I’ll be the first to admit that I’m not the biggest fan of 5e. Most of the games I run or play in are 3.5/Pathfinder, and I prefer the character customization options in those editions over 5e, which primarily focuses on class abilities rather than feats or items and thus leads to less customization options compared to 3.5 or Pathfinder. If there’s one thing I can appreciate about 5e, however, it’s its simplicity. As much as I love Pathfinder, the system itself is complex. There are a lot of rules for various minor edge cases that don’t often come up in play, and unless the GM is extremely confident in their ability to improvise rulings on-the-fly, it’s very easy for a 3.5/PF game to waste a lot of time digging through books or the SRD to look up specific rules. On top of that, the wide range of character options also makes it very difficult for players and the GM to keep track of all the bonuses and abilities that may be in play in a given situation, especially in games with new players.
5e, in contrast, is much simpler, and its rules were built with a focus on streamlining them to make them as efficient as possible. The end result is a system that provides a good core for the game to work off of while trusting the GM to handle edge circumstances as they come up. Though this simplicity makes it a great system for new players, I’ve also found that it creates a much better environment for homebrewing. Don’t get me wrong – I’ve brewed all kinds of rules in Pathfinder and tweaked with the rules in that system in almost any way you can imagine, but the problem with homebrew and Pathfinder is that there are often obscure or underdeveloped rules in the main game for various systems that you have to either decide to ignore or work around when designing custom rules and systems. Since 5e is more focused on just the “core” of the game, it’s a more modular system where you can easily add on custom systems and rules. 5e is also a bit more structured in terms of its core mechanics, which makes it a bit easier to balance custom races, classes, spells, and other content.
It’s perhaps for these reasons that I tend to see more quality homebrew content for 5e than I usually do for 3.5/Pathfinder these days, and every once in a while, I see a homebrewed race or class that I just have to make a build for. This was the case when I saw the Ikwiikwii, a sentient owlbear race, and the build we look at in this edition of Idle Rolling will be based around this homebrewed race.
The Ikwiikwii
Though you can look at the original Reddit post here, before I dive into the build, let me give a quick overview of the Ikwiikwii race. Ikwiikwii are adorable little owl-like humanoids related to owlbears. Although they are Small creatures, their owlbear heritage gives them more Strength and base speed than you would typically expect from a race of this size.
The Ikwiikwii’s racial traits gives us:
- +2 Wisdom, +1 Strength
- Base speed of 25 feet when walking on two legs, or 35 feet when running on all fours
- Climb speed of 20 feet
- Darkvision up to 60 feet
- Advantage on sight-based Wisdom (Perception) checks
- Wield heavy weapons without the normal small creature penalty
- Claws and beak are natural weapons that can be used to make unarmed strikes and deal 1d4 + Strength slashing damage
These traits are pretty varied and can lend themselves well to multiple classes, particularly martial classes. There is also a racial feat to go along with the race, Owlbear Savagery, which can be taken starting at 8th level. This feat allows you to become a savage owlbear for up to 1 hour once per long rest, which gives the following benefits:
- Size doubles in all dimensions, and weight is multiplied by eight. (Increase size by one category)
- Movement speed increases by 10 feet.
- Gain advantage on Strength checks, Strength saving throws, and smell-based Wisdom (Perception) checks.
- Claw damage increases to 1d8 + Strength.
- If both hands are unoccupied when you take the Attack action, you can attack twice instead of once and make a beak attack as a bonus action (dealing 1d8 + Strength piercing damage).
Admittedly, it was the racial feat in particular that caught my eye. Effectively, this feat gives you the effect of Enlarge without actually casting the spell. This either lets you get most of the bonuses of Enlarge without worrying about concentration or, since this growth isn’t due to a spell effect, you could even stack this size increase with another size increase from Enlarge. Unfortunately, the once per long rest restriction means that it isn’t something we can always rely on.
Character Concept
There are a few different directions that I think the Ikwiikwii lends itself well to. Initially, either Monk or Barbarian was the route I was looking at. Monk works well with the Ikwiikwii’s natural weapons and speed, and the Wisdom and Strength bonuses lended themselves well to this class as well. A barbarian build focused on a heavy weapon (perhaps with a Fighter dip for improved critical chance) also looked interesting. Ultimately, however, I went in a more unorthodox direction: a grappling-focused Sorcerer.
