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[Kagus]

UA being broken is a feature, not a bug. And Twilight Circle becoming official is highly unlikely for a number of reasons. That new barbarian is pretty great though.

Speaking of UA being broken, I just looked up Lore Master again... Good lord, that thing is some staggeringly pungent cheese (also I realized it has a funny interaction with Telekinesis, in that you can just slowly lift someone up into the air 30' at a time, up to "the reach of the spell"... Which, since TK has an actual range of 60' and not "Self", means the Lore Master can extend it to one mile).

I've got no idea what Twilight's background is for special circumstances regarding it not going official (other than usual brokenness, which can always be tweaked). Wild Spirit barb just... Just... Uggh.

Say goodbye to using your rage anywhere near your party, except as a means of recharging someone's spell slots. Which I'm sure is eminently exploitable with feedback loops provided someone has some decent healing capabilities, but at least force damage is difficult to gain resistance to...

[Loud Whispers]

So, conversion Warlocks... Characters that use their high CHA to persuade others into serving their patron, shaping cults and earning boons for their service in providing more followers.

What's your preferred patron? Archfey has the Fey Presence thing (which honestly seems a little tricky to maneuver properly), and the spell list has stuff like Calm Emotions and eventually Dominate Beast/Person. There's also the 14th level ability, but that's more for getting one particular individual over to your side than convincing or addressing a larger group.

Fiend actually has some utility with Dark One's Own Luck letting you add 1d10 to an ability check or saving throw, for example when attempting to persuade a group of prospective followers of the wisdom in embracing your patron's guidance. I also think it'd be funny to use Fiendish Resilience along with burning/poisoning yourself in an act to prove the protection your lord provides you. Command on the spell list is nice too, plus they actually get Hallow should you finally pull a proper cult together and want to have some fun with that.

GOO has some nifty stuff in the spell list, plus telepathy can potentially let you have a little "voice of god" moment with people. I imagine speaking from inside someone's head should do a number on convincing them of supernatural power. Thralls at 14th are fun too for those particularly difficult nuts to crack.

I am planning one character who is an actual clown serving an arch-fey who gave him his powers because it is a right laugh. I wanted to do an actual clown, not an edgy killer clown or court assassin jester, so he never uses combat abilities or any spells which do damage. Literally just maxing out on charm spells and illusions to make a clown that goes around recruiting enemies for his hijinks
It helps that I plan for him to use his pocket dimension to bring people to his literal circus world to spread the fun everywhere. Wholesome clowning

[Iduno]

What classes can have a/several candiru that they order around?

[Persus13]

I've got no idea what Twilight's background is for special circumstances regarding it not going official (other than usual brokenness, which can always be tweaked). Wild Spirit barb just... Just... Uggh.

Say goodbye to using your rage anywhere near your party, except as a means of recharging someone's spell slots. Which I'm sure is eminently exploitable with feedback loops provided someone has some decent healing capabilities, but at least force damage is difficult to gain resistance to...

The main reason you're unlikely to see Twilight becoming official is its 4 years old and the druid circles in the same document were released 3 years ago. Also if you've seen Wild Soul in action, using your rage near the party is fine 95% of the time and does a negligible amount of damage to them the rest of the time. The spell slot recharger is the perfect example of a UA ability that needs a few tweaks before it sees the light of day, which is exactly why they put out UA in the first place.

[delphonso]

Ah, a Bushmaster! Lashing freely into any hairy situation, unshaken by even the closest of shaves! Charging headlong into any tangle, and emerging victorious through razor wit or shear luck! Shedding all unnecessary trappings and cutting straight to the chase; the braiding together of the civilized and uncivilized worlds into a unique weave of culture and primalism... Doing away with the locks and trappings of over-sophisticated pomposity, while narrowly avoiding the rat's nest of outright savagery!

...yeah, that's all I've got for now.

This is very much appreciated.

[Kagus]

What classes can have a/several candiru that they order around?

