The School of Abjuration is a subclass of magic that focuses on protection and defense. It offers notable defensive spells such as Shield, Absorb Elements, and Counterspell. An Abjurer gains additional features that provide enhanced protection and defense, allowing them to be an Abjuration Savant (Level 2) or Abjuration Savant (Level 3).
The School of Abjuration Wizard can create protective spells, such as creating a physical or magical barrier, negating magical or physical abilities, harming trespassers, or even banishing them. When casting an abjuration spell of 1st level or higher, the ward regains hit points equal to twice the level of the spell.
Illusion spells are also a part of the school, but they face poor dice checks and can consume a spell slot if failed. Partially real illusions are breakable, and it is not possible to remove existing things, only create new ones.
An abjurer can restore hit points to their Arcane Ward with any abjuration spell of 1st level or higher. However, Minor Illusion is unreliable and may not be suitable for all wizards. For Wizards, Abjurer is great with Sculpt Spells, Diviner is useful, and Enchantment has some nice debuffs to improve illusion spells.
In summary, the School of Abjuration is a fun and effective subclass for players who want to build a defensive and protective wizard.
📹 Abjuration Wizards are hard to kill in Dnd 5e! – Advanced guide to Abjuration
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Is Counterspell an abjuration?
Counterspell is an abjuration spell that aims to prevent another spell from being cast. It can be used to counter a spell within 60 feet of the caster, if the spell is of the same level as counterspell. If the spell is more powerful, it may fail. If the caster wants to interrupt a higher-level spell, they can cast counterspell as a higher-level spell, and if the targeted spell is the same level or lower, it will be stopped.
Is abjuration wizard strong?
The School of Abjuration is a powerful martial art that emphasizes protection and defense. It offers numerous defensive spells like Shield, Absorb Elements, and Counterspell. The School of Abjuration Wizard has additional features that enhance protection and defense, making it even more sturdy than other optimized Wizards. This is due to the interaction of dice probability and AC scaling in a system of bounded accuracy. Optimized full casters with an armor dip can wear a shield in one hand while casting spells with the other, have Shield and other spells ready when needed, and contribute meaningfully to combat.
Unlike optimized martials, which require both hands dedicated to their weapon(s), the School of Abjuration Wizard has additional protective features. This makes the gap in hit dice less significant when the casters are getting hit less often.
Could Snape do wandless magic?
Wandless magic, a rare form of magic, is often used during intense moments of emotion or stress, as seen in the Triwizard Tournament. Other notable wizards who have used wandless magic include Gellert Grindelwald, Queenie Goldstein, Alastor Moody, Barty Crouch Jr., Severus Snape, Filius Flitwick, Minerva McGonagall, Remus Lupin, and Quirinus Quirrell. This form of magic demonstrates that a wand is not the only necessity, and that the true power lies within the wizard.
Harry Potter, upon discovering his magical abilities, navigates a world beyond belief, facing Voldemort and his dark wizarding forces. The Harry Potter franchise, which includes seven books, eight movies, three spinoffs, a stage play, and numerous video games, features a diverse cast including Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, Rupert Grint, Alan Rickman, Michael Gambon, Ralph Fiennes, Maggie Smith, and Robbie Coltrane.
What is the best feat for wizard abjuration?
The School of Abjuration Wizard is a defensive subclass in Dungeons and Dragons Fifth Edition, with students often overreacting with magical wards, shield spells, and counterspells. However, their protective abilities allow them to be more adventurous. Enrolling in the School of Abjuration starts at level two, and once chosen as a specific magical field, players become an Abjuration Savant, halving the time and gold cost required to copy an abjuration spell into their spell book. These abilities allow wizards to be more adventurous and protect themselves from attacks. By playing a School of Abjuration wizard, players can feel safe and confident in their abilities.
Do wizards have access to all spells?
A wizard is privy to the entirety of the spells enumerated on their class list and is thus empowered to replicate any spell belonging to another wizard.
