As one of our resident TTRPG enjoyers here at PC Gamer, I am cursed with the terrible and unfathomable eldritch knowledge of 'knowing a little bit too much about Dungeons & Dragons', the 5th edition ruleset of which forms the building blocks for one of our favourite RPGs, Baldur's Gate 3.
Larian, as you might've heard, has made me look like a big dumb fool and snuck in a final patch, totally for real this time, which is scheduled for 2025. In it, the studio's adding 12 new subclasses, and boy howdy are they a collective doozy.
While the venn diagram of experienced D&D players and Baldur's Gate 3 players has a ton of overlap, it's not a circle. It is for those of you inexperienced with pen and paper that I'm writing this, because I want to communicate just how many absolutely bonkers options Larian is about to unlock, which I can sense like my knee swelling up before a storm.
I won't be going over every subclass here—instead, I'm going to be focusing on a few key builds that these new subclasses unlock, assuming Larian doesn't meddle too much with their final form in the finished product. Gaze into the abyss with me.
Stellar supports
There are two support options here that may very well be best-in-slot for the rigours of Honour Mode. Those being, the bard's College of Glamour and the Circle of Stars druid. Both of these subclasses offer powerful options to keep your crew alive.
Let's start with the bard—bards are just downright solid, but the College of Glamour has one key ability that's utterly nuts. For the measly price of a bonus action, you're able to grant five (eventually scaling to 11) temporary hit points to a number of creatures up to your Charisma modifier, more than enough to cover your party. What's more, they then get to move their speed without provoking opportunity attacks.
Getting around 25-55 temp HP split across your crew as a bonus action is strong enough, but in Baldur's Gate 3, positioning is actually super important. I can't tell you the amount of times I've beaten an encounter just because I was able to funnel my foes into a doorway. Getting to reposition your party at the drop of a hat is some excellent utility.
Meanwhile, the Circle of Stars druid puts out a lot of healing value. At 2nd level, you can adopt a starry form from one of three options. The Chalice gives you an extra 1d8 + Wisdom healing to a secondary target whenever you cast a healing spell, which means that, for one piddly bonus action, you can Healing Word two of your allies back onto their feet. At 10th level, you can swap forms at the start of each of your turns, too, which is a huge amount of utility.
Gish food
The meat of this patch, however, is the inclusion of the Bladesinger and Hexblade subclasses—and the blade cantrips we're almost certainly getting alongside them. These cantrips, Booming Blade and Green Flame Blade, are the bread and butter of a few of D&D's most heinously overpowered multiclass builds. More on those in a moment, but as an honourable mention I should say that Arcane Trickster rogues will get way stronger with their inclusion, too—they only attack once, anyway, which means grabbing Booming Blade is just a free 2d8 thunder damage at max level (and another 3d8 if they're stupid enough to move).
Bladesingers are just genuinely really good, letting wizards study the blade, gaining a hefty bonus to their AC, speed, and concentration checks with their Bladesong. The real star of the show here is the Hexblade warlock, though. Infamously known as one of the best one-level multiclass dips in all of 5e, unless Larian steps in, this subclass will give you:
- Proficiency in medium armour, shields, and martial weapons.
- The ability to have all your attacks with a weapon scale off Charisma.
- Hexblade's curse, which increases your crit range and damage against one creature once per rest—and a bounty of temp HP if you kill them, too.
- Access to the Shield spell, which is good for anybody.
Previously, if you wanted that Charisma scaling, you had to dump a few levels into warlock to snag Pact of the Blade. No longer. This makes a Hexblade dip pretty much mandatory on College of Swords bards, who can dump Dexterity as a stat entirely, and it's an advisable pickup on paladins, too.
Oh, speaking of paladins—with the blade cantrips, the dreaded sorcadin is well and truly online. This multiclass involves grabbing two levels of paladin for access to divine smite, then pumping the rest of your levels into sorcerer. Slap Haste on yourself, grab Booming Blade, and then proceed to attack three times a turn (using quicken spell on your Booming Blade cantrip to do so) while pumping your high-level sorcerer spell slots into smites for systems-breaking levels of damage. Gortash won't know what hit him.
Honourable mentions
While these subclasses don't necessarily lead to busted multiclass combos, they're still pretty damn strong: The Way of the Drunken Master monk, the Swashbuckler rogue, and the Path of Giants barbarian.
The Way of the Drunken Master monk gives you a free disengage action and 10 feet of movement every time you use Flurry of Blows, which is an absurd degree of mobility, as well as the chance to redirect enemy attacks starting at level 6. Meanwhile, the Swashbuckler rogue lets you apply your Sneak Attack to 1v1s, a free version of the mobility feat (enemies you swing at can't hit you as you dance away), and the ability to impose perma-disadvantage on an enemy, as long as they're dueling you and you alone.
The Path of Giants barbarian, meanwhile, is a funny old one, because I predict it'll be busted in Baldur's Gate 3, specifically. In 5th edition, the subclass gives you the ability to return your thrown weapon to your hand starting at level 6 with a choice of elemental-typed damage, as well as a bonus to your thrown weapon attacks even earlier.
This isn't much to write home about in 5e, but Baldur's Gate 3 is a different beast entirely. There are a bunch of items that give you bonuses to your thrown attacks, and the Tavern Brawler feat lets you apply twice your strength modifier to them, too. You can already take advantage of this with the Eldritch Knight, but looking at the Path of Giants barbarian, this thing is strictly better when it comes to offense. Expect some very angry trident throwers in the future.
So, yeah—this upcoming patch is an absolute dreamland for powergamers, and I'll be trying to replicate those most busted builds myself. After all, while playing an untenably overpowered sorcadin at your local table is bad manners and grounds to revoke your dice privileges, in Baldur's Gate 3, there is no DM there to judge me. Except for Amelia Tyler, I guess, but her judgement comes pre-baked, so it's fine.
