pass without trace (+1)

Spell Descriptions

• Detect Magic. Back on our spell list!

Undead Minion Options

This is our final level of minion progression. You’ll want to grab something that’ll either stay good for a long time or scale up in power somehow, because these and the CR 4 minions covered before are the best you’ll get.

Vampiric Mind Flayer (CR 5) – Van Richten’s Guide to Ravenloft. Vampiric Mind Flayers have pretty high Wisdom saves, but if you manage to capture one (we recommend you use locking it down with an Intelligence save spell first), these things are pretty cool. Spider Climb and decent AC and hp means this summon is going to survive a while. 

The main feature of this creature is its Disrupt Psyche. This AoE has a great area of 7×7 and is a DC15 int save to be incapacitated for a minute. It provides a repeat save at the end of each round. It is a bit worse effect than Brain in a Jar, but it’s definitely less awkward to position.

Vampiric Mind Flayers can also regain health essentially for free using their Drink Sapience on any disposable creatures. This makes them have very low sustenance cost.

Wraith (CR 5) – Monster Manual. The exact survivability of a Banshee, Ghost or Specter. The difference here is the special power that is Create Specter, which does exactly what it’s called. It can turn any humanoid that was murdered into a Specter under its control. Having up to 7 specters at a time (and the Wraith) can really speed up the process of scouting, or can act as reliable dpr, since they don’t really take damage from creatures (they can just go into the floor). That damage is 49.2 if you make them go into melee or 34.775 if you somehow provide them all with Magic Stone. (This is done against 17ac). This is a great use of the 3 commoners you get from Noble.

Strategy

Your big thing this level is Aura of Protection. Now you can automatically succeed on almost all concentration saving throws (your minimum result is 10, so you have to take 22 damage all at once to even have a 5% chance of failure), as can any other spellcaster near you with proficiency in Constitution saving throws and a reasonable Constitution score. Sticking near allies (control caster allies in particular, since they need to make concentration saving throws) is now priority #1 in terms of battlefield tactics, so that you can buff your friends’ saves as much as possible.

Level 9 (Clockwork soul sorcerer 1, oathbreaker paladin 6, undead warlock 2)

Eldritch Invocations [Agonizing Blast, Repelling Blast]. You get the standard “EBARB” (eldritch blast + agonizing + repelling blast) package and now have a better damage action than Extra Attack magic stone. On top of that, Repelling Blast makes you adept at pushing people into danger zones.

Spells

Spell Slots

• Level 1: 4 slots, 2 pact slots
• Level 2: 3 slots

Paladin Spells

• Level 1: [Hellish rebuke, inflict wounds] bless, command, detect magic
• Level 2: [Crown of madness, darkness] find steed, aid, locate object, lesser restoration

Sorcerer Spells

• Cantrips: Ray of frost, mind sliver, prestidigitation, mold earth
• Level 1: [Protection from evil and good, alarm] shield, sleep

Warlock Spells

• Cantrips: Eldritch blast, magic stone
• Level 1: Bane, expeditious retreat, unseen servant

Other Spells

• Cantrips: Blade ward
• Level 1: Gift of alacrity (+1)
• Level 2: Misty step (+1), pass without trace (+1)

Spell Descriptions

• Unseen Servant. Really you shouldn’t be casting this spell, if there’s a wizard, bard, Pact of the Tome warlock, or any other ritual caster with access to this spell in the party then there’s no reason for you to cast it at any point. This is just a filler pick really; the level 1 warlock spell list is remarkably sparse.

Strategy

We now have access to one of the best at-will actions in the game: “EBARB,” as explained earlier. Not only is this a decent bit of damage (you add your Charisma modifier to the damage of every ray, putting it solidly above any other cantrip in raw damage), but it is also an extremely potent control effect due to offering forced movement with no saving throw. You are now even moreso the control casters’ best friend: not only are you boosting all of their concentration saves, but you’re also pushing enemies into the wizard’s web or giving the cleric and extra proc of spirit guardians!

Level 10 (Clockwork soul sorcerer 2, oathbreaker paladin 6, undead warlock 2)

Font of Magic. Sorcery Points are just extra slots for now.

