The Psi Knife - D&D: Optimized #73

[@Spendleton]

"if you enjoy creating characters more than you do playing, welcome home." **opens spreadsheet of characters i've never played** **single tear** I'm.. home...

[@DnDDeepDive]

Yay!

[@Spendleton]

My DM has made my year though. We're doing an ALL-FOR-ONE. Everyone creates same class. Played for a few sessions. We all create another class. Alternate sessions. All create a third. Rotate sessions. All stories are converging. All classes are level synced. DM cranks encounter difficulty up really pushing the limits. Surviving (or new) characters are chosen for the epic end game 15-20. We're currently levels 9, second class.

[@Anton_Jermakoŭ]

@@DnDDeepDive me, who started dming only to put my party against my optimised builds: *muahahahaha*

[@deez4free]

Excel...lets play line 237...character is...hmmm...half-orc archeologist duskblade. Thank God for Solo mods and conversion guides.

[@samuelbroad11]

@@Spendleton now that sounds like a great meta romp!

[@nessesaryschoolthing]

Colby being viciously assaulted by his own family for suggesting a use for Silvery Barbs has got to be the cutest thing I've seen this year so far

[@HSuper_Lee]

I mean if the implication there is that silvery bard banners are an adorable swarm, well I've been called much worse, so I can accept that.

[@DnDDeepDive]

[@keithulhu]

True dat

[@HSuper_Lee]

I discovered this channel only about a month ago, and now I'm here less than 10 minutes after a new video drops. I like to think that speaks for the quality of these videos.

[@DnDDeepDive]

Ha ha! Thanks and welcome :)

[@muriomoira]

Welcome to the family!

[@kajetanmazurkiewicz5459]

As Colby says: "Welcome home!" 😊

[@randypawlikowski5127]

The same thing happened to me! I found this channel and within a couple of weeks I had watched 70+ build videos as well as 25+ episodes of their campaign... I might have a problem but its a problem I enjoy!

[@Lucky_Luke486]

Completely agreed, kind of the same

[@VestigialLung]

The rogue in the game I'm running took this focus, and I'll second how awesome the communication angle is. A few sessions back, the party were infiltrating the hideout of a baddie, and she was scouting ahead. She found the villain's inner sanctum, found the hostage, and "radio'd" back to the party what she'd found. She proceeded to spend another psi die to change up who she was talking to to loop in the hostage, told her that she was there to rescue her, to stay quiet when she arrived, snuck in, and extracted the hostage, while the rest of the party stormed the front to create a distraction. That's the sort of power that doesn't ping on people's power charts but was essential to solving that problem.

[@DnDDeepDive]

Awesome!

[@TheRobversion1]

these sorts of situations were also the reason i took the less praised telepathic feat for some of my builds over the usual telekinetic/feytouched/shadow touched/resilient/skill expert half-feats for caster types to round out my odd abiity score.

[@zeik101]

Pro tip: you can action surge to ready an attack at lower levels, then use that attack on a later turn to get sneak attack again

[@BLynn]

Level 1:(see above) [rogue 1 & race] Level 2:(see above) [rogue 2] Level 3:(@15:22) [rogue 3 & subclass] Level 4:(@28:00) [fighter 1 & fighting-style] Level 5:(@28:41) [fighter 2] Level 6:(@29:20) [fighter 3 & subclass] Level 7:(see above) [fighter 4 & ASI] Level 8:(@38:12) [fighter 5] Level 9:(@39:30) [wizard 1] Level 10:(see above) [wizard 2 & subclass] Level 11:(@50:11) [rogue 4 & ASI] Level 12:(@50:35) [fighter 6 & ASI] Level 13:(@52:14) [rogue 5] Level 14:(see above) [rogue 6] Level 15:(@53:42) [rogue 7] Level 16:(@54:07) [rogue 8 & ASI] Level 17:(@54:32) [rogue 9]

[@paralysekid]

I wish he would provide some visual overview of the end result like this, so we could see how many levels of each class a build contains. Rather than having them loosely placed throughout the video.

[@frosty5047]

@@paralysekid 7 mo late but for 2 dollars a month you got written stuff

[@jasonmarbach]

king behavior

[@TheDisplacerBeast]

Its always fun to remember that, RAW, you can add your prof bonus to the soulknife second attack as it does not count as an off hand attack.

[@pauljinkerson6359]

When you said “ it’s like Gambit” I was sold. Flinging laser daggers at people while force pushing objects at the same time and bamphfing from one spot to the other ….amazing. It’s like night crawler and gambit became Jedi. So cool

[@Waywardpaladin]

Best part about the psychic blades is they leave no marks and wounds. So you can kill someone with invisible blades and then they just look like they had a heart attack.

[@Scrumps0]

That line "if you enjoy creating characters for d&d almost as much as you enjoy playing the game itself... welcome home." That got me. Subscribed immediately

[@DnDDeepDive]

Yay! Welcome!

[@jagondal8378]

Me at the start: He's going Elven Accuracy, isn't he? Also me: *surprised Pikachu face* Psi Warrior is definitely Jedi. The only thing I think of with "Psi-Powered Leap" is the reactor fight from Star Wars ep 1. Totally Force jumping. Merch? Dice for the dice goblins! Character sheets for the Character Throne!

