Paladin Sacred Oath: Oathbreaker 5e
Review by Sam West, Twitter:@CrierKobold
Are you itching for some edge, but rogue and warlock are too mainstream for you? May I introduce you to the edgiest paladin option you can go with: Oathbreaker.
Oathbreaker is the “oath” for paladins who revoke their goody-two-shoes original oath to goodness and chastity or whatever. Oathbreakers want to be spooky and hateful for the sake of being spooky and hateful. They aren't here to bring holy, righteous divine energy; they're here to turn that holy energy into raw, unrestricted power to boost themselves to greatness, the rest of the world be damned.
See Also: Best Feats for Oathbreaker Paladin
3rd Level: 1st Level Oath Spells, Channel Divinities
Hellish Rebuke and Inflict Wounds are the 1st level Domain Spells offered.
Inflict Wounds isn't something I'm ever eager to spend actions on as a character with a greatsword and divine smite.
Hellish Rebuke, however, is an excellent addition. Where in Warlock Hellish Rebuke is clunky and costs way more than it's worth, on Paladin, where you can have a few 1st level slots laying around in the mid-tiers, having a guaranteed reaction for punishment to those who manage to connect to your 24 AC is great. Warlocks’ issue with Hellish Rebuke is its cost; when it costs you a pact slot, it’s difficult to justify. As one of four 1st level slots, though? It's WAY better.
Additionally, you get two competing options for your Channel Divinity: Control Undead and Dreadful Aspect.
Control Undead flips the Turn Undead element on its head, instead giving you complete control over any undead of CR lower than your level for a full DAY. Some undead are immune to Turn Undead, but most will easily get bound to your will on a single failed Wis save, and have no subsequent saves to try to break out of it once they fail. You can even reuse it daily to reassert control over the undead over and over again to mimic Animate Dead, but without the limitations of the type presented by the spell. If you want an undead legion overlord, having Control Undead will help you get to that fantasy.
One important note is the recharge versus time commitment on Control Undead; you get your channel divinity back when you finish a short or long rest, meaning you could extend long rests out by an hour to reassert control over something and still start the day with a Channel Divinity to get a Dreadful Aspect use off as well. This leads to Control Undead feeling more like a passive companion feature you can weaponize to make a character with a semi-permanent undead lackey. It's a massive portion of Oathbreaker's power.
Dreadful Aspect is the more generally applicable option, and while less impressive in raw power when it works, does offer a meaningful conditional fear to everyone around you, and maintains the condition as long as you stick to the creatures you frighten. Getting this on top of an undead minion blows most other Channel Divinity options out of the water in cohesion and total power added to your sheet at any given moment.
Both of these features are excellent, and with Hellish Rebuke being a banger of a 1st level reaction spell alongside them, you're setting yourself up for greatness out the gate with Oathbreaker.
5th Level: 2nd Level Oath Spells
Crown of Madness and Darkness are Oathbreaker's 2nd-level Oath Spells.
Crown of Madness is a great little save-or-die option that can turn an enemy mad, potentially getting it to be a weapon against its own allies. Not only does this spell have tons of potential, it fits the flavor of Oathbreaker perfectly.
Darkness too fits their theme. Usually, its utility is a bit too narrow for me to eagerly prepare it, but as an Oath Spell, it'll pop up more often than you think and highlights why Darkness can be worth the slot. It isn't revolutionary by any stretch, but as far as Oath Spells go, I'm pretty happy with both of these.
7th Level: Aura of Hate
Where other domains get protective or supportive auras that grant boons to allies, Oathbreakers get easily the corniest named ability in the game: Aura of HATE.
With Aura of Hate, you boost all of your melee weapon damage rolls by your Charisma modifier. Additionally, all allied undead within 10 feet of you get the benefit too, making your Control Undead all the more appealing to get up and running. Animate Dead is a Oath Spell offered at 9th as well, meaning you can construct your own undead squad of destruction that scale their damage with your Charisma modifier.