Spells

Spell Slots

• Level 1: 4 slots, 2 pact slots
• Level 2: 3 slots
• Level 3: 2 slots

Paladin Spells

• Level 1: [Hellish rebuke, inflict wounds] bless, command, detect magic
• Level 2: [Crown of madness, darkness] find steed, aid, locate object, lesser restoration

Sorcerer Spells

• Cantrips: Ray of frost, mind sliver, prestidigitation, mold earth
• Level 1: [Protection from evil and good, alarm absorb elements] shield, sleep mage armor, silvery barbs

Warlock Spells

• Cantrips: Eldritch blast, magic stone
• Level 1: Bane, expeditious retreat, unseen servant

Other Spells

• Cantrips: Blade ward
• Level 1: Gift of alacrity (+1)
• Level 2: Misty step (+1), pass without trace (+1)

Spell Descriptions

• Absorb Elements. Resistance against powerful elemental AoEs is really good, since a huge majority of strong AoEs are elemental. This is basically what casters use to laugh at dex save proficiency.
• Mage Armor. Rest cast it on your undead (if they benefit from mage armor at all of course). Notable ones are Flameskulls and Vampiric Mind Flayers.
• Silvery Barbs. Strategic reroll on key enemy saving throws. These may include: your party members’ spells, Control Undead, Banshees’ Wail, Brain in a Jar’s Mind Blast. You also get to give someone advantage on anything. This is a really solid spell. You’ll use it decently often, since you effectively get 11 first level slots per day.

Strategy

Our end of T2 isn’t particularly climactic. All this level gives us is an upgrade in our low-level spell repertoire and two slots to upcast with (you’ll either want to use them to cast pass without trace if your 2nd-level spell slots run out in the day, or restcast 3rd-level aid on your friends).

Tier Two Summary

You are what we in the bizz call an aurabot. Your teammates rely on you heavily. Your mere presence makes your teammates significantly more powerful and on top of that you provide a whole extra party member’s worth of power in the form of an undead minion. You provide many basic things that are considered “essential” in a high-op party: forced movement, initiative boosting, save protection, surprise rounds… you’re quite the jack of all trades by now, and this will only become more true in the following levels.

Level 11 (Clockwork soul sorcerer 3, oathbreaker paladin 6, undead warlock 2)

Metamagic [Subtle, Twinned]. You don’t really use it yet. But subtle counterspell is going to be your best use of this feature. Before that, twinning some notable spells like: phantasmal force for offence or gift of alacrity and mage armor for spell slot conservation is going to benefit you quite a bit.

Spells

Spell Slots

• Level 1: 4 slots, 2 pact slots
• Level 2: 3 slots
• Level 3: 3 slots

Paladin Spells

• Level 1: [Hellish rebuke, inflict wounds] bless, command, detect magic
• Level 2: [Crown of madness, darkness] find steed, aid, locate object, lesser restoration protection from poison

Sorcerer Spells

• Cantrips: Ray of frost, mind sliver, prestidigitation, mold earth
• Level 1: [Protection from evil and good, absorb elements] shield, mage armor, silvery barbs
• Level 2: [Aid rope trick, lesser restoration] web

Warlock Spells

• Cantrips: Eldritch blast, magic stone
• Level 1: Bane, expeditious retreat, unseen servant

Other Spells

• Cantrips: Blade ward
• Level 1: Gift of alacrity (+1)
• Level 2: Misty step (+1), pass without trace (+1)

Spell Descriptions

• Rope Trick. This spell is great for taking safe short rests and for a place to get full cover in combat. Don’t forget to pull the rope up out of the reach of enemies.
• Protection from Poison. A decent restcast if you’ve already covered the party with aid; it’ll only last for an hour, but resistance against poison can definitely be nice if you know you’re facing a poison-based foe, since it’s a damage type not covered by absorb elements.
• Lesser Restoration. Just temporarily on the Sorcerer side instead of Paladin. It doesn’t really matter much; we’re doing a little spell juggling here.
• Web. This is an amazing combat spell that you’ll be able to cast 1-3 times per day. This spell reduces the speeds of melee enemies heavily. Best part is, you can push them back into it with Repelling Blast for the same effect as upon casting.