Well, Druid is an obvious pick, alternatively Bard using Magical Secrets to pick up Conjure Animals... Or you could dip into UA and theme a Swarmkeeper Ranger as being surrounded by the little fishies.

However, you may be disappointed to learn that...


How to annoy everyone at the table by rolling a gazillion goddamn dice: Fighter 2, Vengeance Paladin 4, Sorcerer 14 (subclass doesn't really matter, but might as well be red draconic for a little extra damage).

Turn 1: Fighpalerer closes to within 10' of target, uses bonus action to Channel Divinity into Vow of Enmity. Casts Scorching Ray at 8th level (as per multiclass rules, a Sorc14/Pal4 will have an 8th level slot) with Empowered Spell metamagic. Action Surge. Casts Scorching Ray at 7th level with Empowered Spell metamagic.

So that's 16 attack rolls with advantage, or 32 d20 rolls. 2d6 gets rolled 16 times, plus (up to) 10 rerolls off of the two Empowered Spell metas. If you're a Tiefling using Xanathar's guide, you can also pick up the feat that lets you reroll any 1 on a fire damage roll once.

[Iduno]

What classes can have a/several candiru that they order around?

Well, Druid is an obvious pick, alternatively Bard using Magical Secrets to pick up Conjure Animals... Or you could dip into UA and theme a Swarmkeeper Ranger as being surrounded by the little fishies.

However, you may be disappointed to learn that...


How to annoy everyone at the table by rolling a gazillion goddamn dice: Fighter 2, Vengeance Paladin 4, Sorcerer 14 (subclass doesn't really matter, but might as well be red draconic for a little extra damage).

Turn 1: Fighpalerer closes to within 10' of target, uses bonus action to Channel Divinity into Vow of Enmity. Casts Scorching Ray at 8th level (as per multiclass rules, a Sorc14/Pal4 will have an 8th level slot) with Empowered Spell metamagic. Action Surge. Casts Scorching Ray at 7th level with Empowered Spell metamagic.

So that's 16 attack rolls with advantage, or 32 d20 rolls. 2d6 gets rolled 16 times, plus (up to) 10 rerolls off of the two Empowered Spell metas. If you're a Tiefling using Xanathar's guide, you can also pick up the feat that lets you reroll any 1 on a fire damage roll once.

If you want to talk about rolling too many dice, just remember that necromancer is a pretty good choice, because "bounded accuracy" means that everyone has about equal odds of hitting, including the 100 corpses you've got following you around.

[scriver]

However, you may be disappointed to learn that...

Lies from Big Touro

[Persus13]

Quippers are more of a piranha analogue, but I could see them being Candiru in a pinch.

[Kagus]

Meh. Guess it's my turn to start becoming disillusioned with Sage Advice rulings. What with the Twinned Dragon's Breath tomfoolery (which apparently even got errata'd), and another not-entirely-thought-through comment that would seem to imply that the extra action provided by Haste can be used to cast spells (which it quite definitely cannot). The wording on that last one is vague and therefore doesn't directly imply that effect, but it is confusing.

Also, interpreting the official errata document, Twinned Spell cannot be used on:

• Fire Bolt (can target obects)
• Haste (the extra action can be used for a variety of things that would cause multiple rolls)
• Hex/Hunter's Mark (can be redirected if a target dies during the spell, affecting more than one creature)
• Heat Metal (heated object can come in contact with multiple creatures)
• Dominate Beast/Person (dominated target can be made to do something that affects multiple targets)

And, due to the wording of the errata, there is of course some more interpretation to be had here... Making things very clear indeed, yes. Or not.

[Persus13]

Meh. Guess it's my turn to start becoming disillusioned with Sage Advice rulings. What with the Twinned Dragon's Breath tomfoolery (which apparently even got errata'd), and another not-entirely-thought-through comment that would seem to imply that the extra action provided by Haste can be used to cast spells (which it quite definitely cannot). The wording on that last one is vague and therefore doesn't directly imply that effect, but it is confusing.