[@insertphrasehere15]

28:50 If you don't mind giving up your reaction for the turn, action surge does let you get two sneak attacks in: Use the second attack action to hold action to throw a dagger (by RAW this has to be a real dagger I think, as the psychic blades feature is poorly written), then throw the dagger any time before your next turn. Only really relevant from levels 5-7 though, after extra attack it becomes not worth it.

[@exqueue3813]

You're probably better off usimg something like Sentinel to trigger your reaction to get a 2nd sneak attack off since it's repeatable from round to round.

[@insertphrasehere15]

@@exqueue3813 No room in this build for the sentinel feat though. Feats aren't free. In most rogue builds I would agree with you though.

[@GaryBoyles342]

I thought one could only do a single sneak attack per turn?

[@exqueue3813]

@@GaryBoyles342 once per TURN not per round. You can sneak attack again on an opponent's turn using your reaction if you can trigger it with an opportunity attack, etc.

[@mathgeek3_14]

@@exqueue3813 he holds his action to throw the dagger when say the monster moves….thus trigging the characters reaction

[@tomtomlinson2835]

Loved this build, so my cup of tea. One immediate thought though; you could cut the Fighter dip to 3 levels, drop the Wizard entirely and take Ranger levels instead thus gaining spellcasting, an extra fighting style and an extra skill. Gloomstalker sits so well on the Rogue chassis I don't think I could resist. You'd need to roll for stats though and roll well. My last set of numbers would make you swoon; 11, 13. 14. 17, 18, 18. Witnessed by my soon to be DM for his first game. He's not happy whereas I am utterly thrilled. my first time as a player in 5E and I get God tier attributes.

[@DnDDeepDive]

Would be nice, I just worry that you're just delaying extra attack *forever* :). Still, on this character Extra attack isn't adding as much as it does for other builds, so definitely worth considering.

[@GreyGramarye]

When you mentioned wanting a higher level damage bump on psychic blades, I realized - apart from ruling that you can attack with psychic blades whenever you would make a weapon attack (rather than requiring the full Attack action), if they just did damage equal to your psionic energy die it would fix nearly all the issues people have with this feature. Sure you don’t get a hit bonus, but as a pure rogue you’re doing 1d12 with these things, that’s not something rogues get to do often.

[@guyfawkes8873]

Always nice to see a great use of something not Custom Lineage x) also your kids seem quite heavily optimized... You got thrashed in that encounter man.

[@DnDDeepDive]

They are ruthless.

[@knightcaelum968]

I love the way you blend all the various aspects of being a tabletop roleplay gamer; the concept matters, the build matters, you weigh things fairly considering the pros and cons narratively and mechanically, and consider all the options and going in-depth with each of them to see what's honestly going to work "best" for the character you have in mind. It scratches the particular spot of my mind that sees options as ever branching paths and loves the crunch of optimization and the creative endeavour of working within limitations while still ringing turn with some thematically appropriate & interestingly subversive.

[@lucasramey6427]

A fun idea I've had recently would be soulknife rogue multiclassed with echo knight flavored as a psychic projection allowing you to channel psychic power through it, the idea would allow you to be hidden while the projection fights for you if you want to stay safe or would allow you to do some opportunity attack shenanigans by giving an enemy the option of leaving the echo's range and procking an opportunity attack or wasting its attacks on the echo if you decide to go higher levels into echo knight it would allow you to have a great source of scouting without the chance of much danger and it can be in the air in case your 60ft range psychic blades can't reach to get a flying creature

[@WRCannon]

I just realized the other day I could combine Dueling and Thrown Weapon Fighting. Great minds!

[@Sparksy]

how so?

[@shadow-faye]

​@@Sparksythrown weapons are usually melee and youre only holding one at a time

[@Mrryn]

​@@shadow-fayeExactly. Dueling FS just says you have to be wielding a melee weapon in one hand and no weapon in the other hand...nothing about needing to make a melee attack with that weapon to get the +2 to damage. And all weapons that are throwable (except for one...) are melee weapons despite making ranged attacks; Thrown is just a property of weapons, not a class like melee or ranged. As for the exception...it's funny because a similar thing works with the Dart, the one thrown weapon that is a ranged weapon. Dueling doesn't work because it's not melee, but you know what does? Archery. So with a similar setup, you can have a Bullseye-esque character who, instead of a +4 to damage the melee thrown weapon example gets, you get a +2 both to hit and to damage instead.

[@Rakkun_Streak]

Oh my god! I came to this video to see a cool Soulknife Rogue, and found that we thought pretty much the same build (well, very similar, not the same) on one of my favorite Characters i have created (but not played 😢). My distribution was a bit different: Rogue 9 (Soulknife Obv) + Wizard 6 (Bladesinger) + Fighter 3 (Psi Knight). Leaving 2 Levels to customize depending on how the campaign moves along. My concept focused more on the "Soul" part of the Soulknife, creating blades out of Shadows of other people to kill them (thats how they are manifested) and using Wizard levels for the Extra AC in Bladesinger + Mage Armor (20 AC on a Rogue is CRAZY) and one of your favorite spells Shadow Blade. Faerie Fire is not something i had considered before and really changes my perspective on the thing my build could do (I had just planned to use my Familiar to give advantage for the Sneak Attack). My Character Concept stemmed from the Child of a Magus Killer Assassin who served as a Living Spellbook for his father as the spells were Tattooed on his skin, and his tongue got cut (thus, only speaking through the Soulknife 's Telepathic Speech). The magic of turning him into a living Spellbook means he got in contact with his own soul and developed his Soul-based Powers, being able to hit the "soul" of the opponent (so constructs do not have soul, i cannot hit), leaving no visible injuries.