Strategy

We get something serious here: web is the second best spell of its level (we also happen to have the first best, pass without trace) and one of the most potent control spells in the game. It is now a significant consideration whether you want to drop concentration on pass without trace to cast it. Hopefully someone else in the party has already had it since Tier One, but in a tough combat it can never hurt to have more control spells on the battlefield.

Level 12 (Clockwork soul sorcerer 3, oathbreaker paladin 6, undead warlock 3)

Pact Boon: Pact of the Chain. You get another friend. More magic stone minions are always welcome. They can also act as invisible scouts if you don’t have enough of those already. Bat is good for situations where you know your sight won’t be enough.

Pact Magic Upgrade. This isn’t an actual feature, but needs mentioning. 2nd level Pact slots are what we take this level for. It lets us cast pass without trace before every combat or almost every combat with slots to spare. Now you get to cast web, bless, or phantasmal force in practically every combat on top of contributing reliable surprise.

Spells

An “R” in parentheses next to a spell indicates that it can be cast as a ritual.

Spell Slots

• Level 1: 4 slots
• Level 2: 3 slots, 2 pact slots
• Level 3: 3 slots

Paladin Spells

• Level 1: [Hellish rebuke, inflict wounds] bless, command, detect magic
• Level 2: [Crown of madness, darkness] find steed, aid, locate object, protection from poison

Sorcerer Spells

• Cantrips: Ray of frost, mind sliver, prestidigitation, mold earth
• Level 1: [Protection from evil and good, absorb elements] shield, mage armor, silvery barbs
• Level 2: [Rope trick, lesser restoration] web

Warlock Spells

• Cantrips: Eldritch blast, magic stone
• Level 1: Bane, expeditious retreat, unseen servant find familiar (R)
• Level 2: Phantasmal force, suggestion

Other Spells

• Cantrips: Blade ward
• Level 1: Gift of alacrity (+1)
• Level 2: Misty step (+1), pass without trace (+1)

Spell Descriptions

• Find Familiar. You get it from Pact Boon, and can use it to summon all sorts of improved familiars. You’ll want something with invisibility for the purpose of scouting. If your DM lets you extract poison from familiars and someone in the party is capable of doing so, then milk a familiar for free poisons.
• Phantasmal Force. Nigh-inescapable, debilitating one target Intelligence save spell. This is a perfect spell for twinning. Create burning beehives, acid buckets or biting squids on your opponents’ heads for both that small chip damage and blinded/deafened condition.
• Suggestion. This spell is okay on the rare occasion you really need to befriend someone fast.

Strategy

You get to feel like a real caster again, yay! Between your pact slots and your free cast from your race, you should be able to drop concentration on pass without trace in favor of another spell like web or phantasmal force in almost every single combat, never spending a single proper slot on the spell again! Thanks to this, you now get to take full advantage of your Spellcasting. As such, it’s all sorcerer levels from here on out.

Level 13 (Clockwork soul sorcerer 4, oathbreaker paladin 6, undead warlock 3)

Feat [Resilient: Wisdom]. Your Wisdom saving throw bonus goes from +3 to +9. This is definitely worth it over the +2 Charisma, since your teammates really don’t want you dead. Yes, Wisdom saves often just kill you at these levels. Tier 3 is rough.

Spells

Spell Slots

• Level 1: 4 slots
• Level 2: 3 slots, 2 pact slots
• Level 3: 3 slots
• Level 4: 1 slot

Paladin Spells

• Level 1: [Hellish rebuke, inflict wounds] bless, command, detect magic
• Level 2: [Crown of madness, darkness] find steed, aid, locate object, protection from poison lesser restoration

Sorcerer Spells

• Cantrips: Ray of frost, mind sliver, prestidigitation, mold earth, minor illusion, shape water
• Level 1: [Protection from evil and good, absorb elements] shield, mage armor, silvery barbs
• Level 2: [Rope trick, lesser restoration pyrotechnics] web, Tasha’s mind whip

Warlock Spells

• Cantrips: Eldritch blast, magic stone
• Level 1: Bane, expeditious retreat, find familiar (R)
• Level 2: Phantasmal force, suggestion

Other Spells

• Cantrips: Blade ward
• Level 1: Gift of alacrity (+1)
• Level 2: Misty step (+1), pass without trace (+1)

