The Omen Archive

Level 15 analysis

It’s level up time again for the Hells as they head towards what is likely their final confrontation with Ludinus! While the stakes are high and the team faces complex choices, this level up is straightforward for most everyone, so this post will be on the shorter side compared to our previous analyses.

Ashton

Barbarian 15

HP
+11, total: 148
ASI
None

At level 15, Ashton gains Persistent Rage. This means his rage will now continue even if he doesn’t attack or take damage during a round, which gives them more freedom to avoid attacks or strategically use their excellent movement to help their teammates without risking his rage dropping. Before, if Ashton wanted to spend a turn making his way[1] across the field to, say, deliver a potion, they might have had to sacrifice their rage to do it. No such trouble now! Their rage only drops early now if they go unconscious or choose to drop it willingly.

Braius

Bard 3/Paladin 12

HP
+4, total: 118
ASI
None

Braius took his twelfth level in Paladin, and since there was no change to any of his Ability Scores, we know that he opted for a feat. All of the feats we favor for Braius have been mentioned before in previous level ups for other characters—War Caster, Sentinel, Mage Slayer—but out of the bunch, we specifically would love to see him take Mage Slayer. Imposing disadvantage on concentration checks to maintain spells isn’t quite as good as Scream Needle’s ability to double the DC, but it still is a huge boon when dealing with high level casters, of which the Hells are sure to fight many very soon. In Ludinus’ case, we know that he has War Caster or the equivalent, so hitting him with Mage Slayer would effectively negate his advantage. In Episode 109, Liam said about Scream Needle that “[it’s] almost like it was made specifically for our needs,” and those needs haven’t changed; the more the Hells can mess with the effectiveness of high-level casters, the better. Likewise, the more hits the team can get on those casters, the better, and in addition to imposing disadvantage on spell-maintaining CON saves, this feat would allow Braius to use his reaction to attack any caster tossing off a spell within his melee range. It would also grant him advantage on saves against those nearby casters, which certainly can never hurt.

Chetney

Blood Hunter 14/Rogue 1

HP
+8, total: 128
ASI
None

First among Chetney’s updates from his 14th Blood Hunter level is Hardened Soul. This feature comes just in time, because Hardened Soul gives Chet advantage on saving throws against being charmed or frightened—a very useful ability to have when going up against mind-bending enemies that might try to turn Chetney on his friends. He also gets a Crimson Rite improvement, which specifically allows him to add another damage type option to his choices. Currently, he has Rite of Flame and Rite of the Frozen for fire and cold damage respectively. (As a reminder, these rites add extra damage of the chosen type to his weapon attacks.) Level 14 adds necrotic, psychic, and thunder damage to the menu. We expect him to choose either necrotic or thunder, since the Reilora tend to have psychic resistance.

Lastly, Chet gets a fourth Blood Curse. Of those available, we like a few but love one. Blood Curse of the Anxious is useful in its Amplified form, which imposes disadvantage on the targeted creature’s next Wisdom Save. Blood Curse of the Eyeless would allow Chetney to subtract a hemocraft die from his target’s attack rolls—also nice. But what we like best is Blood Curse of Exposure, which would allow Chetney to, in reaction to a creature within 30 feet of him getting hit with damage from a spell, use his Blood Curse to remove that creature’s resistance to all of the damage types associated with the triggering spell. That could be huge against Ludinus, who we know is resistant to spell damage. A couple lightning bolts to his chest from Imogen and Dorian in conjunction with this Curse would be very, very nice.

Dorian

Bard 15

HP
+10, total: 138
ASI
None

This level up, Dorian’s Inspiration die goes up to a d12. He also gains an 8th level spell slot, which gives us a few things to chew on!

One thing that is interesting to consider here is the introduction of the new 2024 D&D Rules. We don’t know to what extent Matt is allowing use of the new rules, but we do know that Braius has used Shining Smite, the replacement for Branding Smite, and Lieve’tel has used the new Power Word Fortify. Presumably the Hells will be keeping their classes and progression firmly in the 2014 rules territory, since the 2024 updates are generally extensive enough to otherwise necessitate rebuilding their characters from scratch, and since Chetney’s Blood Hunter class didn’t get a revamp. However, the use of some 2024 spells does make us wonder if the rest of the new spells are officially on the table for the Hells.

If they are, we would consider the new Befuddlement spell for Dorian. This spell replaces 2014’s Feeblemind. We prefer the newer version, and not just because “Befuddlement” sounds much more affable, like Dorian himself. The primary difference between the two is that Befuddlement does significantly more short-term damage than Feeblemind at the expense of its longer-term massive debuff. Befuddlement does 10d12 damage vs. Feeblemind’s 4d6, and unlike Feeblemind, it still does half damage on a successful save. Befuddlement does not reduce the target’s Intelligence and Charisma scores to 1 like its predecessor, which means it’s not a particularly long-term solution to a dangerous demagogue like Ludinus, but it does still prevent the victim from casting spells, using magic items, or activating magic features. That would still make Ludinus a much easier kill if it managed to succeed. Of course, that’s a big if, since it requires an Intelligence save, which is sure to be his best skill, so despite the devastating effects of Befuddlement, Dorian has some other strong options to consider.

Mind Blank is an incredibly useful buffing spell that is more or less the same both in its 2014 and 2024 iterations, and would be particularly strong against the abilities of the Reilora. This is, of course, why Caleb cast it on Yasha and himself; immunity to psychic damage and complete safety from the charmed condition and any other attempts to mess with the protected creature’s mind will be an incredible boon when facing off against the Weave Mind, and the Hells are likely to also encounter strong psychic attacks on the Moon of Ill Omen.