“Grappling” and “Sorcerer” are two words that don’t typically go together. Sorcerer has a small hit die and no armor proficiency, which doesn’t lend itself well to getting in the thick of combat. On top of that, a small-sized race isn’t the first thing that comes to mind when thinking of a grappling-based character – since you can only grapple creatures up to one size category bigger than you, such a character normally wouldn’t be able to grapple anything Large or bigger. That said, Owlbear Savagery changes things. Enlarge is one of the best buffs available for a grappling character, and this feat gives the parts of Enlarge that matter for grappling without requiring the spell itself. With Savagery active, we can grapple up to Large creatures, have advantage on our grapple checks, and gain some extra movement speed that we can use to drag grappled opponents across the battlefield. If we need to grapple something bigger than that, we can stack Savagery with Enlarge to make us Large, letting us grapple Huge creatures.
There are a lot of spells that can combo in interesting ways with grappling, and since a grapple-focused character is already primarily control-based, our Sorcerer spellcasting lets us pick up a couple of other spell options to give us additional control options in situations where grappling may not be effective. The most notable combo spells available to Sorcerers, aside from the previously-mentioned Enlarge, include Jump, Fly, Haste, barrier-type spells like Wall of Force/Forcecage and positioning-based spells such as Wall of Fire.
Jump/Fly let us grapple an enemy, take them as high in the air as we can go, then drop or suplex them into the ground for 1d6 damage per 10 feet of height. Haste gives us extra movement to let us drag enemies further or fly higher, plus additional actions that we can use to get in additional attacks, cast additional spells to further combo with our grapples or control the battlefield, or to Dash for even more movement speed. Barrier spells like Wall of Force or Forcecage let us grapple a particularly bothersome enemy, drag them away from the fight, and trap them in a cage with us (Thunderdome, anyone?). If the enemy in question is, say, an enemy spellcaster that really doesn’t want to get involved in melee combat, being trapped with our grappling little owl is certainly bad news for them. Finally, positioning-based/AoE spells like Wall of Fire can be used to create hazards we can drag grappled enemies into.
In order to get some extra survivability and additional combo options, we’re going to take Favored Soul (UA) with the Nature domain as our Sorcerous Origin. As a race of primarily hunters living in mountains or forests, this option also fits well flavor-wise with the Ikwiikwii. With this origin, we gain light and medium armor proficiency, helping our survivability considerably, gain Extra Attack at 6th level, and gain Nature domain spells, the most notable of which is Spike Growth, which is one of the best hazard spells to drag grappled foes through. Though we mainly want this origin for the armor proficiency and access to Spike Growth, it also has the added benefit of giving us the ability to sprout wings at-will with a bonus action at 14th level, which means we no longer need to cast Fly in order to suplex/drop enemies from high altitudes.
Once we have our wings, our late-game levels go into Monk, which gives us some extra base damage with our claws, additional movement speed, Slow Fall to mitigate any mishaps with our Jump/Fly combo, and Step of the Wind to give us another method of boosting our speed.
The Build
Anik the Ikwiikwii
Sorcerer (Favored Soul) 14 / Monk 6
Race: Ikwiikwii
Ability Scores:
As a Sorcerer, you might expect Charisma to be our highest ability score, but since we are focusing on grappling and our most important spells are primarily buffs, we don’t need a huge focus on our casting stat and instead emphasize Strength and Constitution for our melee prowess.
27-point buy: Str 15, Dex 12, Con 14, Int 8, Wis 8, Cha 14
With our racial bonuses, we’re looking at starting scores of 16 Strength and 10 Wisdom.
Background: Outlander
The biggest reason we want Outlander is for the Athletics proficiency to boost our grapple checks. Outlander also fits extremely well with the flavor of the Ikwiikwii race.
Feats/Score Increases:
Level 4: War Caster
Level 8: Mobile
Since our damage is primarily going to come from dropping/suplexing enemies and/or dragging them through spells, our ability score increases early on are used to grab some key feats needed to improve the build rather than immediately pumping Strength.
War Caster is a must-have to let us maintain a concentration buff while in melee combat and should be grabbed as soon as possible. Mobile gives us an extra 10 feet of base movement speed, which improves all of our dragging/flying/suplexing combos. Ten feet may not seem like enough of a boost to be worth a feat, but since we will usually have some combination of Boots of Speed, Haste, and Step of the Wind/Dash active late game, that 10 feet boost will really be turning into 20, 40, or even 80 feet. Even when halved by grappling, that boost still amounts to an extra 1d6/2d6/4d6 falling damage, or an extra 4d4/8d4/16d4 damage from dragging your grappled target through a Spike Growth.