Spell Descriptions

• Minor Illusion. Create temporary cover and have creative fun out of combat.
• Shape Water. Create even bigger temporary cover; open doors with ice keys and much more! It’s another creativity cantrip.
• Pyrotechnics. This spell requires a bit of finesse, but is definitely worth it. Have a minion of yours hold a torch, then use Smoke on it. Now you have a portable source of heavy obscurement. This can negate advantage on attack rolls or block line of sight of enemy casters for the purpose of casting spells. It backfires easily if you don’t think casting it through; so, do that.
• Tasha’s Mind Whip. A non-committal, short duration, single-target control option, which can be twinned. It takes enemy actions away easily, so it’s good when you need to stall an enemy for a round.
• Lesser Restoration. Welcome back to the paladin side!

Strategy

Nothing much has changed. You have some fun cantrips, decent non-concentration spells, and a significant defensive boost with your Wisdom save bonus tripling. Not an eventful level but definitely important.

Level 14 (Clockwork soul sorcerer 5, oathbreaker paladin 6, undead warlock 3)

Magical Guidance. Magical Guidance: You might need this for some reason. It’s not going to be common.

Spells

Spell Slots

• Level 1: 4 slots
• Level 2: 3 slots, 2 pact slots
• Level 3: 3 slots
• Level 4: 2 slots

Paladin Spells

• Level 1: [Hellish rebuke, inflict wounds] bless, command, detect magic
• Level 2: [Crown of madness, darkness] find steed, aid, locate object, lesser restoration

Sorcerer Spells

• Cantrips: Mind sliver, prestidigitation, mold earth, minor illusion, shape water
• Level 1: [Protection from evil and good, absorb elements] shield, mage armor, silvery barbs
• Level 2: [Rope trick, pyrotechnics] web, Tasha’s mind whip
• Level 3: [Dispel magic, protection from energy counterspell] sleet storm

Warlock Spells

• Cantrips: Eldritch blast, magic stone
• Level 1: Bane, expeditious retreat, find familiar (R)
• Level 2: Phantasmal force, suggestion

Other Spells

• Cantrips: Blade ward
• Level 1: Gift of alacrity (+1)
• Level 2: Misty step (+1), pass without trace (+1)

Spell Descriptions

• Dispel Magic. What it says on the box. Get rid of annoying spells. Keep in mind that this can only end spells that are cast ON the target; you cannot target a spell’s effect to directly end it (for example, you could not end a persistent AoE like sleet storm).
• Counterspell. What it says on the box. Get rid of annoying spells, but at the root this time.
• Sleet Storm. Another spell that causes heavy obscurement. Except this one has a billion other benefits. Good range, huge area, difficult terrain, save against prone and concentration disruption. This counters melee attackers AND casters. The two major categories of monster are covered. This spell pairs amazingly with forced movement.

Strategy

Sleet storm! Once again, all you’re doing right now is growing your arsenal as a control caster. Stick near your friends, cast pass without trace, drop it once combat starts… you know how it is by now.

Level 15 (Clockwork soul sorcerer 6, oathbreaker paladin 6, undead warlock 3)

Bastion of Law. It’s a trap!

Spells

Spell Slots

• Level 1: 4 slots
• Level 2: 3 slots, 2 pact slots
• Level 3: 3 slots
• Level 4: 3 slots
• Level 5: 1 slot

Paladin Spells

• Level 1: [Hellish rebuke, inflict wounds] bless, command, detect magic
• Level 2: [Crown of madness, darkness] find steed, aid, locate object, lesser restoration

Sorcerer Spells

• Cantrips: Mind sliver, prestidigitation, mold earth, minor illusion, shape water
• Level 1: [Protection from evil and good, absorb elements] shield, mage armor, silvery barbs
• Level 2: [Rope trick, pyrotechnics] web, Tasha’s mind whip
• Level 3: [Dispel magic tiny servant, counterspell] sleet storm, hypnotic pattern

Warlock Spells

• Cantrips: Eldritch blast, magic stone
• Level 1: Bane, expeditious retreat, find familiar (R)
• Level 2: Phantasmal force, suggestion