[@LuisGLC31]

I was one of the people that requested this kind of a build. So glad to see you actually delivered! :)

[@KevinVideo]

Your description of the PC having daggers all over the body, throwing lots of knives, reminded me of Danny Trejo's character in "Desperado".

[@tristanwellisch2637]

I discovered this channel only about a week ago but I am in love. This series is so fun and inspires me to make more unique builds like these almost every day. It's a pleasant treat every time. But I gotta tell you that the cherry on top of this whole thing was when I saw you were wearing a Trogdor shirt. I know I can't prove it to you but I also happen to be wearing my Trogdor shirt on the day I'm watching this. That moment when you started singing "Burninating the countryside!!" was the highlight of my day. Thank you.

[@DnDDeepDive]

Ha ha! Yes! Glad you found us :). Welcome!

[@gogogusto]

I was waiting for a soul knife build! Been here since the very start of the channel with your hexblade PAMlock build, and it is amazing to see how far this has come. Hope you are doing well, take care!

[@lordro256]

All of the builds I’ve watched so far have been really damn cool, but oh my god this is the build that I have most wanted to play of all of them. The psionic theme just pulls me in, and I’ve been wanting to play a fighter rogue for a long time. Thanks Colby!

[@DnDDeepDive]

YW! Glad you enjoyed :)

[@benjeffries2610]

Like a tonic for the nerves. 💕 This is a wonderful way to break the holiday fast. The silvery barb gags was HILARIOUS. Beautiful family

[@DnDDeepDive]

Ha ha thanks!

[@beneteus3833]

as the DM in my games i allow soulknifes to attune to daggers and those the "template" of hte psychic blade (like the hex weapon of hexblade warlocks) and use the extra attack with a psychic blade

[@Trial88]

Ahhhh so satisfying. I’m rolling through my second watch of it already. I love the psionics and I love the idea of playing a rogue Jedi. Also!! I think what would be a cool idea that I think you’d get a lot of views for would be a video series where you give us your favorite items for either certain classes or certain character roles. Or adding that as an aside near the end of the videos what your top 3-5 items you’d like for that specific character if you could get them.

[@bigjimslim]

Rogues are my favorite playstyle in every game that has them. Seeing a new D&D rogue build on this channel is like a Christmas present.

[@NobodyDungeons]

So, one thing I love to do on rogue characters is pick up the blooming blade cantrip, and get access to find familiar. The reason for this is that a familiar can give you the help action to get advantage on your attacks allowing you to get sneak attack easily. With booming blade you get extra damage, damage versatility, and crowd control for free with zero draw backs the booming blade spell doesn't even create a massive sound like the knock or thunder wave spell.

[@codyrackley2075]

I love this build! First thing that popped into my head was.... "With MIND BULLETS!'

[@SCAR3DY_C4T]

Race: Gith Theme: Space Pirate sailing the astral sea. This is more or less one of the very first "martial" characters I started to theory craft over a year ago before I even knew about your channel. I like this idea so much.

[@simonkennedy6116]

This really helps my psi rogue character build. I've had the concept for a while but haven't really nailed the details

[@bronzedragon18]

I'm running a yuan -ti Soulknife Rouge. Karya does massive damage (usually) in combat and is very useful to her party , not to mention a lot of fun to play!

[@Em3.14re]

I would definitely take the catapult spell as a wizard to lean into the telekinetic aspect of this character. Fair damage for a first level spell, but also lets you throw distant objects closer to you or allies, including disarmed enemy weapons. The objects can even be magical. :)

[@ryanvox7812]

I had to pause the video because your family is so precious. Your content makes me smile and helps me relax during some stressful stuff so thank you for being on KZbin. ❤

[@Veledan]

I'll always be a diehard Bladesinger advocate, but I've been dying for you to drop this video. I'm so excited! Thanks as always for the amount of time and effort you put into these videos Colby!

[@chandlerreviews8804]

i dont usually comment but i discovered your channel i wanna say a week or 2 ago and man has it been great i like to sleep with a video in the background and your voice is actually perfect for that. i usually sit at my desk for a little at the start then lie down thinking about the concepts you talk about imagining their appearance and such and its so incredibly fun thanks for the content and for giving me some fun and good rest that i dont always get due to my brain being all over the place at night

[@LunaLunatic1337]

I made a Soul Knife Rogue/Eloquence Bard Changling. You are the ultimate assassin. No blood, no evidence of you ever being there, you can change into your kill or someone who should be present for quick get away, Jack of all trades and no less than a 10 on a roll for Deception and Persuasion. Plus everything else they get from Soul Knife Rouge. It's beautiful. One of my players is going to test it out whoever we start a new game or if her current one dies

[@Swimavidly]

