Example Character: Fighter / Guardian
There are many benefits to designing player options as prestige classes in 5th edition when compared with designing new subclasses. While new subclasses are usually the appropriate way to handle a character concept that cannot be realized, some character archetypes are well-suited to many different classes. As a prestige class, the new concept can be combined with any existing other subclasses. For example, if you rely on a barbarian subclass to achieve your defender-barbarian concept, you will be unable to build a defender barbarian that is also a werewolf using the Path of the Were-Beast, which some players might want to do. In the same way, relying on the Cavalier subclass from Xanathar’s Guide to achieve your defender-with-a-mark concept prevents you from doing what we’ll be doing today: combining that concept with a different fighter subclass! Today’s example build for the Guardian will show the possibilities of combining it with the abilities of a Battlemaster Fighter and spicing that with polearm mechanics, creating a peerless warrior who can hold any position and lock down any foe in the defense of their allies and their cause by spinning and striking with their polearm. Because of the weapon they use and their role on the battlefield, we’ll be calling this build the Partisan.
So how is this warrior for a cause actually built? The Partisan is a level 11 character, a fighter multiclassed with guardian -- fighter 6 / guardian 5. To begin, they take 6 straight levels as fighter, making their first significant choice at level 1 when they select a fighting style. Because we know the Partisan will be using a two-handed polearm, they’ll likely want either Defense or Great-Weapon Fighting. At 3rd level, the Partisan chooses a fighter subclass. For this build, the Partisan will be a Battlemaster, granting them access to a set of dice that they can use on a variety of special techniques. Trip Attack is a must, since it works very well when used with an opportunity attack (which this build specializes in). For the other two, the build would work well with your choice of Distracting Strike, Menacing Attack, Precision Attack, or Pushing Attack.
At 4th level, the Partisan could boost their Strength, but we’ll have them select a feat to achieve their particular concept: the Polearm Master feat. Now with a regular way of making use of their bonus action, the Partisan continues putting levels into fighter, reaching level 5 and gaining Extra Attack, then reaching level 6 and gaining the opportunity to boost their Strength, making good use of that extra attack. Now with 6 levels in other classes and proficiency in shields, all the Partisan needs to meet the prerequisites for the guardian prestige class is to have at least a 15 Constitution. We’ll assume that through racial bonuses, initial point-buy, and ability score improvements, the Partisan can reach that.
Now for their 7th level, the Partisan takes their 1st level in guardian, losing nothing in hit dice (both fighter and guardian use d10s) and gaining access to the interactive Guardian’s Calling feature and the core class feature Guardian’s Mark:
Guardian’s Calling
Starting at 1st level, you gain a bonus to the damage rolls of any opportunity attacks you make equal to your Constitution modifier (minimum +1).
In addition, your grit impresses those in need of protection. When you make a Charisma check to influence a humanoid that is missing any of its hit points, you gain a bonus to the roll equal to your Constitution modifier (minimum +1).
Guardian’s Mark
When you gain your first level in this prestige class, you also learn how to excel at foiling attacks and protecting your allies by menacing your foes. When you hit a creature with a melee weapon attack, you can mark the creature until the end of your next turn.
Also, when you deal damage to a creature using a spell, an effect that replicates a spell, or a channel divinity feature, you can choose to mark that creature if it is within 30 feet of you and can see or hear you. The mark lasts until the end of your next turn. You can't mark more creatures in a turn in this way than the number determined by your guardian level, as shown in the "Ability Marks" column of the class table on the previous page.
A creature marked by you has disadvantage on any attack roll that doesn't target you while it is within your reach. Your mark ends early if you are incapacitated or you die, or if someone else marks the creature. There is no limit to the number of creatures you can have marked at once.
In addition, if a creature marked by you deals damage to anyone other than you, you can make one melee weapon attack against it using your reaction. This attack counts as an opportunity attack. You can make this special attack up to a number of times as shown in the "Mark Attacks" column of the class table on the previous page, and you regain all expended uses when you finish a short or long rest.
