D&D 5E Divine Smite questions and a few comments about the paladin class

[Psikerlord#]

To answer the OP: yes I agree that doubling paladin crit smite damage is overkill. We changed crits at our table - max normal weapon dice, roll one extra lot of weapon dice (cantrips - just 1 die max and 1 extra), and no doubling of SA, Smite or any other add on. Result is all the classes do great damage on a crit, but no-one does crazy damage. Works like a charm.

And before anyone off - we have no assassins.

 

[LittleElvis]

I have a paladin question. How does it work with somatic components if you're using a sword and board?

I saw this, which is apparently from Jeremy Crawford, but I'm still not sure on the basics here:

can a Cleric or Paladin cast spells requiring somatic components when wielding weapon + shield emblazoned with holy symbol? I'd say yes if the holy symbol is being used as the material component of the spell, so yes if "S, M," but no if only "S." -J

 

[guachi]

I agree with Crawford's answer and can see why he ruled the way he did. You can hold the material component in the same hand you do the somatic part with. That, to me, means the necessary arm/hand movement's aren't as precise as they might be with no material components. If a spell has no material components but does have somatic components, perhaps it has complex finger, arm, or hand movements that are precluded when holding a shield.

 

[pukunui]

Luckily a fair portion of the paladin spells only have a verbal spell component.

 

[Riley37]

Taking on the obligations of both a paladin Oath and a warlock Pact strikes me as a roleplaying nightmare, unless your Oath and your Pact are both with the same entity, such as the elven goddess of natural beauty (Sehanine Moonbeam).

 

[Lidgar]

From the Basic Rules PDF for somatic components:
"If a spell requires a somatic component, the caster must have free use of at least one hand to perform these gestures."

From the Basic Rules PDF for material components:
"A spellcaster must have a hand free to access these components, but it can be the same hand that he or she uses to perform somatic components."

So my read is a paladin (or cleric or whatever) wielding a one-handed weapon with shield can sheath the weapon and cast a spell using somatic and/or material components as part of his/her action.

 

[Saeviomagy]

To help fuel your smites you might want to take 2 or 3 levels of warlock to get some spell slots that recover with short rests.

I'm not sure this works because of smite's restriction to paladin spell slots. Other multiclasses work because the spell slots all go in one pool, but warlock slots are entirely different. To me, avoiding wierd spell slots being used to fuel paladin smite is a good thing.

 

[pukunui]

The devs have said it works.

 

[LittleElvis]

From the Basic Rules PDF for somatic components:
"If a spell requires a somatic component, the caster must have free use of at least one hand to perform these gestures."

From the Basic Rules PDF for material components:
"A spellcaster must have a hand free to access these components, but it can be the same hand that he or she uses to perform somatic components."

So my read is a paladin (or cleric or whatever) wielding a one-handed weapon with shield can sheath the weapon and cast a spell using somatic and/or material components as part of his/her action.

Does this mean you have time to sheathe the weapon, cast the somatic or material spell, and then unsheathe the weapon again? I'm just not clear at all on how M and S work with a paladin who holds a weapon and shield.

 

[Lidgar]

I would rule that unsheathing the weapon would need to happen as part of the character's action in the following round, as part of a melee attack action. So in a round 1, the paladin sheaths sword and casts a spell with M/S, next round he/she unsheathes and makes a melee attack.