Great video! LOVE IT! I just finished putting together three soul knife builds when you put out this video. I took a similar route with levels in psi warrior, but delayed fighter levels until after level 9 rogue. When I compared the DPR with the Treantmonk baseline I found that the delay did better DPR because of the increased accuracy of homing strikes and increased sneak attack damage than taking fighter levels early. But I'm guessing you already knew this since you mentioned in your video that you had wanted to get to homing strikes earlier, but focused on showcasing the psionic ability of the character at lower levels. In case anyone else is interested, here are the other two builds: I made a pure rogue changeling spy with actor feat and the figthing initiate feat to get the thrown weapon fighting style. The DPR is only slightly lower for that build than the one with the psi warrrior levels. And instead of intelligence, I focused on Charisma. The last build focused on Wisdom with Ranger (Gloomstalker) levels. Gloomstalker synergizes with any rogue build. And spellcasting adds to the character's damage and utility. At first I thought it was odd that the soulknife's features didn't use any mental stats. But after making three different builds with three different mental stats, I am convinced it's good design because it expands the multiclass options for the soulknife.

[@LittleBananaJoe]

I see how mechanically evocation makes sense. And that war magic or bladesinger make sense. But thematically this is the one build where divination is an absolute must in my mind. The powers of your mind have expanded so vastly that you can actually see the future. Your mind has surmounted the constraints of not only space but time itself (yeah chronurgy does not exist)

[@JamesMoore-sc3io]

although flavor and roleplay wise, paladin will always be my favorite class, my heart has a soft spot for rogues, which was the first class I played in an official dnd campaign. Something about the class makes you really consider what your options are, as you're effectiveness is based upon the state of the battlefield more so than any other class. You make plans more, trying to orchestrate an unfolding situation into a state that you can best take advantage of. You see if you can spend your turn doing more than just adding to dps. Where others might be blinded by their spellbook or their divine prayers, you have to make do with cunning and daring-do to shift the tide of battle. Precise use of ball bearings, alchemists fire, bottles of grease, or even standard ropework make you interact with the system in ways that many classes simply don't, because they don't have to. Such a blast to play.

[@yodaleiaheehoo9960]

"And burnination has forsaken the countryside, only one guy will remain. My money's on Trogdor!" 😆 The Trogdor reference brings back lots of memories, man I loved Strong Bad emails! Also the build was great, thematically at the top of the list of builds you've done.

[@deez4free]

Just wanted to say great game tonight with Chris, Kelly and Monty. Definitely entertaining to watch you guys putting your creations through an adventure so we can see how your tweaks actually work in real game play. Need to make that a regular thing, kudos to all you guys for putting it together. As a follower of all 3 channels and new to DMing, it is greatly appreciated.

[@DnDDeepDive]

Thanks!

[@ZomgItzKent]

Literally been theorycrafting this class combo for the past 3 months myself (love the psi concept) So glad you made a video about it!

[@keggotht9323]

This is so weird that over the holidays made a level 15 character that was so similar to this, I had 9 levels of soul knife and 6 of psi warrior. I went with custome liniage and took the gift of the gem dragon feat for some extra telekinetic reaction and story for why the character had psionics. But other than that I did a very similar thing with thrown weapon fighting and dueling from a feat. Missed your videos over the holidays and glad to have you back

[@Rillikual]

Been following the channel, on here(Yt), and Spotify for a few months now. This channel has made me aware, as a new TTRPG enthusiast, that I have had an itch not fully realized until finding things/communities that specialize in conceptualizing. Thanks for the quality, wholesome, and we'll thought content. Major thumbs up for integrity of edits, reviewing content, links, and timestamps. I look forward to more content as well as supporting these thought provoking character designs/optimizations.

[@Rillikual]

Btw, Really enjoyed Beastmaster V2. Stayed true to the theme while being very viable

[@DnDDeepDive]

Thanks for the kind words!

[@ManualdeSobrevivencia]

Hi Colby. I sort of worked around this build and got some improvements I'll share here. Get the kobold race, go rogue 3, ranger (BM) 5, fighter 3 and back to rogue til the end. Take the beast of the sky, which has flyby and make it give yourself adv on every attack. Rangers get HM anyways, so you don't need the mark of finding race. You also don't need to waste a feat on the fighting style because you get one from ranger, which can be either dueling or thrown weapon fighting. You get Hunters mark and the effects of faerie fire. And there you have it. Sustained dpr with room for an "emergency" nova round.

[@randomdud668]

I think an interesting solution would be the ability to designate a magic weapon as your soul blade, kind of like the warlocks pact of the blade. I'm not sure how powerful it would be but I think it sounds pretty cool.

[@RoninXDarknight]

This is definitely a conversation to have w/your DM. Personally I'd allow it or else provide custom items that buff the psychic blades to imitate magic weapons.

[@AdamZollo]

One fun thing about thrown weapon fighting style that I like, is it lets you make an opportunity attack against enemies even if you don’t have a weapon in your hand, since you can pull out the dagger as part of the attack. It’s a cool feature on a rogue who will always love a good opportunity attack for sneak attack.

[@cmccbuilds8229]

Oh man - I have a soul knife build in the works too. Always cool to see how we both handle similar options.

