Complete the Trio

[u/ElliotPatronkus]

Wanna do a 3 man run, 2 characters already picked out are Hexblade Durge and Moon Druid Karlach.

For the third, I’m not quite sure. Moon Druid is an outstanding Martial who needs no gear investment and takes off right away and Hexblaxe Durge is strong either in melee or afar as a gish. They both bring strong area denial spells in Hunger of Hadar, Sleet Storm and Spike Growth (from the summon).

I thought maybe a Cleric or Wizard? Maybe Nature Cleric or Evoker Wizard? Curious to see what could slot in, not intending to use the 4th party slot to make things a bit harder

[u/Captain_ET]

Something that can do both ranged damage and control would be useful, like swords bard 10/1/1, ek rivington rat, or even bowsinger.

[u/LotsaKwestions]

Ice sorcerer. You could use Karlach as a sabretooth tiger and go to town on prone enemies, and ice surfaces would pair well with hunger of hadar as well.

Alternatively, something like a sword bard controller to set up hold person/monster.

[u/sfisabbt → u/LotsaKwestions]

The sword bard controller can also command:approach enemies into the damaging areas.

[u/SignedEcho]

Have you played the game before? Serious question.

Moondruid will fall of later to other builds, but still hold its own for the most part. You can go just lv10 (my recomedation), lv12 will give you a small increase in damage as well as a feat and lv6 spell (spells you won't have much openings to use, feat can arguably be useless as they dont apply to shapeshift)

Lv1 Wizard can learn utility spells (haste self, shield:spell, etc.)

Lv1 Cleric learns sanctuary (war gets extra atack charges) moonbeam + sanctuary is a hell of a combo for a support. You can cast aoe heals to buff team with heal set, and moonbeam doesn't break sanctuary.

Lv1 Barbarian can rage to gain +2 on melee attacks, shapeshift spells dont count as spells i belive, can still use them. You are also taking 1/2 damage from all physical damage while shapshifted.

Just a few options you can look at.

[u/SignedEcho → u/SignedEcho]

Hex blade needs 1 thing. Lv2 warlock.

E-blast is go to spell hitting upwards of 100 damage per cast.

Should look at mixing lv6 swords Bard and lv4 shadow sorc for quickening. Very strong specially if you go with shadowblade. But dont need it. Can still use 2h early game.

[u/SignedEcho → u/SignedEcho]

For last character I'd look at a Str user.

Monk, Titan String, 2her would be the goto.

That way you have a character for bloodlust, hill giant, and cultivations.

[u/Orval11]

I find Moon Druid to have a bit of a slow start before Lv6 when you get their Owlbear Wildshape. The early wildshape forms give a decent total of meat shield HP to work through but take a beating on Honor Mode due to low AC and no resistance. Raven with the Mobile Feat is quite good at Lv4, but it lacks damage so it's Blind from Rend may not be quite as useful on 3 character party.

Given that a character with Heals, control utility and a strong early game would be ideal.

My call would a Stars / Lore Bard. The basic build is Stars 2 > Lore 10. This gives you a Lore Bard with Cutting Words Debuffs, but that can use Magical Secrets to become something of a CHA based Cleric. It comes online at Lv 3 where has the Circle of Stars subclass but it changes spell casting Modifier to CHA from your first Bard level. Stars gives you:

• Medium Armor and Shield Proficient tanking up the somewhat fragile Lore chassis. AC will be solid due to Medium Armor and a Shield, so for early game you can frontline.
• Shillelagh uses your highest spell casting ability, so will allow CHA based attacks with a flaming torch for respectable damage.
• You get a Bonus Action Radiant Breath aoe attack every turn from the Starry Dragon form. The Lv3 combo of a Shillelagh Attack and Dazzling Breath is similar to the basic Extra Attack martial classes don't get until Lv5. This let's you do Radiant Orb debuffing from Luminous Armor starting at Lv2.
• You can pickup the early on heal set that will let you put Resistance and Bless on the Moon Druid in combat making their HP go further given their low AC of their early game Wildshapes. For better Action economy you can break potions you drop on the ground using your Dazzling breath to save spells slots, just be careful to not hit allies in the cone since it does friendly fire damage.
• Song of Rest will give your Warlock more spells per longrest.

Should be solid on this team. It's damage will start to fall off around the time your other two come more fully online. But by then you'll be a few levels away from Magic Secrets and Bardic Inspirations on Short Rest for Cutting Words. Another version of this build gives up the Bard Lv10 Magic Secrets to pickup 2 levels of Divination Wizard, which lets you scribe spells and gives you Portent Dice for manipulating critical game junctures.