Other Spells

• Cantrips: Blade ward
• Level 1: Gift of alacrity (+1)
• Level 2: Misty step (+1), pass without trace (+1)

Spell Descriptions

• Tiny Servant. Well, dispel magic wasn’t that good, so we’re taking 5 guaranteed minions instead (since you want to rest cast it with your spare 5th level slot). Use them for the usual: magic stone and cool items. Pretty good spell overall.
• Hypnotic Pattern. This is a cornerstone of control spells in this game. It’s fallen off a bit due to higher Wisdom saves, charm immunity being more common and Legendary Resistance. This spell is still really good in many battles and can even end encounters.

Strategy

Same old, same old. At least now you have no excuse to not cast magic stone every turn, given your tiny servants are 100% guaranteed minions to throw those pebbles.

Level 16 (Clockwork soul sorcerer 7, oathbreaker paladin 6, undead warlock 3)

Spells

Spell Slots

• Level 1: 4 slots
• Level 2: 3 slots, 2 pact slots
• Level 3: 3 slots
• Level 4: 3 slots
• Level 5: 2 slot

Paladin Spells

• Level 1: [Hellish rebuke, inflict wounds] bless, command, detect magic
• Level 2: [Crown of madness, darkness] find steed, aid, locate object, lesser restoration

Sorcerer Spells

• Cantrips: Mind sliver, prestidigitation, mold earth, minor illusion, shape water
• Level 1: [Protection from evil and good, absorb elements] shield, mage armor, silvery barbs
• Level 2: [Rope trick, pyrotechnics] web, Tasha’s mind whip
• Level 3: [Tiny servant, counterspell] sleet storm, hypnotic pattern
• Level 4: [Freedom of movement, summon construct fabricate] dimension door

Warlock Spells

• Cantrips: Eldritch blast, magic stone
• Level 1: Bane, expeditious retreat, find familiar (R)
• Level 2: Phantasmal force, suggestion

Other Spells

• Cantrips: Blade ward
• Level 1: Gift of alacrity (+1)
• Level 2: Misty step (+1), pass without trace (+1)

Spell Descriptions

• Freedom of Movement. Not remarkable, but isn’t a terrible panic option. If a teammate is really in a pickle, just have your familiar deliver it to them.
• Fabricate. Make useful items. You should mainly use it to mass-produce equipment for minions (specifically if you have something like a Wight or Wraith that controls many creatures) on the spot.
• Dimension Door. Panic option teleport far away into safety. If your party is fully small; profit.

Strategy

Yet another relatively uneventful level, but that’s Tier Three done with! At least your large amount spell delay means that you got to enjoy a big power jump that real sorcerers normally miss out on in this tier.

Tier Three Summary

You spent this tier getting some of the most potent spells for their level. Keep going, murder machine! You’re once again playing like a caster.

Level 17 (Clockwork soul sorcerer 8, oathbreaker paladin 6, undead warlock 3)

Ability Score Improvement [+2 Charisma]. This is simple really. You finally max your aura and spellcasting stat, and get an extra paladin preparation. Thanks to Aura of Protection, paladin is one of the only casters in the whole game that actually needs to spend an Ability Score Increase on directly boosting their casting ability rather than taking feats.

Spells

Spell Slots

• Level 1: 4 slots
• Level 2: 3 slots, 2 pact slots
• Level 3: 3 slots
• Level 4: 3 slots
• Level 5: 2 slot
• Level 6: 1 slot

Paladin Spells

• Level 1: [Hellish rebuke, inflict wounds] bless, command, detect magic
• Level 2: [Crown of madness, darkness] find steed, aid, locate object, lesser restoration, protection from poison

Sorcerer Spells

• Cantrips: Mind sliver, prestidigitation, mold earth, minor illusion, shape water
• Level 1: [Protection from evil and good, absorb elements] shield, mage armor, silvery barbs
• Level 2: [Rope trick, pyrotechnics] web, Tasha’s mind whip, vortex warp
• Level 3: [Tiny servant, counterspell] sleet storm, hypnotic pattern
• Level 4: [Freedom of movement stone shape, fabricate] dimension door