[@Gemini_Storm8]

Im interested in seeing his take on an Eldritch Knave. Swashbuckler rogue with some kind of warlock. Hexblade if you wanted to go stereotypical nuke.

[@RobearRich]

A rogue with mask of many faces is incredibly dangerous

[@crystalzest2748]

I'm doing a Swashbuckler Rogue with levels of Draconic Sorcerer in an upcoming campaign, I too would love to see a big rogue + caster build on this channel

[@pokecats8552]

@@crystalzest2748 there is the assasserer, assassin rogue with sorcerer burst damage build

[@johannesstephanusroos4969]

That's the first time I've seen someone spell Rogue correctly, while messing up the spelling of Knight, lol

[@Gemini_Storm8]

@@johannesstephanusroos4969 it's not a typo, I used knave intentionally, like a pirate. Like Davey Jones or even Jack Sparrow essentially, cut a deal for power on the high seas.

[@BeardedDragonite]

Never seen half orc art with such fabulous boots and generous cake

[@jamesmullen3068]

This is a good opportunity to talk about the utility possibility of action surge. There will be times when you need an extra dash or dodge action in order to get your attacks off, and there will be times when you need to use an object such as a key in a puzzle or a magic item such as cape of the mountebank. A lot of cool combo moves become possible when you don't need action surge for a nova round.

[@TheDarthnazrael]

When I decided to build a knife-throwing rogue, I of course heavily considered a Soulknife, but eventually settled on a Fighter 1/Phantom Rogue X. Phantom's class features require you to be within 30 ft of the target, which is a synergistic limitation for the short range of thrown daggers.

[@colterlemons233]

Colby, your voice is so soothing. Thank you for giving me fun and peace during these crazy times!!

[@DnDDeepDive]

Thanks!

[@alanschaub147]

@@DnDDeepDive I still say that you could be an actor. I know that am totally failing as your agent. 😔

[@DnDDeepDive]

@@alanschaub147 Ha ha!

[@TheRobversion1]

@@alanschaub147 he is. Colby is Anthony Starr in real life. Colby Polson is just another character he plays. ;)

[@Galus999]

THIS! This was the build that I as looking for. Bravo! Well done!

[@genrepunk]

It's neat how many different build directions are possible around the core mechanic, since it's not bound to INT.

[@Phiktional]

Every week I watch your builds, and every week I have the urge to immediately go play it. Why am I like this?

[@DnDDeepDive]

Ha ha, you and me both!

[@RedCap-vz1dw]

Two things: 1. Im trying out lotusden halfling since they can cast entangle starting at 3rd lvl. 2. I'd suggest taking martial adept for quick toss, which let's you make a thrown weapon attack as a bonus action

[@soldier660]

Still one of my favorites channels on youtube, Thank you buddy ^^ !!!

[@bobbyLNZ]

I have watched this video at least once a day for awhile now. I really love this build idea. Psionics was always a favorite part of the lore. Rogue was my first ever character and this is such a well done combo

[@DragonKingSkye]

As a bit of a dissenting opinion from those that may or may not be upset when you use Custom Lineage, I wanted to say I heavily prefer it. Why? Because I can flavor my character as whatever I want. When a build is centered around, say, a kobold, it relies on the assumption that I'll be playing one when I might not like to play certain races in DnD very much, but anyone can make Custom Lineage into something they enjoy playing. Keep up the great work brother.

[@DnDDeepDive]

A breath of fresh air comment! :) But I agree 100%, actually. Always seems odd to me when people complain, but I understand the desire for variety.

[@TheRobversion1]

Absolutely agreed here. i'm one of the people as well who use custom lineage in 80% of my builds as it gives a mechanical advantage and i can flavor the race in whatever way i want.

[@SniperYanda]

I think my favorite Soul Knife multiclass is with Beast Barbarian, because combined with the claws and bonus action attack, you get a pretty ridiculous number of decently strong attacks from someone with no weapon required. Plus, reminds me of Raziel from Soul Reaver with all the psychic-swords and beastlike claws, just make'em a Dhampir and no one would tell the difference!

[@johannesstephanusroos4969]

Nice, my Protoss Zealot build is Beast Barb and Psi Warrior. Damage mitigation due to Rage and psionic shields, tons of claw attacks

[@thesuitablecommand]