It’s a simple yet rewarding feature. You can ignore the undead boons on it and still get a fine reward for your own damage, but by investing into undead control you can push its power even further.
9th Level: 3rd Level Oath Spells
Animate Dead and Bestow Curse are Oathbreaker's 3rd-level options.
Animate Dead, as mentioned prior, scales beautifully with Aura of Hate and actually rewards using zombies instead of skeleton archers. It's a bit expensive and clunky at this tier, but if you can consistently keep two or three zombies around with a few 3rd level slot investments, it can easily define your character as an undead marshal leading from the front lines alongside their unliving minions.
Bestow Curse, on the other hand, is horrendous. The flavor is great, but mechanically the spell is terrible. Too much depends on the DM giving you better outcomes than the listed conditions, as the “regular” curses aren't even close to usable in combat, and out of combat more petty than actually detrimental.
13th Level: 4th Level Oath Spells
Blight, like Inflict Wounds, is competing with your Attack Action alongside a Divine Smite for damage. Chances are, you're going to want to make two attacks and smite for 5d8 bonus damage instead of making one 8d8 damage save, especially now with Aura of Hate stacking a +5 damage on top of your weapon attacks.
Confusion at least offers some level of discord you can sow in enemy lines when things are going south. It isn't a spell I'm ever thrilled with the results of, but can be effective enough in a pinch should you have already used your Dreadful Aspect and need more area control tools.
15th Level: Supernatural Resistance
I never am a big fan of a kind of damage resistance being an entire feature. Supernatural Resistance is just that. At this tier, you're not facing down regular amounts of massively threatening non-magical damage, making this a feature you benefit most from in encounters you're most likely to succeed in anyway. Against magical upper-tier villains, not getting anything from this is a real bummer.
17th Level 5th Level Oath Spells
Contagion is a joke of a spell that requires way too much to go right for ANYTHING to happen in the first place. It's the last thing you want to be spending one of your new, shiny, 5th-level spell slots on when your wizard is raining meteors from the sky and your bard is transforming into a dragon with True Polymorph.
Dominate Person at least scales with the game. Being able to dominate upper CR humanoids to use their more powerful abilities is about as much as you could ask for out of a 5th-level spell that needs to compete with 9th-level spells, so long as there are actually humanoids to dominate at this tier. It can be a backbreaking effect that a humanoid supervillain has to burn a Legendary Resistance on, or else an encounter be entirely trivialized. Usually, you’ve left the realm of humanoid villains and are more likely facing otherworldly entities like massive celestial or demon princes, making this a lot less exciting.
20th Level: Dread Lord
Dread Lord closes the option out with a minute-long fear reward with an aura of protection and bonus action 3d10 + charisma modifier spell attack. Altogether, when stacked up with Dreadful Aspect, you've got a powerhouse feature that gives you a place to put your bonus action for meaningful extra damage on top of a big defensive boon to you, your undead lackeys, and your nearby party members. It isn't the most game-warping of top end features, but does fit beautifully together with the rest of the options.
All Together
Outside of a couple of lackluster oath spells and Supernatural Resistance, Oathbreaker is packing heat. By default, it wants you to build an undead overlord leading, but doesn't need to rely on the fantasy for all of its power. If you want the most out of Oathbreaker, you do need to care about undead, but you can have a perfectly reasonable character off of Hellish Rebuke, Crown of Madness, Darkness, Aura of Hate, and Dread Lord making you a beacon of evil and power.
I'm a big fan of Oathbreaker. It can be a deeply complex and rewarding option while also offering an easier to track route involving less undead management. If you want to smite things, but don't want to be righteous about it, Oathbreaker is here for you. If you want to do the undead overlord thing but also want to stab, Oathbreaker is here for you. If you just want a powerful, linear paladin option that is good at killing things, Oathbreaker is here for you.
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