What can abjuration magic do?
Abjuration is a school of magic that focuses on protective spells and suppressing others’ magic. It creates physical or magical barriers, negates abilities, harms trespassers, or banishes the target to another plane of existence. Abjurers or abjurists specialize in this type of magic. The Breaching Festival, held annually at the Acadamae, the premier magical college in Korvosa, challenges participants to defeat the protective magics of the school.
Abjuration is also a major focus at the Stone of the Seers, Magnimar’s best-known academy of magic. During the reign of ancient Thassilon, abjuration was associated with the sin of envy and was the specialty of the ruler of Edasseril.
Can any Wizard take dunamancy spells?
The objective of dunamancy spells is to facilitate accessibility to two specific wizard subclasses in the immediate future. However, there is also the possibility of implementing these spells for other spellcasting classes, with the intention of earning or rewarding them.
What is the abjuration spell in Wizard?
Abjuration is one of the eight schools of magic in Dungeons and Dragons, with abjurers being specialists who focus on spells belonging to this school. These spells focus on protection, avoiding detection from magic, and dealing with extradimensional beings. Abjurers are skilled at protecting themselves and strengthening their allies. Wizards who choose D and D’s School of Abjuration for their Arcane Tradition gain access to amazing abilities, such as Arcane Ward, which allows them to create a magical buffer that absorbs damage.
The 10th level Improved Abjuration allows players to add their proficiency bonus to ability checks on abjuration spells, making it easier to stop enemy spellcasters. If an abjurer reaches level 14, they gain the Spell Resistance ability, giving damage resistance to all spells and an advantage on saving throws against spells. Abjurers are as skilled at keeping themselves alive as their allies and make a potent team with Clerics focusing on healing. The Player’s Handbook lists all spells alphabetically, with specific schools noted in spell descriptions.
Can chronurgy wizards take graviturgy spells?
The rules text does not explicitly limit Dunamancy spells to wizards of either Chonurgy Magic or Graviturgy Magic subclasses. The categorization is thematic, allowing Chronurgy Magic Wizards to learn and cast Graviturgy spells. Toll the Dead is a better comparison to Chill Touch, as it has double the range, does d8 or d12 damage, and targets Wisdom saves that aren’t as consistently high. While the spell is not a bad concept, it’s not reliable and not effective when used. To improve its effectiveness, try raising the damage die to d6s, extending the range to 50 or 60 ft., or changing the saving throw to a Strength save.
Can all wizards do wandless magic?
Wandless magic is the practice of performing magic without a wand, which can be challenging for beginners and can have unpredictable results. Witches and wizards accustomed to using wands can only reliably perform wandless magic if they possess great skill. However, in regions where wands were not used, wandless magic was considered the norm and using one was optional. Wands were used by witches and wizards to channel their magic, making their spells more accurate and potent.
Only the most powerful and disciplined wizards could perform wandless magic reliably. The wand was a European invention, and some cultures did not traditionally rely on such tools for magic. Native Americans had pre-European practices that did not require a wand, and African witches and wizards only adopted the wand in the 20th century.
Do wizards get 2 spells every level?
As a wizard, you can add two spells of your choice to your spellbook for free each time you gain a wizard level. These spells must be of a level for which you have spell slots, as shown on the Wizard table. You may find other spells during your adventures. Additionally, you can regain some magical energy by studying your spellbook. Once a day, you can choose expended spell slots to recover, with a combined level equal to or less than half your wizard level. For instance, a 4th-level wizard can recover up to two levels worth of spell slots.
📹 5 Tricks All Good Wizards Know In D&D
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I’m so old that I played D&D when the fallacy of squishy casters wasn’t a fallacy. D&D used to be balanced around the idea that spellcasters were insanely powerful at higher levels, but it was really hard to get there for reasons like arcane casting couldn’t happen in any armor, proficiency or no: d4 hit dice and more experience points needed to gain levels. Optimized 5e parties can easily be played with no martial and that makes me sad. Oh well, I’m off to roll another god-wizard.