Note that the bonus to opportunity attack damage rolls granted by Guardian’s Calling applies to the opportunity attacks provoked by entering the Partisan’s reach thanks to the Polearm Master feat that they took earlier. This is part of why we valued that feat more highly than an increase to Strength, even though Strength is needed to hit more often and mark multiple targets in a turn. You can also see how the other part of that feat, which enables the Partisan to make an extra attack each turn using their bonus action, gives the Partisan a third opportunity to mark a target each turn, a 50% increase!
Though their ability to easily mark two to three enemies each turn and make devastating opportunity attacks against any target that comes too close is already frightening at level 7, the Partisan nonetheless reaches level 8 and gains their 2nd level in guardian. They choose Sacrificial Dive for their Protection Specialty, since they can’t cast spells to make use of the other option. They also gain access to Withstand Pain, which more than makes up for the slight loss of hit points from Second Wind that the Partisan experiences for every level they put into guardian instead of fighter.
Sacrificial Dive
When a creature within 5 feet of you is hit by an attack, you can use your reaction to force the attack to hit you instead. The attack hits you regardless of your AC or other abilities.
Withstand Pain
At 2nd level, your resolve grows, and you become able to steel yourself against injuries that would fell a lesser warrior. As a bonus action on your turn, or as a reaction before you take damage from a creature that is marked by you, you can focus your will and gain temporary hit points equal to 1d4 + your guardian level + half your total level. These temporary hit points disappear after 1 minute.
You can use this ability up to a number of times equal to your Constitution modifier (minimum of once), and you regain all expended uses when you finish a long rest.
Though the Partisan makes very thorough use of their bonus action and reaction already, the 1 minute duration on Withstand Pain makes it relatively easy to make use of despite that. Then the Partisan reaches level 9 overall which becomes their 3rd guardian level. They gain the exploration feature Unwavering, which also provides a small boost to temporary hit points gained from any source, as well as doubling the number of reaction attacks they can make each rest from Guardian’s Mark. They also gain the Powerful Reprisal feature and learn two techniques, and since they lack the ability to fly, cast spells, or activate Channel Divinity, the Partisan only has a few choices. They choose Martial Reprisal because of the Partisan’s ability to hurl spears and javelins as a fighter, proficient in all weapons, and Threatening Reprisal because it not only fits the theme of the character, but gives the Partisan access to a bit of debuff power, which is normally difficult for a fighter.
Martial Reprisal
When you use this technique, you can draw or stow up to two extra weapons. You make one melee weapon attack or up to two ranged weapon attacks against the triggering enemy. These attacks have advantage and deal bonus damage equal to your Constitution modifier. Finally, you can draw or stow one more weapon at any time that turn.
If you hit with a melee weapon attack using this technique, the target must make a Strength saving throw. The DC is equal to 8 + your proficiency bonus + your Constitution modifier. The target falls prone on a failed save.
Threatening Reprisal
When you use this technique, you glare and shout at the creature fiercely. If the triggering enemy can see and hear you, it must make a Wisdom saving throw. The DC is equal to 8 + your proficiency bonus + your Constitution modifier. On a failed saving throw, the creature is frightened until the end of your next turn. While frightened in this way, the creature can't take actions, reactions, or bonus actions, and it can't make attacks unless the attack is granted by a legendary action.
The 4th guardian level is an ability score improvement, which the Partisan could use to boost Strength (likely to its maximum of 20) or Constitution, or they could select another feat. While both Strength (which increases damage done with all melee attacks and adds chance to hit and thus mark enemies) and Constitution (which boosts not only general toughness but many guardian abilities and thus adds to opportunity attack damage) have clear benefits to being improved, there are also some very appealing feats. The Sentinel feat in particular would enable the Partisan to make an opportunity attack against an oncoming enemy, stopping it in its tracks 10 feet away from the Partisan but at the same time giving it disadvantage on any attack it makes against anyone else! This is such a potent combination of abilities that we’ll have the Partisan in our build delay improvements to those ability scores to take the Sentinel feat.
Finally, the Partisan reaches level 11, and takes their final level in the Guardian prestige class. They gain a 3rd reaction attack from Guardian’s Mark each rest and even gain a third usage of Powerful Reprisal per day, but the most important benefit from this level is the Unyielding class feature:
Unyielding
Starting at 5th level, when you hit a creature with an opportunity attack and deal damage to it, you gain a bonus to the damage roll equal to your proficiency bonus, and you regain the use of your reaction at the end of that turn.
