Best Feats for Watchers Paladin 5e
by Prince Phantom
I absolutely love the Oath of the Watchers Paladin for a lot of reasons. We get a pretty good expanded spell list with Moonbeam, Counterspell, Banishment, and Hold Monster, our two channel divinity options are both amazing for the full 20 levels, and we get to boost our entire team’s initiative at 7th level. 15th level is a bit less exciting, but I’d argue that this oath gets the coolest capstone of all, with the ability to banish enemies with each attack we make. The majority of these features lean us into a more supportive role, which is a great place for a Paladin to be. Feat selection will look pretty standard, as none of these drastically change our combat flow.
Best Feats for Watchers Paladin 5e
Crossbow Expert/Sharpshooter (ASAP): I continue my crusade for ranged Paladins being the optimal choice for the majority of subclasses, knowing full well that most of you will ignore this advice. I get it, you like smite, you like playing the typical knight archetype, but melee is just bad in 5e. Focusing on ranged lets us pick our targets more easily, take far less damage, protect our concentration, deal roughly equivalent damage, keep allies in our aura more easily, save our spell slots for actual spells that have a much bigger impact than a few d8 of damage, and engage flying enemies or enemies out of our walking range. Blame the designers, not me, for giving basically no incentive to go into melee.
Fey Touched (Lv 8): I’m honestly surprised that they didn’t give this subclass any form of teleportation like the Horizon Walker Ranger or similarly flavored subclasses. Misty Step fixes this problem, and Silvery Barbs is the clear choice for our other spell, giving us a great tool to empower our own spells or those of our friends.
Gift of the Gem Dragon (Lv 8): If you want a different feat that improves your Charisma, this isn’t a bad option at all, especially if you plan to stay at range. This allows us to push back an enemy and maybe even interrupt their multiattack if they do not have the movement left to get back in melee range of us.
Inspiring Leader (Lv 12): All parties should have some form of mass temporary HP, and you’re a good candidate to fill that role if it hasn’t already been filled. Taking this just gives such a massive boon to overall durability, and only becomes better the bigger your party is, including your pets and summons.
Alert (Lv 12): This is mostly here for the meme of having an initiative bonus of easily over 10, definitely much higher if you fight at range and invested in Dex instead of Strength. You don’t really need this, but if you want to make sure you go first in literally every combat, it’s probably the best way to accomplish that.
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