I got invited to play with some much less experienced players, and used Abjuration Wizard to play a Muscle Wizard. I walked around tanking with Shield spell and Arcane Ward and punched stuff. When someone made a rookie mistake and got bailed out with a well placed Web or other shutdown spell, they said “Oh right. You’re a Wizard”. It was fun. It was also a very unoptimized table. With a more serious build the dungeons could be soloed, so the suboptimal strategy created space at the table for the new players to do stuff.
My friend ran a high level one-shot with a spellcaster BBEG, so I rolled a mark of warding dwarf abjuration wizard and dipped sorcerer to get subtle spell. Can’t counter my counterspell if you don’t see me casting it! The best one was when the BBEG tried to true polymorph himself into a tarrasque and got counterspelled. We had a blast and I really enjoyed playing a abjuration wizard. TL;DR – Subtle spell is also a fun combo with abjuration wizard when you’re fighting other spellcasters. They can’t counter your reaction, and it refills your ward!
I like the Deep Gnome for this: “Gnomish Magic Resistance. You have advantage on Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma saving throws against spells.” Although, I like Vedalken better: “Vedalken Dispassion. You have advantage on all Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma saving throws.” b/c MotM did not touch them. 🙂
“Whenever you take damage, the ward takes the damage instead. If this damage reduces the ward to 0 hit points, you take any remaining damage.” The damage is calculated against you, then reduced properly: meaning it WOULD count any resistances, Immunities, and vulnerabilities before the ward takes it Otherwise if you were Immune to a type of damage the ward would take damage anyway (which is… dumb)
I have a Mark of Warding Dwarf multiclass that has quite quickly become my favourite I have ever played. The Abjurer Armourer! 3 levels of Artificer with Armourer subclass, then the rest going into in Abjuration Wizard. Obviously picked up Eldritch Adept to recharge my Ward. I haven’t planned out later feats yet but the setup let’s me play party tank super well while keeping all the power of a Wizard (though a little delayed). I am able use Int for melee attacks, force people to target me lest they have disadvantage on their attacks against my allies but upon hitting me in melee get chunked by Armour of Agathys, and still get really high ac with little stat investment by using heavy armour and a shield (no str needed because Arcane Armour and no dex needed for obvious reasons, though dex is still really useful for saving throws). I get the high ac may seem counter productive to Armour of Agathys but I let my allies get ac boosting stuff first to keep me more likely to get hit while still keeping relatively safe from ranged attacks.
I will say that as someone who’s played a DEX Goblin abjuration wizard, the combination is so strong. Like, Hiding or disengaging on a bonus action is insane, because you can pair that with an action spell with an attack roll for advantage (I preferred to use Scorching ray, because it scales very well with spell levels and is super spammable). Fury of the Small was also always great as a damage bonus too in combination with spells that are super likely to hit. I also liked using Greater Invisibility to grant myself infinite advantage on stealth, and while it doesn’t always work due to true sight and the like, it works enough to justify defaulting to it as a concentration spell in combat. Counterspell and Dispel Magic get such a huge buff from adding proficiency to their checks too. Like it cannot be stated enough how having an extra few points in that calculation skews it so heavily. like on average, you could roll like a 10 and still get 19 at that level if you’re maxed in intelligence. That’s enough to dispel a 9th level spell effect. You know, just the strongest spells in the game. In fact, if you really wanted to be crafty, you could pair this feature with the Rogues Reliable talent skill to ALWAYS dispel or counterspell outside of a higher level. Albeit that would be silly unless you were playing a level 20 game because a 10/10 split is the only way to do it really. Still cool though. The ward scales really well, and getting advantage against spells is so big as a capstone.