Hey Colby, I watched your old support Bard video recently and I came up with a very different but very effective parallel support Lore Bard!! I really think you'll like it and it comes online at level 3. Class composition is Divine Soul Sorcerer 1 / Peace Domain Cleric 1 / Lore Bard X, in that order. The whole idea of this build is to throw tons of d4 bonuses or penalties across the battlefield. Typically this is achieved through some combination of Bless/Bane, Emboldening Bond, Guidance, Resistance, Ceremony, etc. I believe that this build can grant a +3d4 bonus to an ally if you use Ceremony on top of Bless (or the relevant cantrips) and Emboldening Bond. This character is very much not focused on damage; it will have a few damaging spells, but most will be buff/debuff/control. Even the cantrips will be intended for d4 penalties (mind sliver and vicious mockery) rather than damage, though you could pick up fire bold and toll the dead for sure - God knows you'll have enough cantrip slots for them! Also, a word on Sanctuary. As a Divine Soul, you get Cleric spells as a Sorcerer. Which means that you can get Sanctuary cast with your primary ability score for a higher Wisdom save. And since you won't need to be attacking regularly, one Sanctuary will last you a good, long time while you sit back and play support. Or while you sit forward and play support, if you really want to. My particular build has only 10 AC, but is harder to hit than most Paladins at very high levels. If you consider an ancient red dragon, for example, it has a whopping +17 bonus to attack rolls, but only a +9 to wisdom saves. So, it still has about a 50% chance of even being able to attack this character while Sanctuary is active without burning a legendary resistance (which would be totally fine by me, let the Monk stun it that much earlier!) Then stack on top of that Bane, and the odds are actually _in your favor_ against getting hit by an _ancient red dragon_ which is ABSURD! Compared to an AC 23 Paladin (concentrating on Shield of Faith with the defense fighting style), this build will be hit about 30% less often. But Calvin, what about saving throw attacks? Yes, this build still vulnerable to those... But that's where Bless + Favor of the Gods comes into play. An easy +3d4 to a save is always welcome in a pinch. Then all the usual shenanigans with Lore bards getting their pick of all the best spells in the game, as you discussed in your video... Probably minus Goodberry, but you could make it work of you still want it 😉

[@TheRobversion1]

nice way to be sturdy via sanctuary. however, my bet is the DM just avoids you and kills your party members instead. your buffs will delay it but sanctuary will make you pretty much useless after you cast aside it aside from supporting/healing. cant bane post sanctuary either.

[@thesuitablecommand]

@@TheRobversion1 hmm, well, this build wasn't made to serve as a tank or distraction, so I would consider it a win if my party is keeping the enemies engaged away from me. This character is much better suited to sitting on the sidelines casting Vicious Mockery or Mind Sliver each round than hiding behind Sanctuary without using those cantrips. It's a good defensive option that persists longer than, say, Shield, if it is needed, but ideally it won't be needed all the time.

[@Ph0tek77]

Great build, with great flavor. Maybe somebody already suggested it, but you could also go Fairy as your race. 1 free fairy fire per day, and… flight! Love the idea of throwing psychic blades from above the battlefield. Btw, best wiches to you and your family.

[@nicolasaloni4282]

Amazing art by Randall!!

[@GrumbleGrunt]

I know I'm a year late seeing this, but I was genuinely thinking about this multiclass last night, and here I am today, finding Colby's build on it... Sir, you genuinely are an amazing resource and I love all of your videos.

[@DnDDeepDive]

Cheers!

[@lukeanator5619]

playing a soulknife 4 atm, passed 2 DC 25 thieves tools checks in a row (arcane locks) without expertise (but did have guidance) soulknifes dont fail skill checks ever. i was debating what i could multiclass into but i didnt want to delay things, this has helped a bunch, thanks

[@Ontaros1]

Thank you for doing the Psion build man I really appreciate it. The flexibility here with the Psionic dice is REALLY good and stacking the two fighting styles was a nice touch too cause extra dice can be nice but extra flat damage almost always feels better.

[@bottomtext3340]

So, A little tip if you want damage over everything else. Take a level in hexblade and go aasimar lol. It’s a free 20 damage at level 20 and +6 per attack. So with 11 in psi knight, 1 in hexblade, 8 in soul knife with hexblades curse, necrotic shroud, telekinetic strike, and the hex spell active you would be doing 3d6 +1d4 +1d10 +4d6 +4d6 +72 damage per round. That averages at 73 dpr against a 22 ac, 94 against 18, 113 against a 10 ac. Now I realize that it’s not all to reliable to hit things with this build. So! 11 chronurgy wiz 9 soul knife. Store haste with arcane ambiance and give it to your familiar, have your familiar cast haste on you, cast tensers transformation on yourself, use necrotic shroud, then do damage. 2 attacks from tensers, 1 from haste, one as a ba, for 3d6 +5d6 +1d4 +8d12 +48. Yes this build has fighting initiate for thrown weapon fighting. Now… 130 damage… on an ac of 22. You can do this for 10 rounds and still have psi dice to spare.

[@LoudAngryJerk]

I feel like it's worth noting that as much as the bonus action says "when you make an attack, you can make a second attack as a bonus action", it doesn't say that your second attack has to be your final attack. You can attack, then move, then attack as part of the attack action, I don't see why you can't take your attackaction1, attackba, attackaction2. It's silly phrasing, but as far as I know there's nothing saying you can't say that's how it mechanically happened, even if rolling wise, just for the sake of concision you rolled your two action-attacks together, and your bonus action separately.

[@shinybugg9156]

If they're all the same kind of attack, what does it matter which ones come from your action and which is your bonus action?