Warlock Spells

• Cantrips: Eldritch blast, magic stone
• Level 1: Bane, expeditious retreat, find familiar (R)
• Level 2: Phantasmal force, suggestion

Other Spells

• Cantrips: Blade ward
• Level 1: Gift of alacrity (+1)
• Level 2: Misty step (+1), pass without trace (+1)

Spell Descriptions

• Vortex Warp. Another panic teleport with good range, but this time for your teammates and you can use it on 2 far-away targets at once if you twin it.
• Stone Shape. This is mold earth on crack. Create walls, cages or anything else you wish to make. You can absolutely go wild with this spell. At these levels it’s not as good as in Tier 2, due to stone HP not scaling, but this is still a good non-concentration option.
• Protection from Poison. Welcome back. We didn’t really miss you, but we don’t have fantastic paladin options.

Strategy

We’re kicking off Tier Four pretty strongly by finally maxing out our aura and spellcasting ability. All this means is that you’re better at doing what you already were doing: your aura is protecting your friends better, your EBARB is hitting people harder, and your spells are shutting down enemies more.

Level 18 (Clockwork soul sorcerer 9, oathbreaker paladin 6, undead warlock 3)

Spells

Spell Slots

• Level 1: 4 slots
• Level 2: 3 slots, 2 pact slots
• Level 3: 3 slots
• Level 4: 3 slots
• Level 5: 2 slot
• Level 6: 1 slot

Paladin Spells

• Level 1: [Hellish rebuke, inflict wounds] bless, command, detect magic
• Level 2: [Crown of madness, darkness] find steed, aid, locate object, lesser restoration, protection from poison

Sorcerer Spells

• Cantrips: Mind sliver, prestidigitation, mold earth, minor illusion, shape water
• Level 1: [Protection from evil and good, absorb elements] shield, mage armor, silvery barbs
• Level 2: [Rope trick, pyrotechnics] web, Tasha’s mind whip, vortex warp
• Level 3: [Tiny servant, counterspell] sleet storm, hypnotic pattern
• Level 4: [Stone shape, fabricate] dimension door
• Level 5: [Greater restoration transmute rock, wall of force] synaptic static

Warlock Spells

• Cantrips: Eldritch blast, magic stone
• Level 1: Bane, expeditious retreat, find familiar (R)
• Level 2: Phantasmal force, suggestion

Other Spells

• Cantrips: Blade ward
• Level 1: Gift of alacrity (+1)
• Level 2: Misty step (+1), pass without trace (+1)

Spell Descriptions

• Transmute Rock. Extremely potent control. It’s plant growth with a smaller area, except also has an amazing secondary effect of restraining enemies with an action to get out. This is another perfect spell for forced movement. Think of it as a combination of web and plant growth, with the best of both worlds.
• Wall of Force. The apex of control spells. Any caster will always find a way to use this spell. It’s simply incredible. It can divide enemies, divide enemies from allies, trap enemies in danger zones. All of these are extremely powerful uses which are applicable to any combat. You can even teleport enemies into this spell’s area, so they’re stuck in a danger zone.
• Synaptic Static. Great non-concentration damage option. Get rid of low hp enemies, debilitate annoying hordes or annoy enemy casters. This spell adds a little spice of blasting and direct debuffing to our usual spell repertoire of continuous control effects.

Strategy

Quite a bit of variety in our spells this level. Wall of force is a devastating spell that even our non-delayed caster buddies are still casting due to its lockdown power, and synaptic static is a great option when burst damage is needed: a psychic fireball that seriously debuffs enemy attacks, checks, and concentration saves doesn’t need a whole paragraph of explanation to understand its power.

Level 19 (Clockwork soul sorcerer 10, oathbreaker paladin 6, undead warlock 3)

Extra Metamagic [Careful Spell]. Not the most powerful thing in the world, but can be useful very situationally. This is just to patch some minor potential holes in gameplan.