Loved the article, all these features are what drew me to make my own Metallic Dragonborn Abjurer, I decided to take the gift of the metallic dragon from FToD for extra theme, ally protection, and access to cure wounds (The character is sort of filling a Paladin/Wizard role within the party, buffing and protecting whilst also doing a bit of debuffing/damage against enemies)
I had played this with a character that was also the turtle race so I had 17 ac and using an unearthed arcana ( with permission from the DM) to have proficiency in shields, I became sort of a tank for the party especially with blur. Probably not the best combination of class and race but it was definitely fun and a different play style than a normal wizard
My biggest problem with Abjuration wizard is that there just are just… so few generally-useful abjuration spells. Don’t get me wrong, I understand why the school isn’t as populated as Evocation, but still… There are 28 spells in the school, but really only ~7 are worth casting. The rest are housekeeping spells like Arcane Lock, scrying interference spells like Nondetection, hyper-specific like Magic Circle, or actively terrible like Stoneskin… and of those 7 spells that are worth casting, 3 of them are only valid against spellcasters, and most of the remaining spells are 1st level. Edit for clarity: The only number I can say for certain is exact here is the 28. Everything else is a lot of hasty counting so I probably missed one or two here or there, and yours and my definition of “generally useful” may be different.
I’m currently playing an Agathys Abjurer in my campaign, and finally at level 4 my build has come online (I went 1 warlock/2 wizard/2 warlock and will continue with only wizard from here). I ended up going Genie Dao warlock because the vessel is a cool feature, like a private wizard library, and the extra guaranteed damage on my cantrips just feels nice even if it isn’t that much. The only problem with going Hexblade I feel is that you can’t actually use the Armor of Shadows invocation while wearing armor, so you’d have to take a few minutes donning and doffing armor. It isn’t really a big issue but it was enough for me to not. And for my Warlock spells, I took Hex, Armor of Agathys, and Comprehend Languages. I wanted to avoid anything that would use my Charisma score, and Hex has really helped keep my damage relevant as everyone else got second level spell slots. All in all, the build feels okay at level 4, but I can’t wait for bigger spell slots and bigger Agathys casts, as I’m our second frontline type character and ten is a lot of damage per hit even at level 5!
pretty huge thing here I feel like was missed, Crafting scrolls, over time you can craft up plenty of mage armor scrolls and shield scrolls, it can get pretty out of hand. but realistically using mage armor at the beginning of the day and then using arcane recovery to just get the spell slot back with arcane recovery, and fill you scroll case with dozens of shield spells for if things ever get super hairy.
If there is another subclass I would love to have an in-depth article like this on, it would have to be the necromancy wizard. I think getting super specific insights into how the different features interact with your staple spells as a necromancer could be very nice. A few points you could bring up is that animate dead when used at the end of a day could give you ludicrous amounts of minions, as well as all your spell slots the next day. Obviously, both Summon Undead from Tasha’s and more importantly, Danse Macabre are amazing spells for you, because those undead are also buffed from your 6th level feature (however the Skeletal version of Summon Undead doesn’t actually get the damage bonus). As for other notable spells that could be good for combination is Invisibility, so you can run around almost untargetable and micromanage your zombies as a bonus action, or simply having them all dogpile and grapple targets while you drop a cloudkill on them. And then talking about the potential of Comman Undead, especially with stuff like Nightwalkers, would be really cool
how would you make a character near immortal? personally i went with at minimum Kalashtar Totem Barbarian 4 Arcana Cleric 11 this is so that i am now resiliant to EVERY kind of damage and can have contingency for Revivify if possible with the DM to gain a Supernatural Gift then the obvious ones to gain are ether Heroic Destiny or Hollow One for ether advantage on death saves and one use 1hp revive per long rest or a constant roll of 16 or higher on a death save your back at 1HP respectivly
So, I often alter the spell school based second level ability to allow you to cast a spell of said school proficiency modifier times per long rest without consuming a spell slot chosen when you prepare your spells. This gives the older wizard subclasses a bit of a bump that they need to be especially powerful.