In addition, when you finish a short rest and roll a hit die to regain hit points, you can choose to reroll the die and use the new result instead. You can use this to affect up to a number of hit dice equal to your proficiency bonus, and you regain all expended uses when you finish a long rest.
Finally, when you roll initiative and have no uses of the special attack granted by your Guardian's Mark feature remaining, you regain one use of the special attack.
Moving up from the bottom, we see the meaningful aspects of this feature for the Partisan in order of ascending importance. For the Partisan, who commonly uses their reaction to make all manner of normal and feat-granted opportunity attacks, the extra usage of the Guardian’s Mark attack is certainly nice, but nothing to sneeze at, either. Since the Partisan has no shield and no way to gain resistance like a barbarian does, the extra healing granted by rerolling poorly rolled hit dice can go a long way as the game progresses, so that paragraph is fairly nice for this character. But the core benefit that the Partisan has been drooling over for some time is the first paragraph. Not only does this apply a potent +4 additional damage to the Partisan’s already devastating and reliable opportunity attacks (which will increase as they level to +5 and eventually +6), but the Partisan only has to hit with the opportunity attack to regain their reaction to use on the next enemy’s turn as well! You can see how this synergizes with their other abilities so far:
They can make an opportunity attack when an enemy enters their 10-foot reach.
They can mark a creature they hit with a melee attack, granting disadvantage on attacks against other targets.
They can force an enemy struck by their opportunity attack to end their movement for that turn.
The Partisan faces a hallway full of combatants. The first two move forward, only to each face an opportunity attack from the Partisan’s halberd. They stop, now unable to move, but unable to reach the Partisan with their melee attacks. They have disadvantage on attack rolls against anyone else, and they’ve each taken a powerful melee attack. The next two combatants stride forward, facing the same threat. If enough are stopped at the 10-foot line, none of the army behind them will be able to make it through the traffic jam. The enemies’ only hope is that the Partisan misses with one of their opportunity attacks, thus losing their reaction for the round — but with such Battlemaster techniques as Precision Attack available, that’s unlikely.
Though we can see the devastating power and beautiful thematic unity of the Partisan in its current form, there are also other ways to build it that retain the same core idea. Instead of Battlemaster, the Champion subclass can be used for a more simple gameplay mode and more satisfying critical opportunity attacks. The Samurai, also from Xanathar’s Guide, is another excellent choice that provides both offensive power and defensive protection, both of which the Partisan wants, and does so in a more focused and less complicated way than the Battlemaster. And while they wouldn’t gain any benefit from the Cavalier subclass’s mark, the extra attack granted on a defied mark could give the Partisan even more bite on the turns following a pugnacious enemy’s strike on their ally. And of course, some of these feats could be taken at a later time or not at all, replaced by ability score improvements or other interesting feat choices.
As they gain levels, the Partisan will likely want to put more levels into fighter, catching up to the many features they eschewed to pursue 5 levels in guardian. Those 5 missing levels leave the Partisan, a level 11 character but only a level 6 fighter, down a number of important abilities compared to a level 11 fighter. Those fighters also have not just two subclass features (for the Battlemaster, stronger and more superiority dice) and the potent Indomitable feature, but also the fighter’s hallmark ability — improved Extra Attack granting a third basic attack (not counting bonus actions) each turn. For those 5 levels, however, they gain a variety of benefits as a guardian — the ability to dissuade enemies from attacking allies, or to throw themselves in harm’s way instead of an ally — the toughness from Withstand Pain to more than make up for the lost 5 hit points on each usage of Second Wind — and most importantly, devastatingly powerful opportunity attacks that can be used multiple times in a round, along with even more potent special reaction attacks that crush enemies foolish enough to strike their allies. This tradeoff, while potent, is roughly balanced. The Partisan has exchanged 5 levels of direct, generalized combat power as a fighter for 5 levels of defender-focused abilities and toughness to achieve a new, flavorful, and exciting character concept that still isn’t out of place to fans of fantasy, and they couldn’t have done it without the prestige classes in D&D Unleashed!