Also, interpreting the official errata document, Twinned Spell cannot be used on:

• Fire Bolt (can target obects)
• Haste (the extra action can be used for a variety of things that would cause multiple rolls)
• Hex/Hunter's Mark (can be redirected if a target dies during the spell, affecting more than one creature)
• Heat Metal (heated object can come in contact with multiple creatures)
• Dominate Beast/Person (dominated target can be made to do something that affects multiple targets)

And, due to the wording of the errata, there is of course some more interpretation to be had here... Making things very clear indeed, yes. Or not.

Dominate and Haste could still be Twinned under that criteria since the issue is not with multiple rolls but a singular roll affecting multiple creatures. Fire bolt has always been unable to be twinned by a strict reading of the spell, and Hex, Hunter's Mark and Heat Metal were always not eligible (doubly so for Heat Metal since it doesn't target a creature)

Also being Hasted to be able to Dodge, Disengage or do other stuff so you can spend your normal action to cast a spell is extremely helpful.

[Grim Portent]

So a few months back I did a bunch of logistics calculations on maintaining a bunch of soldier hirelings, the supplies needed to feed them, shelter them, transport goods, feed the horses, provide water and so on in DnD 5e.

I am now wondering about the same basic math, but replacing some hirelings with elephants and going full elephant cavalry, and also the variant using horses and going for conventional cavalry.

Elephants eat a lot, it works out to about 600 pounds, or 3gp a day in feed or a long time spent foraging if you aren't using goodberries to feed them. They also need a lot of water, about one and a quarter 40 gallon barrels a day. Obviously this makes for a lot of food and water that needs transported if you can't rely on natural sources, and you can never really rely on natural sources.

A dnd elephant can pull 6600 pounds, which means one elephant drawn wagon can carry supplies for the animal for just over a week. This is much worse than the maths I had done in the past for horses, oxen and donkeys, but elephants in dnd are much weaker than real ones for various stupid reasons.

So elephant cavalry is impractical without a bunch of horse drawn carts carrying food for the elephants, plus people and gear on top of that. So they can be written off as a dead end for hireling mounts. If you need two draft horses and a wagon just to carry feed for one elephant for a week things are going to get impractical fast.


Horses are much more economical to feed, and can carry huge amounts of cargo in excess of what they need to eat and drink even with their pulling capacity being much lower than real life horses. If you can get past the hurdle of saddle and warhorse costs then a couple of draft horses, or oxen if you really want to pull a lot of supplies, can be the baggage train for a dozen cavalrymen. Warhorses cost twice what an elephant does by the way, which seems quite insane.


EDIT: If you can persuade them that a diet of chickens, goats and the odd bandit is a good deal* then worgs are also surprisingly economical mounts, and they're as smart as orcs to boot. Obviously there's no real world equivalent to base their dietary needs on, but grizzly bears seem like a good rough starting point, and it works out to about a goat a day depending on the size of the goat. Goats are only 1gp, which is half the price of a normal skilled hireling.

*It's a great deal compared to what the average goblin can give them.

[Yoink]

I guess the only practical solution is... zombie elephants.   

Though we should probably bear in mind that most such creatures can graze, rather than needing to rely exclusively on feed - but then I don't know wtf elephants would even graze on, exactly, or what biomes would support them doing so.   

[Grim Portent]

They spend about 14 hours a day grazing, stripping bark off trees, eating slender branches, saplings, fruit and so on.

If you're traveling giving them time to graze would mean taking a slow meandering path.

The problem is really how little they can pull, real elephants can pull about 9 tons, or roughly three times what dnd elephants can pull, that opens up a lot of luggage space. Real horses would still be waaaay more efficient though.

[Jimmy]

Isn't hiring an unskilled laborer only something in the range of 2 sp per day? Assuming they have average scores for strength, for the cost of one elephant you can have fifteen laborers carrying 150 lbs each. Since one elephant doesn't have fifteen times the strength of the laborers, I'd assume laborers are more cost effective when transporting equipment, until you consider cost of feeding them. Then you'd need to calculate the total distance you intend to travel, divide that by the movement speed and extrapolate the cost of food for your minions.