Spells

Spell Slots

• Level 1: 4 slots
• Level 2: 3 slots, 2 pact slots
• Level 3: 3 slots
• Level 4: 3 slots
• Level 5: 2 slot
• Level 6: 1 slot
• Level 7: 1 slot

Paladin Spells

• Level 1: [Hellish rebuke, inflict wounds] bless, command, detect magic
• Level 2: [Crown of madness, darkness] find steed, aid, locate object, lesser restoration, protection from poison

Sorcerer Spells

• Cantrips: Mind sliver, prestidigitation, mold earth, minor illusion, shape water
• Level 1: [Protection from evil and good shield, absorb elements] shield, mage armor, silvery barbs
• Level 2: [Rope trick, pyrotechnics] web, Tasha’s mind whip, vortex warp
• Level 3: [Tiny servant, counterspell] sleet storm, hypnotic pattern, dispel magic
• Level 4: [Stone shape, fabricate] dimension door, banishment
• Level 5: [Transmute rock, wall of force] synaptic static

Warlock Spells

• Cantrips: Eldritch blast, magic stone
• Level 1: Bane, expeditious retreat, find familiar (R)
• Level 2: Phantasmal force, suggestion

Other Spells

• Cantrips: Blade ward
• Level 1: Gift of alacrity (+1)
• Level 2: Misty step (+1), pass without trace (+1)

Spell Descriptions

• Shield. Just a simple spell juggle to free up an extra spell known.
• Dispel Magic. We’ve had this before, now it’s here to stay.
• Banishment. Get rid of enemies with low Charisma saves. This is a very situational spell at this level, especially given that high-CR monsters tend to have quite high Charisma saves (not to mention Legendary Resistance), but it can be an emergency button to remove an extremely terrifying foe.

Strategy

Nothing big this level, honestly. The main thing we did here with regards to spells was just to gear up for the final level.

Level 20 (Clockwork soul sorcerer 11, oathbreaker paladin 6, undead warlock 3)

Spells

Spell Slots

• Level 1: 4 slots
• Level 2: 3 slots, 2 pact slots
• Level 3: 3 slots
• Level 4: 3 slots
• Level 5: 2 slot
• Level 6: 1 slot
• Level 7: 1 slot

Paladin Spells

• Level 1: [Hellish rebuke, inflict wounds] bless, command, detect magic
• Level 2: [Crown of madness, darkness] find steed, aid, locate object, lesser restoration, protection from poison

Sorcerer Spells

• Cantrips: Mind sliver, prestidigitation, mold earth, minor illusion, shape water
• Level 1: [shield, absorb elements] mage armor, silvery barbs
• Level 2: [Rope trick, pyrotechnics] web, Tasha’s mind whip, vortex warp
• Level 3: [Tiny servant, counterspell] sleet storm, hypnotic pattern, dispel magic
• Level 4: [Stone shape, fabricate] dimension door, banishment
• Level 5: [Transmute rock, wall of force] synaptic static
• Level 6: Mass suggestion, scatter

Warlock Spells

• Cantrips: Eldritch blast, magic stone
• Level 1: Bane, expeditious retreat, find familiar (R)
• Level 2: Phantasmal force, suggestion

Other Spells

• Cantrips: Blade ward
• Level 1: Gift of alacrity (+1)
• Level 2: Misty step (+1), pass without trace (+1)

Spell Descriptions

• Mass Suggestion. Set conditional commands or get an unpaid workforce. Pretty nice overall.
• Scatter. This is vortex warp but affects more creatures and is more expensive. Can make your whole party fall back in case of an enemy with a truly dangerous spell like feeblemind or something similar, or just if you think your Aura of Protection won’t be adequate protection against a big scary AoE.

Strategy

Not a terribly exciting way to wrap up our levels, but hey, we never said paladin would be an exciting class. Play like you always have been since about Tier Three, but just directly better. Essentially the biggest thing separating you from a normal sorcerer is the lack of the wish spell; sorcerer spells between level 6 and 8 are pretty lackluster anyway.

Overall Summary

As you can see, Paladins can essentially play like ⅔ casters with some outstanding features. Their unique position in 5e makes them perfect candidates for keeping pass without trace up and their uber-powerful features ensure that it’s not all they’re contributing. This build is a bit campaign dependant, but that’s about it for the negatives of this build. Otherwise it’s a powerhouse in all departments, except for single target damage (unless you get a Minotaur Skeleton, Wight, Deathlock Wight, a good dpr Ghost humanoid or a Wraith). Yeah, this thing is pretty good.

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