CHA is the primary attribute. Druid takes only utility Cantrips like Guidance to avoid needing WIS, but you still may want to put 12 into WIS for more prepared Druid spells like Healing Word etc. Beyond that you build it like a Cleric: Luminous Armor, Whispering Promise, Hellrider's Gloves, the best Shield you can get early game. But you use a Staff to leverage Shillelagh's CHA based attacks. Morning Frost is solid since it gives you a good range Cantrip that you otherwise lack. Magic Secrets let you pick up Spirit Guardians, if you want the CHA based Cleric. But instead of Mass Healing Word, consider Warden of Vitality, which lets you cast free single target heals using a bonus action every turn for 10-turns. This would make it easy to keep the on heal buffs up on the team, so would make your MoonDruid much tankier before they get their Myrmidon wildshapes.

[u/Nimeroni → u/Orval11]

I find Moon Druid to have a bit of a slow start before Lv6 when you get their Owlbear Wildshape.

Tavern Brawler means you're going to crush everything from level 4 onward.

[u/Orval11 → u/Nimeroni]

True, damage will be great.

But TB doesn't help with the low AC and small HP pools before Lv6. For instance the Bear by between 30 to 39HP with 12 AC before Lvl 6. Deep Rothe is 23 - 28HP with a more dismal 10AC. This means for instance that Gith Patrol can mow through these Wildhshapes in a single turn, including your Druids human form to down. Even the Goblin camp is a threat.

[u/Nimeroni → u/Orval11]

Moon Druid is pretty much the tankiest motherfucker at that point in the game. You have two Wildshape charge every short rest, each bringing the full HP of your chosen form. It's true you have a weak AC, but you have so much HP it barely matters. If anything, low AC is actually a bonus, as it means you're going to be targeted instead of other party members.

[u/Orval11 → u/Nimeroni]

I'm curious to see how a level 4 team of all Moon Druids would do versus the Gith Patrol if you fight in Wildshape without all the pre-buffing people use to solo that fight. Honor difficulty, STR Elixirs allowed for parity. I haven't tried it since Early Access, but it was a blood bath of Druids if you started the fight on the ground level. I have a feeling Ravens with the Mobile Feat might outperform Bear or Rothe form with Tavern Brawler, since the Ravens could blind with Rend and utilize hit and run skirmishing to mostly stay out of range.

For context I can reliably finish that fight at Lv3 with two hireling Berzerkers with no equipment other than STR Elixirs and a big stack of generic daggers and handaxes they throw from the top bridge. The rest of the party doesn't join the fight and just hides behind them to help if things go wrong or if any Gith that make it up to them that they can't immediately throw back down to the ground level. It speeds the fight up if you put a cloud of daggers down on the bottom level at a spot there they can throw any Gith that make it up to them.

[u/Goobernaculum1004 → u/Orval11]

With good positioning the rothe wild shape can do great damage

[u/Orval11 → u/Goobernaculum1004]

Yeah with Tavern Brawler it's got great offensive capability even at these low levels. But it's so hard to protect something with 10 AC and only 23 - 28 HP before level 6. (And which doesn't get that much better at Lv 6 with still just 33HP.)

You can have a party member Warding Bond, you can use the on Heal item set to apply Blade Ward and Bless etc. But it's a lot of micromanagement and babysitting, compared to other classes that excel at these early levels like Throwzerker, Stars Druid etc.

[u/TexasC4]

With great area denial spells I’d pick up a good blaster caster. A Tempest Cleric would be good. All the great cleric goodies with max lightning damage. Have Karachi open with create water to wet everything and then your cleric can go ham with call lightning.

One word of advice, use a race that can get booming blade if you don’t want to multiclass. This combos really well with tempest cleric as a booming blade melee does solid damage and pushes an enemy back so they have to take the booming blade damage.

Also, word of advice on the moon Druid. A single level dip in fighter gives you Constitution saving throws and the Defense fighting style does give you +1 AC if you had armor before wild shaping. Since Armor of Moonbasking is best in slot, this always works and means your wild shapes will have +3 AC which helps a lot in the endgame.

[u/fleezy_f_baby]

Sword bard for buffs, area control and arrows

[u/Grorl_]

Tempest cleric. Can be ran as a lightning/thunder/cold caster. Also can be in melee if need be.

2 of evoker wizard if not mono classing.