Now, enjoyable article Kobold…but you started it off on a lie; 5E is a dangerous game. 5E is objectively one of the least dangerous games on the market. I’ve got 20 years of RPG experience, own nearly 100 RPGs, have GMed about half of those, and run multiple different games and systems at any time. A GM can MAKE 5E dangerous, but that requires significant work. By default, 5E is only really dangerous at levels 1-2. After that, only exceptional dice rolls or terrible play can make a game run RAW dangerous.
Great stuff, I didn’t know about the deep gnome thing. Big shame about the material cost but hey at later levels that could be a negligible cost. I think armor of agathys is as good as people say it is with arcane ward, only because (especially until later) abjuration spell options suuuuck. So many of them are way situational or not useable during combat. Even the best ones, Counterspell and Dispel Magic, require you to be fighting spellcasters, and a lot of dnd monsters just have magical features instead of innate casting that would even be worth countering. Meanwhile armor of agathys gives you temp HP which is always nice, since just about every dnd monster deals damage to win, with the added bonus of messing up melee attackers. Even if it takes your whole action, you still have your reaction available for counterspell, shield, or to throw out a projected ward with those new ward points you just got back.
Technically, if you project your ward to a friend about to be hit by a melee attack, resulting in your ward taking X amount of melee damage. Would that trigger (AoA)Armor of Agathys’ damage proc? I assume no, because AoA states ‘If a creature hits you’. However, the same argument could be stated for the attack hitting the ward and not you regardless of projection or your own melee attacking foe.
Yeah! Gnomes Bad! But what do we think about dipping Abjuration Wizards? If you get the ability to refill it at no cost then is it worth taking like 2-4 levels of this subclass? Let’s say you take this dip and have a 14 intelligence? That gives you 6 HP extra that you can refill for free after every battle. I’m just thinking about a build here so ignore if you desire. You could go Turtle race. This gives you a 17 AC. Take the first two levels in Hexblade Warlock. This gives you access to shields. Your base AC is 19, and you can dump Dex. You can take Armor of Aggy. Then take 2 levels in Wizard. If you took the points that you’d usually put from dex and put in Int you’d probably have a 14 or so. Maybe can do 15 and at some point take a half feet to get to 16. But for now you’d have a 19 AC with Armor of Agathis cast and your 6 point arcane ward. So effectively 11 point Armor of Agathis. Wizard also gives you the Shield spell to further control what hits you take. Then I’d like to take something like Swords Bard, and go the rest of the way there. Flourishes can raise your AC to a max of 30 wth good die rolls. Average would be 27.5 when you definitely don’t want to be hit… This character likes being hit, but some attacks just deal too much damage or you could be in a critical situation. Thoughts?
I’m currently playing a Hobgoblin Abjuration Wizard at a no-multiclassing table, planning on taking moderately armored at level 4 for medium armor and shields to build off hobgoblin’s racial light armor. Really enjoying the subclass so far, it’s always funny to be a wizard able to frontline decently well in early levels.
wouldn’t Eldritch mind just be over reaching in the concentration protection basket? if you’re already adding a hitpool of more than 15hp and still play as defensively as other casters why would you need advantage? unless the campaign and encounters are skewed to mess with concentration based casters…
Armour of Agathys is NOT overrated. It is vastly underrated. What people overrate is the ammounts of time it should be used. For a wizard – healing comes at a premium and sometimes survivability is of incredible import – at these times having armour of agathys as an option is absolutely crazy powerful as an abjuration wizard. Spamming this and expecting greater results that from using things like wall of force, counterspell and wish…. No. Armour of Agathys is just another ace up your sleeve that can save your life sometimes and sometimes deal insane ammounts of damage. Use when the situation calls for it and otherwise dont. We dont spam any spell without using our brains. And no, dont play gnome.
