Classes
Adventurers are extraordinary people, driven by a thirst for excitement into a life that others would never dare lead. They are heroes, compelled to explore the dark places of the world and take on the challenges that lesser folk can’t stand against.
Class is the primary definition of what your character can do. It’s more than a profession; it’s your character’s calling. Class shapes the way you think about the world and interact with it and your relationship with other people and powers. A fighter, for example, might view the world in pragmatic terms of strategy and maneuvering, and see herself as just a pawn in a much larger game. A cleric, by contrast, might see himself as a willing servant in a god’s unfolding plan or a conflict brewing among various deities. While the fighter has contacts in a mercenary company or army, the cleric might know a number of priests, paladins, and devotees who share his faith.
Your class gives you a variety of special features, such as a fighter’s mastery of weapons and armor, and a wizard’s spells. At low levels, your class gives you only two or three features, but as you advance in level you gain more and your existing features often improve.
Multiclassing
Adventurers sometimes advance in more than one class. A rogue might switch direction in life and swear the oath of a paladin. A barbarian might discover latent magical ability and dabble in the sorcerer class while continuing to advance as a barbarian.
Multiclassing allows you to gain levels in multiple classes. Doing so lets you mix the abilities of those classes to realize a character concept that might not be reflected in one of the standard class options.
With this rule, you have the option of gaining a level in a new class whenever you advance in level, instead of gaining a level in your current class. Your levels in all your classes are added together to determine your character level. For example, if you have three levels in wizard and two in fighter, you're a 5th-level character.
As you advance in levels, you might primarily remain a member of your original class with just a few levels in another class, or you might change course entirely, never looking back at the class you left behind. You might even start progressing in a third or fourth class. Compared to a single-class character of the same level, you'll sacrifice some focus in exchange for versatility. From here on, your class with the highest amount of levels will be refered to as your primary class.
Prerequisites
To qualify for a new class, you must meet the ability score prerequisites for both your current class and your new one:
| Class | Ability Score Requirement |
|---|---|
| Artificer | Intelligence 13 |
| Barbarian | Strength 13+ |
| Bard | Charisma 13+ |
| Cleric | Wisdom 13+ |
| Druid | Wisdom 13+ |
| Fighter | Strength or Dexterity 13+ |
| Monk | Dexterity or Wisdom 13+ |
| Paladin | Strength or Charisma 13+ |
| Ranger | Dexterity or Wisdom 13+ |
| Rogue | Dexterity 13+ |
| Sorcerer | Charisma 13+ |
| Warlock | Charisma 13+ |
| Wizard | Intelligence 13+ |
Hit Dice
When you level up, regardless of which class you level your total Hit Dice will be your character level and their type will be that of your primary class. Once your primary class changes, be sure to recalculate your health to account for your new die's type.
Proficiencies
Your proficiency bonus is always based on your total character level, not your level in a particular class. For example, if you are a fighter 3/rogue 2, you have the proficiency bonus of a 5th-level character, which is +3.
When you gain your first level in a class other than your initial class, you gain only some of new class's starting proficiencies:
| Class | Proficiencies Gained |
|---|---|
| Artificer | Light armor, medium armor, shields, thieves' tools, tinker's tools |
| Barbarian | Shields, simple weapons, martial weapons |
| Bard | Light armor, one skill of your choice, one musical instrument of your choice |
| Cleric | Light armor, medium armor, shields |
| Druid | Light armor, medium armor, shields |
| Fighter | Light armor, medium armor, shields, simple weapons, martial weapons |
| Monk | Simple weapons, shortswords |
| Paladin | Light armor, medium armor, shields, simple weapons, martial weapons |
| Ranger | Light armor, medium armor, shields, simple weapons, martial weapons, one skill from the class's skill list |
| Rogue | Light armor, one skill from the class's skill list, thieves' tools |
| Sorcerer | |
| Warlock | Light armor, simple weapons |
| Wizard |
Class Features
When you gain a new level in a class, you get its features for that level. You don't, however, receive the class's starting equipment, and a few features have additional rules when you're multiclassing: Channel Divinity, Extra Attack, Unarmored Defense, and Spellcasting.
Channel Divinity
If you already have the Channel Divinity feature and gain a level in a class that also grants the feature, you gain the Channel Divinity effects granted by that class, but getting the feature again doesn't give you an additional use of it. You gain additional uses only when you reach a class level that explicitly grants them to you. For example, if you are a cleric 6/paladin 4, you can use Channel Divinity twice between rests because you are high enough level in the cleric class to have more uses. Whenever you use the feature, you can choose any of the Channel Divinity effects available to you from your two classes.
Extra Attack
If you gain the Extra Attack class feature from more than one class, the features don't add together. You can't make more than two attacks with this feature unless it says you do (as the fighter's version of Extra Attack does). Similarly, the warlock's eldritch invocation Thirsting Blade doesn't give you additional attacks if you also have Extra Attack.
Unarmored Defense
If you already have the Unarmored Defense feature, you can't gain it again from another class.
Spellcasting
Your capacity for spellcasting depends partly on your combined levels in all your spellcasting classes and partly on your individual levels in those classes. Once you have the Spellcasting feature from more than one class, use the rules below. If you multiclass but have the Spellcasting feature from only one class, you follow the rules as described in that class.
Spells Known and Prepared
You determine what spells you know and can prepare for each class individually, as if you were a single-classed member of that class. If you are a ranger 4/wizard 3, for example, you know three 1st-level ranger spells based on your levels in the ranger class. As 3rd-level wizard, you know three wizard cantrips, and your spellbook contains ten wizard spells, two of which (the two you gained when you reached 3rd level as a wizard) can be 2nd-level spells. If your Intelligence is 16, you can prepare six wizard spells from your spellbook.
Your spellcasting ability is determined by your primary class. It is the method that you learned to channel magic. Once your primary class changes, this signifies a change in how your character associates magic with themselves, and this could change your spellcasting ability. On the other hand, a spellcasting focus, such as a holy symbol, can be used only for the spells from the class associated with that focus.
Spell Slots
You determine your available spell slots by adding together all your levels in the bard, cleric, druid, sorcerer, and wizard classes, and half your levels (rounded down) in the artificer, paladin and ranger classes.
If you have more than one spellcasting class, this table might give you spell slots of a level that is higher than the spells you know or can prepare. You can use those slots, but only to cast your lower-level spells. If a lower-level spell that you cast has an enhanced effect when cast using a higher-level slot, you can use the enhanced effect, even though you don't have any spells of that higher level.
If you have both the Spellcasting class feature and the Pact Magic class feature from the warlock class, you can use the spell slots you gain from the Pact Magic feature to cast spells you know or have prepared from classes with the Spellcasting class feature, and you can use the spell slots you gain from the Spellcasting class feature to cast warlock spells you know.
| Level | 1st | 2nd | 3rd | 4th | 5th | 6th | 7th | 8th | 9th |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1st | 2 | ||||||||
| 2nd | 3 | ||||||||
| 3rd | 4 | 2 | |||||||
| 4th | 4 | 3 | |||||||
| 5th | 4 | 3 | 2 | ||||||
| 6th | 4 | 3 | 3 | ||||||
| 7th | 4 | 3 | 3 | 1 | |||||
| 8th | 4 | 3 | 3 | 2 | |||||
| 9th | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 1 | ||||
| 10th | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 2 | ||||
| 11th | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 1 | |||
| 12th | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 1 | |||
| 13th | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 1 | ||
| 14th | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 1 | ||
| 15th | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | |
| 16th | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | |
| 17th | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| 18th | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| 19th | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| 20th | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 |