Level 12: Owlbear Savagery or +2 Str
Level 16: +2 Str
Level 19: +2 Str or +2 Con or +2 Dex
As discussed earlier, Owlbear Savagery can do a ton for a grapple-based build, but the once per long rest restriction makes it hard to rely on constantly. If you don’t expect to be facing many Huge or larger creatures, you certainly could skip it to start maxing out Strength earlier. If you do this, you will want to make sure you have consistent means of getting Enlarge cast on you – either by buying/making a supply of Potions of Growth or having an ally capable and willing to cast it or Haste on you in combat so that you are still capable of getting both buffs when needed. If you skip Owlbear Savagery, your final score increase can go into Con for more health or, if you’re planning on picking up a Ring of Health, Dex for a bump to AC and Initiative or Cha to boost your casting.
Skills:
Athletics, Survival (from background)
Intimidation, Persuasion/Deception/Insight (from class)
Intimidation is a no-brainer for a grapple-based character, and the imagery of a tiny 3-4 foot owl trying to intimidate someone (and probably eventually resorting to an arm bar or something similar to get their point across) is hilarious. Even though we’re not pumping Charisma too much by Sorcerer standards, its still high enough to make us a good face if the party needs one, and the Sorcerer’s list of skills contains all of the important ones needed by a face. Persuasion or Deception are good Cha-based choices, and Insight is also a good option, although 10 Wisdom may not be enough to take full advantage of it. Arcana and Religion are some of the better Knowledge skills, but aren’t worth it since we’ve dumped Intelligence.
Suggested Spells:
- Cantrips: Prestidigitation, Minor Illusion, Chill Touch, Create Bonfire, Fire Bolt, Light
- 1st: Jump, Shield, Feather Fall
- 2nd: Enlarge/Reduce, Silence
- 3rd: Fly, Haste, Fireball
- 4th: Wall of Fire, Fire Shield
- 5th: Bigby’s Hand, Wall of Force
- 7th: Delayed Blast Fireball
- Bonus Nature Spells: Animal Friendship (1st), Speak with Animals (1st), Barkskin (2nd), Spike Growth (2nd), Plant Growth (3rd), Wind Wall (3rd), Dominate Beast (4th), Grasping Vine (4th), Insect Plague (5th), Tree Strike (5th)
The Sorcerer is always in short supply of spells known, but fortunately, many of the spells that combo with our grappling also have utility or damage potential on their own. Our cantrips, in particular, are focused on utility – Prestidigitation and Minor Illusion can be used for a variety of things, and Chill Touch can stop enemies from healing in addition to being a backup source of damage. Fire Bolt gives us some basic ranged damage, and Create Bonfire can be used as an early-game substitute for Spike Growth (albeit a bad one).
Although we have some damage and utility options in our low-level spell slots, our most important level 1-3 spells are buffs – particularly Enlarge at 2nd level and Fly/Haste at 3rd level. The exception to this is Spike Growth, which is one of the best spells to combo with our grapples. Our high-level spells are more focused on utility spells, but many of them can also combine well with our grappling abilities. For example, enemies can be dragged into a Wall of Fire, Bigby’s Hand can grapple enemies from a distance, Wall of Force can be used to trap a grappled enemy with you. Delayed Blast Fireball also forms a sort of combo with grappling – once your delayed fireball has built up enough power, fly over it with your grappled target, drop them into fireball range, fly out of the explosion radius, and detonate the fireball. Depending on your GM, if the dropped enemy is knocked prone from the falling damage, they may face disadvantage on the resulting Dex save.
Metamagic:
Extended and Quickened Spell are must-haves. You can be more flexible with the extra metamagic option gained at 10th level. I personally like Subtle Spell, which in theory could let you cast spells while grappling an opponent in each hand. Twinned may also be a good option to share the buffs you cast on yourself with an ally.
Equipment/Magic Items:
The one must-have attuned item for this build is a pair of Boots of Speed, which gives you another means of doubling movement speed. A Ring of Health is also useful to boost your HP – with a d6 hit die, we need more Con and HP wherever we can get it. A Reserve Ioun Stone or Pearl of Power may also be useful to get us more slots for our most important spells.
A supply of Potions of Growth is very useful, since they let you grow in size without requiring concentration and aren’t prohibitively expensive. You will especially want these if you pass up on taking Owlbear Savagery to ensure that you have multiple means of increasing your size and gaining Strength advantage.
As far as mundane equipment goes, you will want to wear medium armor, which is the highest proficiency we get via Favored Soul. Our HP is nothing special due to our hit die, so getting our AC as high as possible is important to help aid our survivability.