I can’t count the number of times I’ve had a DM get the use of Counterspell and Dispel Magic wrong. Every time I hear that a non-aberration Wizard can add their proficiency to those spells, I ask the DM after the game why it was allowed, and they claim its RAI. I then ask what they intend to give Aberration Wizards at level 10 in response to such a rule, and I’m asked “What are you talking about?” I show the ability, they read it, and go, “Oh! … Oh. … Oh…….” At that point I say, “That’s right. Stopping a spell from being cast or already in place is hard. Adding proficiency is something only someone practiced at doing it can get.” I’ll also be honest, I didn’t think about the Bard’s “Jack of all Trades” bonus to all untrained skill checks. They certainly could benefit from it as it’s a skill check.
A.) Agathys is a summon and when used with umbra they possess. Its very real. Sorry you likely know this. B.) Abjur is the heaven word for abjuration. U though is for use. Abjer is for emission nen types like me. (Thanks Ms Valefor David for telling me) C.) Svirfneblin is a grimm gaea fae power to do as you described. I use Absol clairvoyance and attributes (puesdo sphinx jimengan type). D.) Alarm is in the same tree as detect lie. Naeberius lie eater jackal Anuea helps with this.
This is honestly one of my favorite subclasses for Wizard, simply because I absolutely LOVE the concept of wards and protectiveness towards others. One thing that I’ve always been curious about is the recharge mechanic for the Ward. Does it go off the level of the spell or the spell slot you use? Say I decide to Counterspell at 6th level, would I still get 6 ward health back for it being a 3rd level spell or 12 for deciding to use a 6th level slot on it?
I play an abjuration Wizard in our Campaign and my DM gave us a book, where we could take mini feats every few levels. One of them boosted my ward to a bit more hp. I then took the eldritch adept feat with shadow armour feat. So now I can refill the ward after every combat. He then proceeded to give me magic items to increase my AC to 21. Additional I now have access to contingency, which makes me even more unkillable😂
Perhaps worth pointing out, as the second Sage Advice says that the Ward does not share any of the casters Immunities or Resistances, that would mean even if you cast Resist/Protection from Elements and choose Fire for example, and then take Fire damage, the Ward takes the full damage as it does not share said resistance. However, excess damage after the Ward falls is then resisted by the Wizard. Also, I am kinda wanting to make an Eldritch Knight/Abjuration Wizard multiclass build. I’d say about 6-8 Fighter (for ASI/Feats) and the rest Wizard. Effectively, and Abjuration Wizard in Full Plate with the Shield Spell, and possibly a physical shield too. Maybe use one of the Fighters Feats to get Magic Initiate for the Warlocks Armor of Agathys, and use your high level spell slots to cast it. Thus not only restoring your Ward with the High level/Up-Casted Abjuration Spell, but being the Front Line Mage/Tank as it were, any who attack you in melee takes damage.
I started as a fighter with defence fighting style so with a shield i had 19 AC at lvl 1. Then continued fighter to lvl 2 because action surge is fun. Then i will just continue abjuration wizard. Me, my gf and some friends takes turn being dm and my gf is ruthless and I wanted to have an unkillible wizard.
Gnomes rule, kobalds drool! That said, great article on arcane ward. I’d add that when min/maxing your stats as a wizard, Arcane Ward also allows you to minimize the amount of points you put to constitution (so they can be spent on Int, Wis, or Dex instead), as the Ward makes up for a significant portion of the lost hit points while also significantly reducing the importance of constitution when it comes to maintaining concentration. HOWEVER, it’s also really important to remember that Arcane Ward hit points are not your character’s HP, so spells that are based on a targets HP, like power word kill, would completely ignore the ward and kill you dead if you nerfed your Constitution and have less than 100 HP. However, one critique that I’d offer is that you make it seem like you’re only taking Svirfniblin magic to get Mage Armor at will, but you also get a few other daily cast spells, which (while not at will casts) are free in that you don’t have to select them when leveling and you don’t have to prepare them in your spellbook to cast. You also say that Arcane Ward is why you pick this sub-class. While it is a MAJOR reason, the abjuration sub-class also has spell resistance and a bunch of other features which make it very powerful against outsiders like devils, fey, etc. (banishments/long-term summons binding) and against other magic users. Average Magic Caster or Magic Using Creature: “I will use my power to reshape the material world and bend it to my will!” Abjuration Specialist: “And I will use my power to reshape your spells and bend you to MY will!
