Best Feats for Rune Knight Fighter 5e
by Prince Phantom
The Rune Knight is one of the most interesting and fun subclass designs in 5e. The ability to grow to large size is normally only possible through Polymorph-style effects or the Enlarge spell. This ability is such an amazing point to build your character around that it ends up making Rune Knights feel so incredibly different than almost any other character.
I haven’t even mentioned the actual runes yet, which all provide both passive and active buffs and abilities to mix up your combat even further. Let’s talk about some feats that let us leverage our large size even better.
Best Feats for Rune Knight Fighter 5e
Polearm Master/Great Weapon Master (ASAP): Huzzah! A subclass that actually rewards us for building for Strength and being in melee! There’s certainly no problem with playing a ranged Rune Knight, but I feel like most people are choosing this to be a big stompy giant that smashes things with a big stick. Lucky for us, that’s actually a good idea with this subclass! If we build for Strength, we become one of the best grapple builds in the game by default, and we can use our large size to control a much larger portion of the battlefield. This is why Polearm Master is so great, as when using a reach weapon, we control a 30x30ft area around us. This makes us a big obstacle for our enemies, allowing us to shield our allies behind us. I highly recommend taking the Defense fighting style if you plan on doing this, as we take a -1 penalty to our AC while large, and we are definitely going to be the target of quite a few attacks. Also, Great Weapon Fighting kinda sucks as it only adds an average of .5 dpr for us, even with our 3 attacks at level 5.
Heavy Armor Master (Lv 4): If you plan on taking this feat, I’d take it at level 4 instead of Great Weapon Master as it is most useful at earlier levels, and you will be alright in terms of damage for those two levels you’ve chosen to wait. With our lower defenses and want to be in the thick of it, some extra damage reduction can go a very long way towards our survival.
Sentinel (Lv 6): There is no better user of the Sentinel/Polearm Master combo in 5e than a Rune Knight. Our ability to control such a large area means that we can consistently prevent enemies from reaching our allies, and we are almost guaranteed an opportunity attack every round because of our threat range plus Polearm Master. Being able to stop an enemy before they reach us also helps our own durability, which is great considering how massive of a target we are. You might want to sprinkle a Barbarian level in your build somewhere to help that out… heck maybe even two for Reckless Attack, oh and we could take a third for Bear Totem or Ancestral Guardians…
Aberrant Dragonmark (Lv 8): Our rune DC is tied to our Constitution, meaning feats that increase it are even better for us. Aberrant Dragonmark comes from Ebberon, so it may not be available for your campaign, but it doesn’t contain any setting specific content so it can theoretically fit in any setting. For the cantrip, I’m probably grabbing Minor Illusion as it is the best utility cantrip available, and as for the first level spell we have some great options. Absorb Elements and Shield both add to our durability and are great picks, Fog Cloud and Silent Image have good combat utility, and no one will expect the 20ft tall tower of armor and muscle to cast Silvery Barbs. Personally, I’m concerned with our defense so I’m taking Shield. I’ll use it on turns where I can expert to be targeted by a lot of attacks, and it will probably save me from most of them. Oh and if your DM lets you roll for an epic boon after level 10, that’s just gravy. I did have a Fighter who took this feat right at level 10, and I had him immediately roll for the boon. He got it first try, but don’t be fooled, that’s not usually what happens. This feat is enough without the boon.
Magic Initiate/Fey Touched (Lv 8): If Aberrant Dragonmark isn’t available in your campaign, these feats will also work just fine. If you don’t have a familiar in your party, I’d take Magic Initiate, but if you do then Fey Touched may be the better option. Silvery Barbs is the front runner for 1st level spells, but there are plenty of other great options as well.
Alert (Lv 8): Because we are building a Strength based Fighter, our initiative is going to be pretty low. Alert helps compensate for that, along with a few other nice benefits. Going early in initiative allows us to position ourselves to best block for our allies and helps us lock down an important target with something like our Fire Rune.
Skill Expert (Lv 10): If you are looking to take as much advantage of your ability to grapple as possible (which you should, grappling is cool), taking this for expertise in Athletics will allow you to basically never fail a grapple check ever again. I’d like to take a moment to explain why grappling is so good for us. It only takes one of our attacks to initiate, and we can drag our target with us as we move at half speed. If you really want to push this concept you might chose to play a Centaur and take Mobile to give you a 50ft speed, meaning you can drag an enemy 25ft every turn at base. If your friendly Ranger or Druid decides to cast a Spike Growth, just dash around the edge of that spell, dragging your opponent through the spikes and dealing a guaranteed, no save, 10d4 damage, and all you’ve expended is your movement. Teamwork is very good with grappling, so make sure to communicate with your friends about your battle strategy.
Tough (Lv 10): We may actually want to consider taking Tough a lot earlier than most other characters. It should be noted that simply increasing our Constitution to another even number is also fantastic for us, as it helps with some of our runes as well as our hp, but I think Tough is better for a few reasons. We can chose runes that don’t provide a saving throw like Cloud or Hill, and we really need as much hp as possible to support our reckless playstyle.
Resilient Wisdom (Lv 12): Do not be a fool and neglect your Wisdom saves. You should be fighting enemies that do more than a bite and claw attack each turn at this level, and a lot of those things are forcing Wisdom saves. Failing a Wisdom save normally means you are out of the fight for a few turns at best, and swinging at your allies at worst. All the other feats that we have taken don’t matter if you are fleeing in terror from a Fear spell.
Crusher/Slasher (Lv 14): Since we are using Polearm Master, we can actually qualify for both of these feats with the same weapon, a glaive or halberd to be specific. Adding a 5ft shove can be situationally useful, and becomes really good if you just need that extra push to get your enemy into that Sickening Radiance your Wizard just laid down. The 10ft slow from Slasher adds to our control potential and means we might can save our opportunity attack for a different creature since the one we slowed can’t make it to our friends anyway.
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