[@LoudAngryJerk]

@@shinybugg9156 yeah, exactly

[@jedim793]

I think this build is (of course) perfectly optimised. But a 3 levels whispers bard dip would give a bonus to damage, access to the faerie fire spell, leaving room for more race options. Even more increased utility, support features and of course it would be SUPER on theme

[@the_ceeman]

Love the build (soulknife is probably my favorite subclass in the game). I think a fun alternative to psi knight would be a swarmkeeper, since you get fairy fire, along with extra attack and some telekinetic like features. Also it could have a really cool "hive mind" kinda theme

[@J.sh_CDN]

Flavour your swarm as Swirling Psy energy swirling around you. Gets you your fighting style, and you can choose to go fighter or ranger 5 for extra attack. Adding piercing to an attack, or pushing the target, or moving yourself for a bonus action free disengage.... gotta love the Swarmkeeper

[@ethiepops05]

You could have taken the 'Shadowblade" spell as it has the same property's as your psionic blades. This would allow you to deal 2d8 + all the bonuses. However it requires concentration meaning no faier fire. However this requires you to take an additional Wizard level

[@michaellavy3269]

Interesting idea. Unfortunately you’d have to also sacrifice your bonus action psionic blade attack to recall the thrown shadow blade, but numbers wise the shadow blade still wins

[@DnDDeepDive]

@@michaellavy3269 Right... this was the main reason I avoided my favorite spell in the game :). Both concentration *and* Bonus Action when we're already using our Action to throw a psychic blade felt like it belonged on a different character. I *did* make use of throwing a shadow blade here though... kzbin.info/www/bejne/Z2GppKSJjdx9rbc

[@Rashagar]

Funnily enough this is exactly the character concept I'm currently playing (from level 1, currently level 2) and you may or may not be surprised to hear how much endless idle agonising over when to take levels in which I've been going through XD

[@delibirdite]

Happy new year DNDO team! I recently theoried a tabaxi rogue/bard that uses the psychic knife features from soulknife and one of the features from bard of valor/swords (I forget which subclass atm) The soulknife rogue is badass because, if I read it correctly, it sounds a lot like you can be unarmed but, as you attack, your blade appears in one hand and then, for your bonus action, you can use your offhand attack while your first blade disappears and a second blade appears in your second hand. This means you can benefit from from the dueling fight style because you never have more than 1 weapon! I might be wrong, but that's how I interpret it. This gives me a cool vision of a cat-like rogue that can almost dance across a battlefield, hence the tabaxi racial choice

[@TheRobversion1]

most likely swords as valor bards are inferior for a striker type.

[@delibirdite]

@@TheRobversion1 Turns out I was very wrong, its got a 3 level dip into bard of whispers

[@jacobbrutcher1690]

Another awesome video! you are really feeding my dnd character creation addiction!

[@benpauls7851]

I think I really like this. I am going to be playing in a 1 shot at level 12 and have been scouring your builds. Very exciting, take a cool idea and concept and them make it my own!

[@DnDDeepDive]

Glad you enjoyed! Let me know how it goes :).

[@willow6618]

The side bit about the psychic blades not benefitting from sharpshooter caught my attention a bit. I'm in a campaign currently where my plan for my character is to multiclass fey wanderer ranger with soulknife rogue (currently only rogue 1 and ranger 2 but I've got most of the things planned out). Since the weapon I'll be using for the most part early on is a shortbow, I'm planning to pick up sharpshooter as soon as I hit ranger 4, and I asked my dm about whether or not he'd allow sharpshooter (and the archery fighting style) to work with thrown weapons as well, and he said since there's a number for the range of thrown weapons, he'd allow both to apply to thrown weapons. I'm not sure what RAW for this is but I assume it doesn't work for one reason or another, but thankfully my dm is cool 🙏

[@tehsamuels]

So glad I watched this video. I wasn’t aware that you could add the modifier to the second soul knife blade!

[@jodylester9118]

To the point of merch: Would LOVE longsleeves with the logo going down the sleeves!

[@backlash660]

At 31:54 when you mentioned Luke Skywalkering your light sabre I immediately thought this character needs a Sunblade .

[@MrKrisipock]

You got me with X-Com Games.

[@LittleBananaJoe]

I gave my soulknife player an amulet made out of pure psychic energy. So the chain, the amulet everything is just shimmering blue psychic energy no metal or anything. When worn this first gave her psychic blades a +1 to hit and damag, later I let her find something she could use to further tweak the thing to a +2, and finally giving her resistance to psychic damage. I don’t think it was overpowered considering the magic shit the others got. And it was beyond cool

[@tylerambeault1641]

I got a build idea for you. The idea isn't how much damage it can do but how many things just simply die. 7 lvls of shadow sorcerer 5 lvls of eloquence bard 3-5 lvls of warlord Concept is to grab sickening radiance from sorcerer and plant growth from bard combined with the eloquence bard to minus saving throws sorcerer's heightened meta magic and the Hound of Ill-Omen plus the warlocks push and pull effects from Eldritch blast.

[@DnDDeepDive]

Will put it on the list!

[@tylerambeault1641]

@@DnDDeepDive Silvery Barbs as a reaction can also help make ppl fail the Con save, could even add 2 lvls of fighter for action surge to drop it all in 1 turn. Also the debuffing combo doesn't have to go with sickening radiance/plant growth. You could just banish them, hold monster/person, or ray of enfeeblement

[@Vitromancy]

Not as damage optimised, but a really fun modification for this is Soulknife/Echo Knight/Swords Bard. Huge mobility, with the Echo letting you blip around the battlefield much earlier, as well as throw your knives from multiple angles.