Combos
Although there are many ways we can combine our spells and grappling, most of our most powerful options involve some variation of maximizing our movement speed and converting that movement to damage, either by dropping a grappled foe from high altitudes or by dragging them through area control spells like Spike Growth. Our most powerful, “bread ‘n butter” combos are the suplex/eagle dive (“owl dive?”) and faceplanting our grappled enemies into Spike Growth (D&D’s equivalent of the old WWE thumbtack spots).
The Owl Dive
We have many different spells and abilities we can combine to make this combo work at various levels, but all of them revolve around the following principle:
First, we find a way to either jump extremely high or to obtain a flying speed. Then, we grapple our target, activate whatever abilities we can to increase our movement speed, jump/fly as high as possible, and throw them back down.
Levels 1-4: Jump
Damage dealt: 2d6 or 3d6 bludgeoning + prone
Until we gain Fly at 5th level, the Jump spell is our only means of gaining enough height to reliably pull off this technique. While under the effects of Jump, grapple an enemy with your Attack action, and use your movement to high jump (making sure you have moved at least 10 feet prior to jumping) and slam them back down.
A running high jump in this way lets you jump 3 + Str feet high normally, which is then tripled due to the jump spell. At our 16 starting Strength, that is a 24 foot jump. 5e jumping rules also state that you can multiply your character’s height by 1.5 and add this to your height to see how high you can reach when trying to grab a ledge; if your GM allows, this can also be used to determine how high the enemy falls from if you lift them as high as you can above your head. Ikwiikwii are only 2-3 feet tall, so on its own, this won’t get you another die of falling damage, but if you are under the effects of Enlarge, it would be enough to make the opponent take 30ft worth of falling damage instead of 20ft.
Levels 5-13: Fly
Damage dealt: up to 16d6 + prone + extra/plummeting attack
Once you hit 5th level, you can use Fly instead of Jump to enable the full “owl dive” maneuver. With Fly active, use your attack action to grapple, fly straight up in the air with your opponent, and throw them down to the ground. At this point, you also have the option of using your extra attack to make a plummeting attack by dive bombing the thrown enemy, but you will need to discuss with your GM how to handle this, as the 5e rules have no provision for a plummeting attack like this. If your GM doesn’t let you make a plummeting attack, you can also just use your extra attack to hit the opponent with your free claw or beak while grappling them.
Without any other abilities, Fly will let you carry an opponent up to 30 feet in the air, which equates to 3d6 damage. The real strength of using Fly rather than Jump, however, comes from the fact that abilities that modify your speed will also come into play. With a pair of Boots of Speed and the Mobile feat, your fly speed while grappling will be bumped up to 70 feet, which translates to 7d6 damage. If you can get an ally to cast Haste on you at the same time and add on the movement speed boost from Owlbear Savagery, your fly speed while grappling can peak at 160 feet for 16d6 worth of falling damage.
Levels 14+: Favored Soul Fly
Damage dealt: up to 28d6 + prone extra/plummeting attack
Once we hit Sorcerer 14, we no longer need to cast Fly to be able to fly, freeing up our concentration buff for Haste. The downside to our wings granted by Favored Soul is that they don’t have a starting speed of 60 feet, but rather whatever our walking speed is. At level 14, this will mean that our Favored Soul wings will have a speed of 35-45 feet, depending on whether Owlbear Savagery is active or not. Haste makes up for this speed loss, of course, and also makes it so that we can pull off this combo immediately on the first turn of combat:
First, use your attack action to grapple the enemy. As a bonus action, cast a quickened Haste. Use your haste action to Dash or activate Owlbear Savagery, depending on the situation, and your haste bonus action to activate Boots of Speed. Assuming you used Dash, this gives you a fly speed while grappling of 140 feet (35 feet base * 2 Haste * 2 Dash * 2 Boots / 2 grappling) for 14d6 damage, almost matching the normal Fly combo’s best-case scenario. With Haste, Dash, Boots, and Owlbear Savagery all active, your fly speed gets bumped up to 18d6, slightly above the normal Fly combo.
As you progress past level 14 and gain Monk levels, the potency of this combo increases significantly. At level 16, the bonus +10 ft. movement speed from Monk ups your fly speed without Savagery to 180 feet and up to 220 feet with Savagery. At level 20, your fly speed reaches a maximum of 240 feet without Savagery and 280 feet with, for a maximum of 28d6 damage. On top of this, Monk’s Step of the Wind lets you Dash as a bonus action, potentially freeing up your Haste action for an extra attack or for something else.