War Mage Wizard is kinda underappreciated in my opinion. Maybe because people forget that their +2 to AC or +4 to saves works outside of battle AND it is only applied IF you are hit or fail the saving throw. I played one in a very roleplay heavy campaign. It didn’t come up very often but it was very clutch in those situations… except when I just rolled very poorly, lol
I played an abjuration wizard hobgoblin as a frontline tank and it was super effective. I have to give my life cleric credit for catching on and prioritizing me for her healing, but even after I got up after going down – losing my class ability due to being temporarily unconcious – I was disgustingly difficult to take down. 10/10 would recommend 👌
• Moon Druid • Action = Cast Concentration spell • Bonus Action = Wild Shape into Giant Badger • Movement = Burrow straight down You now have Full Cover and can use spell slots to heal yourself, if an enemy manages to hit you. Add Silvery Barbs through a feat or other means to gain a useful Reaction to protect your Concentration.
Would a Mountain Dwarf also not be a good build for this class? Using Tasha’s to move the ability points you now have 2+2 vs standard 2+1, also you have medium armor proficiency. This would negate having to cast Mage Armor twice a day and your Arcane Ward can activate as soon as you need it (soon as you cast Shield or Absorb Elements the first time you might possibly take dmg). Downside you only have 25ft movement but you’re a wizard so you mostly stay back anyways.
I play a warlock on monday nights and we are a group of 4 level 1 adventurers. We are running Rime of the frost maiden and were facing a grell in a mine. We weren’t doing the best and the grell had a party member grappled and was taking it away, so I cast armor of agathys and then entered its space, forcing it to make an attack of opportunity (which it succeeded in hitting me) and it took an automatic 5 cold damage, then our wizard cast ray of frost, freezing the beast and killing it. It was a very long fight, but it proved that armor of agathys does in fact come in handy. Btw, at the end of the battle, only the wizard was left standing and had just a single hit point left. Wizards save the day.
As the DM of an Abjuration wizard, I can confirm, they are hard to kill. Not that I am actually trying to kill my players, it’s just plain hard to even touch his actual HP. Throw in shield, smart positioning, and liberal uses of counterspell, and you can see why he feels like an unstoppable machine, haha.
I’ve played an Abjuration wizard and I just don’t think the arcane ward scales well, 2/wizard level plus int mod might be only 1 hit. Is the main feature of the class really worth just 1 hit per combat? or maybe 2? It’s not worth charging it during combat due to action economy, You are better off trying to take down your enemies instead of using your action to just charge a few HP worth of a shield.
If we go with a couple of levels of Warlock using this, another spell worth picking up is Hellish Rebuke to compliment Armor of Agathys. When combined with the defenses the Abjuration Wizard gives you and updating these spells then you can use your reaction to take a little damage and punish them with with a ton of fire and ice damage to finish them off while taking very little actual damage to yourself. Not a combo to abuse but it can be awesome for finishing off a big boss in glorious fashion lol
I am currently playing a mark of warding Dwarf abjuration wizard and I am loving it! We’ve reached level 7 and my DM is starting to respect my tank wizard. Though my DM and I both agree that the ward takes damage in place of you, therefore Armour of Agathys doesn’t proc until your ward is depleted. It makes your projected ward feature a little more useful in my opinion too. The rule you quote at 8:14 supports this too. Thanks for the article! edit – changed timestamp
Arcane Ward is the bomb, I gave a kinda weaker version to my table’s homebrew Paladin subclass that allows him to move it from ally to ally as need be. It’s super fun to see him place the ward on the wild shaped Druid and keep their animal up longer, or protect the wizard when he’s concentrating on a big important spell.