[@FaIIenSkater91]

@29:16 love the sound effects Colby

[@DownUnderDM]

Another option is Soul Knife multicalssed with the new beast master ranger. Your companion acts on your turn, so you can move it up to an enemy to trigger your sneak attack, you get a fighting style & also extra attack and some spell casting. You can sacrifice your BA to have your companion take the help action to give you advantage aswell.

[@honorablevalor6337]

Love this concept! Reminds me a bit of a build I sent you back in the beginning. X-Com rocks too!

[@Ricardo-zo1ti]

44:49 LOL, so cute. Happy new year!

[@Sanglant4342]

I've been playing a Feywild Ranger, hit level 5 and started multiclassing into rogue to pick up scout. Variant Human for sharpshooter, 16 Dex, 14 Wis, 14 Cha, performer background, ranger expertise perception. Play him as a spy for the feywild, infiltrate towns as a performer and gather info. More of a town based ranger who learns the wilderness as he levels. Lots of options for charisma, wisdom, and dex based skills that are very high. Can focus more on dmg at 4 or skills by increasing dex or wis. Lots of utility, you can probably optimize better then I. So far been a fun concept playing Anton the Amazing piccoloist extraordinare with a reversible cloak, to become codename Ferret infiltrator agent for the courts of the Feywild.

[@matthewsmoot1981]

Great to see you back and love the build. I was hoping Kalashtar if you're gonna use Eberron ;) you know, for max psionic theme goodness, but yeah Mark of Finding is great.

[@Oddricm]

Lot of redundancies with a Kalashtar. Soulknives receive the telepathic communication at 3rd, and Psi Warriors nab Psychic Resistance at 10th. That's 2 out of 4 racial traits redundant, leaving advantage on Wisdom Saves and the No Sleep feature. None of these features are eligible to be replaced with Customised Origin ala Tasha's without DM fiat. Soulknife's telepathic communication is an improvement over the Kalashtar's version, even if it is resource dependent, both in range and number of targets. The psychic resistance is less of an issue if you follow this specific build, since you never reach Psi Warrior's 10th level feature.

[@superiorus999]

I would suggest aasimar as race. With action surge you can proc the transformation and make all your attacks in the same turn, and the added damage (and potentially additional effects depending on the subrace) can be pretty useful and relevant

[@Thomas-cc1lj]

I've played something similar. I went Divination for the wizard as Portent just played into the psychic ability theme in my mind. Mine was also a Gem Dragonborn for the occasional fly and being able to use a breath weapon for the 2nd attack (much better than a 1d4 dagger).

[@claykalmar8131]

The cool factor is indeed through the roof with this build!

[@ManualdeSobrevivencia]

You can use your action surge first to make an attack, which in turn let you make and attack with your bonus action and then use your regular action to ready an action to make an attack as soon as your turn ends. That would you make better use of your surge, allowing you to add your sneak attack bonus damage to that attack. Unfortunately, you can't add the Psionic Strike damage to that one. But it's an increase, nontheless.

[@bernhardglitzner4985]

I would love for those videos to be sound only on Spotify or something like that. Colby has such a soothing voice.

[@VainToxicity]

I’m a weird DM… If I had a player who was so committed to a character concept that they’d even use feats and stuff; I’d bend over backwards to help them bring it to fruition. I’d let both Crossbow Expert and Sharpshooter apply. I’d probably even try to help the DPS scale better. Similar to how Monk’s unarmed strikes work. Eventually the D6 would become D8, with the D4 offhand turning into D6. I’d even let them use the Mark of Finding spells without any spell slots; a once per day sort of thing. Something like that. It’d obviously be a WIP with the player and I, but I’d be game. I even homebrew a lot of the feats using inspiration from Baldur’s Gate 3 and the Pathfinder Kingmaker\WotR games. We want to be Fire Lord wizard? Cool. We’ll workshop it. Let’s see… You’re now able to take Elemental Adept for the same element and it stacks. First time does what it says on the tin. Second time: normal becomes vulnerable, resistance becomes normal and immune becomes resistant. Third time? Okay. You’re resistant to fire. Those 1s you treat as 2s? You can now reroll that die but must take the new roll. Fourth? Listen, I know you are an Evocation fan but you do know that you only get 5 of those right? Okay.. You are now immune to fire damage. You gain the Transmuted Spell metamagic and 2-3 metamagic points. Probably would go with just 2 and have them come back on a short rest. You’re still not finished? You’re using the feat again? What about your spell casting modifier? It looks sad and neglected.. Whatever floats your boat, or blows it up and sinks it in your case. 5th and final. You’re now not only immune to fire, but fire damage actually heals you. Provided it comes from a spell slot. Probably. Have to sort of balance it? Maybe? Don’t judge; it’s a workshop! ( As I assume you’re still reading this for some reason. Lol.) This healing is for (IDK maybe about half-ish) the damage dealt. You now can treat any 1s or 2s on your damage die as 3s. Anyway… Random rant is random. I’m done. 😅

[@stephenchisholm3288]

Happy New Year thanks for being a highlight of my week for a while

[@jacobyullman5005]

I think a cool build to try and make would be a multiclass between Armorer Artificer (using the Infiltrator Armor) and some sort of Rogue. Sneak Attack on your Lightning Launcher seems like such a cool concept, and with the benefits granted by the Infiltrator Armor in stealth and movement speed, it just seems like a no brainer.