Spike Growth
The basic idea of the Spike Growth combo is similar to that of the owl dive: convert movement speed to damage. In this case, however, rather than using falling damage, we put down an area control spell and drag our opponent’s face through it as much as possible. Thanks to Favored Soul: Nature, we get access to Spike Growth, which is the single best spell available for this. We also do not need to drop/throw our grappled enemies with this combo, meaning we can keep them grappled and continue to drag them through the spikes each turn while getting in some melee attacks.
Unlike falling damage, Spike Growth will deal damage for every 5 feet of movement we have, and the damage it deals is greater – 2d4 rather than 1d6. However, Spike Growth is also a concentration spell, which means that we cannot use Haste, and thus cannot set up the entire combo in one round like higher levels of the owl dive combo.
Level 3-4: Unboosted Spike Growth
Damage dealt: up to 10d4 + grappled
We don’t gain access to Spike Growth until level 3. Once we do have it, however, we can cast it on a target area. On the next round (or the same round, if you used metamagic to quicken Spike Growth), use an attack action to grapple and run in a circle around the Spike Growth, dragging the grappled foe through it at your side. There are no real ways for us to boost our movement speed this early in the game, so we’re in the awkward position of having our 25 ft. base speed be halved to 10 ft., which means we can only deal at most 4d4 damage from movement in that first turn.
If you are able to maintain the grapple into subsequent rounds, you can use your action to Dash, doubling our base speed to 50 feet and letting us get in 25 ft. worth of spike damage each round for 10d4 damage.
Levels 5-15: 4x Spike Growth
Damage dealt: up to 36d4 (72d4 with Haste) + grappled + extra attack
At fifth level, you may be able to have a spellcasting ally cast Haste on you for an additional movement speed boost. This is also the point where rare magic items like Boots of Speed typically start to be found. With Boots and Dash active, you can drag an opponent for up to 50 feet and 20d4 spike damage. As you get Mobile and Owlbear Savagery feats, this speed can get bumped up to 90 feet for 36d4 spike damage.
If you have an ally capable of casting Haste on you, you can double your speed again for a maximum of 180 feet, or 72d4 spike damage.
Levels 16+: Monk Spike Growth
Damage dealt: up to 48d4 (96d4 with Haste) + grappled + extra attack
The extra 10-15 base movement speed from Monk bumps up our drag speed (without Savagery and with Dash/Boots) to 90-100 feet (36d4 or 40d4 damage). With Savagery active, that goes up further to a maximum of 120 feet and 48d4 spike damage. If an ally casts Haste on you, that doubles to 240 feet, or 96d4 spike damage.
Also important is the fact that Monk allows you to Dash as a bonus action for 1 ki, which helps improve the action economy of this combo.
Playstyle and Role
As a grappler, Anik specializes in single-target control. Our spells do give us some other control options for dealing with groups, but our strongest options generally involve us taking a problematic enemy out of the fight then smashing their face in.
Because we do possess a range of utility spells, this build can fit well in most parties with some alteration to your spell selection to lean more towards damage, control, or support/utility, depending on what the party needs. That said, since we are kind of a hybrid in-between a melee DPR character and a battlefield controlling arcane caster, we’re not as powerful at each of these roles as a dedicated martial character or caster and this build probably shouldn’t be relied on as the party’s only source of DPR or control – if the party is missing one of these roles entirely, you may be better off building a dedicated DPR or control build.
Having a good support caster as an ally is a big benefit to Anik – having another caster capable of casting buffs like Enlarge or Haste frees up some of our action economy, and healing along with defensive buffs will help mitigate the fact that we have relatively low HP for a melee-focused character. I would be more reluctant to run this type of build in a party where healing/defensive support was in short supply.
Roleplaying
Ikwiikwii have fairly rigid family structures and familial bonds are extremely important to them – Anik is no exception. Ikwiikwii mate for life, and when a nest (family) reaches four individuals, the eldest child is encouraged to leave and start their own family. Anik is the second-oldest of four children in his family, and thus, has just left the nest to start his own family. Though most Ikwiikwii tend to be shy and cautions, Anik’s older brother had plenty of adventures after leaving the nest, and Anik seeks the same journey, leading him to be energetic and at times a bit reckless. His personality, combined with his appearance, means that he frequently draws attention to himself and the party, though not always intentionally.
What Build to do Next?
Have a particular idea for a build you want to see in a future edition of Idle Rolling? Shoot me an e-mail at thegm@chaoticneutralgm.com.