For the Armor of Agathys damage, if your ward takes damage and you don’t (since neither your actual or temp HP take damage, and it is phrased as the ward taking the damage instead of you) are you actually getting hit? edit also, at the end, you say Sage Advice states that the ward isn’t tied to the wizard, so that would further support my interpretation xD
7:31 Unfortunately I don’t think this will work, since the description says: While the ward has 0 hit points, it can’t absorb damage, but its magic remains. Whenever you cast an abjuration spell of 1st level or higher, the ward regains a number of hit points equal to twice the level of the spell. Which means, as I understand it, that it would work just for the first spell cast. I don’t think you can actually stack the cumulative effect of multiple ritual (or even normal) abjuration spells cast once the ward is no longer at 0 HP.
The other thing about armor of Agathys is that your dm can do what my dm did. Concentration rules as written says that you must make a constitution saving throw in order to maintain concentration when YOU take damage, armor of Agathys rules say if a creature hits YOU with a melee attack, that creature takes the cold damage from armor of agathys. My dm ruled that since arcane ward blocks damage for the sake of a concentration save, it takes damage INSTEAD of me, and thus does not trigger armor of agathys damage because I am not technically being hit by a creature with a melee attack, the ward is.
I… Question this… I see options to refill the ward without spell slots and I’m always skeptical if a DM would allow this because that’s basically infinite HP with extra steps. Heck I’m not sure I’d allow it (if not I’d rule it as the ward only recharges hp if a slot is used). On one hand: the player made choices (and therefore trade-offs) to allow it to be possible in the first place (either time for ritual casting or feats/multiclassing). On the other: it’s article-gamey cheese in feel. (Yeah it could be narrated as basically meditating to recharge it, but mechanically it’s casting mage repeatedly like you’re leveling Alteration in Skyrim). Anyone have experience with this in game: either it getting house ruled, or if the constant refilling was in fact not actually disruptive to play/balance?
I personally prefer the Mark Dwarf forge cleric just for heavy armor + shield + agathis at lvl 1 then all the way wizard. It’s not optimal because i need 15 str for 20 ac, but oh well. The other option would be 3 levels in artificer for the arcane armor (use heavy armor wothout str) but that’s a 3 lvls delay
Projected Ward was the inspiration for a homebrewed shield item I made. You can expend 1-3 charges to boost the AC of someone within 30ft by that much, in response to them being hit with an attack (this technically applies to the shield-wielder themselves, as it’s a creature they can see, and not another creature, felt I might as well let the martial have something nice and caster-y). If the boost isn’t enough to force a miss, it still reduces the damage by 1d6 per charge.
Arcane Ward has such shoddy wording in my opinion. It doesn’t say how many hit points, if any, the ward has when you first summon it, only the hit point maximum, so it’s perfectly reasonable to read it as: The first spell makes the ward but it’s empty and you need to fill it up with further casts OR it starts with twice the spell level used to create it. If you read it in either of these ways it basically necessitates using cheesy methods to refill it to get any value from the feature. Secondly, the way you refill it is in a new paragraph that starts with “while the ward has 0 hit points” which for a cursory reading (ie: a player reading the ability for the first time) implies that the following paragraph is only relevant while the ward has 0 hp. It makes it seem like you can only refill it from empty.
the unfortunate and sad thing about Eldritch Adept, it’s basically only usable on warlocks, ” learn one Eldritch Invocation option of your choice from the warlock class. ” this isn’t to say you CAN’T pick it up as a fighter, it’s just you still need to meet the requirements of the Invocation, i.e. warlock levels