Power Word Stun is of course incredibly powerful (no pun intended), and the 2024 rules version is if anything a bit better. The 2014 version of the spell does nothing if the target has more than 150 hit points, but the new version reduces an over-150-HP creature’s speed to 0 until the start of the caster’s next turn. For the sake of diversifying the party’s abilities, we would favor this slightly less for Dorian, because we’re expecting it to be Imogen’s 8th level choice, something we will talk about a little later in this analysis.

Ultimately, we think we favor Mind Blank, because it is a sure thing and lasts a full 24 hours. It could make for some fun roleplay, too—perhaps Dorian learned it from watching Caleb, and perhaps his choice as to recipient might be less strategic and more emotional, which is always fun.

Fearne

Druid 10/Rogue 5

HP
+5, total: 97
ASI
None

If the Hells were still doing a lot of cross-Exandria travel, we would be more surprised that Fearne took another level in Rogue instead of going Druid 11, which would have unlocked the Transport via Plants spell that Fearne has audibly longed for many times throughout the campaign. However, with the Hells heading into a battle on Ruidus with Ludinus, taking a fifth level in Rogue is a good strategic choice by Ashley, since it gives her Uncanny Dodge. The ability to halve incoming damage using her reaction is very, very big for Fearne, who is still sitting under 100 HP with a 17 AC, making her one of the most vulnerable party members. Imogen may have fewer HP, but her AC has shot up to 19 and her enhanced mobility via flight lets her get out of harm’s way much more easily, and while Laudna may have a lower AC, her HP is higher than half the party’s martial fighters and her Mirror Image means that hitting her is harder than her AC implies. Since Fearne is a key part of the party’s healing and buffing strategies, with Aura of Life and Mass Cure Wounds in particular—as well as the hopefully unnecessary but definitely reassuring Revivify—keeping herself up keeps everyone up.

Fearne’s sneak attack damage also goes up to 3d6, but since she doesn’t rely on weapon attacks, and her Moon Sickle is neither a finesse nor a ranged weapon, she doesn’t have the means to make use of it, so this level up choice is all about that Dodge.

Imogen

Sorcerer 15

HP
+5, total: 92
ASI
None
Sorcery Points
+1, total: 15

Like Dorian, Imogen has also gained an 8th level spell and slot. We think her spell choice is a bit more straightforward, though: Power Word Stun.

Her other choices are Horrid Wilting, Demiplane (newly accessible to Sorcerers in the 2024 rules), Dominate Monster, Earthquake, Incendiary Cloud, and Sunburst. Dominate Monster fits with Imogen’s mental control theme, and seems the most likely alternative to Power Word Stun, but we find the wisdom check rerolls on taking damage a bit too much of a liability in a showdown with Ludinus. Sunburst is useful for hitting a lot of targets and inflicts the blinded condition, but with such a large area of effect, it is quite likely to catch allies in the crossfire. Plus, undead creatures get disadvantage on the save, and we just can’t see Imogen putting Laudna in particular danger that way. The rest of Imogen’s options don’t really vibe with her themes as much, and she tends to be very on theme in terms of her spell choices. That’s part of why we think Power Word Stun suits her so well. Imogen’s emergence as a leader has gone hand in hand with her increasing skill with words, initially with deception and then with persuasion; giving her a Power Word at the end of the campaign feels thematically relevant, on top of the fact that the spell is just very, very good. It’s also the spell that the Matron’s facsimile of Liliana used on Imogen in her test, something that shook Imogen greatly, which increases the narrative weight of Imogen choosing to add it to her own arsenal.

One thing that we did not mention when discussing Imogen’s 7th level spell choice in our level 13 analysis—something we still don’t know, but the Archivists hope is Power Word Pain—is the fact that as a Sorcerer with the Twinned Spell metamagic option, Imogen would be able to spend sorcery points to use any of the Power Word spells available to her class on two targets instead of one. It would be very pricey—8 sorcery points to twin a Power Word Stun—but if she has the points to spare, it could very well be worth it, effectively giving her two devastatingly powerful spells in one turn.

Either way, this is a spell we want in the Hells’ arsenal. Stunned enemies are incapacitated (meaning no actions or reactions) and all attacks have advantage against them. If Imogen could get this off on Ludinus after his HP is winnowed down (we know his simulacrum in the Feywild took 172 damage, so doubling per typical simulacrum rules puts actual Ludinus’ HP in the realm of 344 HP), it would open the door to a brutal beatdown from her martial friends. Power Word Stun also a particularly good choice against Ludinus because its initial effect does not rely on a spell save, which we know that he has advantage on thanks to episode 98.

Laudna

Sorcerer 12/Warlock 3

HP
+6, total: 132
ASI
+2 Dex
Sorcery Points
+1, total: 12

This is a relatively simple level up for Laudna! Taking another level in sorcerer gets Laudna another sorcery point for her pool, but no additional spells or slots. The level also offers an Ability Score Improvement or Feat. Marisha has opted for an ASI, placing 2 more points in Dexterity. This brings her AC up to 15, a solid choice given that AC is Laudna’s one weak point in an otherwise tanky build for a caster. Marisha mentioned during the potion swapping in episode 110 that it’s been a long time since Laudna last went down—if you exclude the Delaudna fight, it was way back in episode 48, in fact—and this bump should help keep that streak going.

Orym

Fighter 15

HP
+6, total: 161
ASI
+2 Dex

Orym rounds us out with another level in Fighter. This grants him Relentless, which lets him regain one superiority die if he doesn’t have any left when initiative is rolled. His total number of superiority dice also goes up by one, giving him a total of 5d10 and 1d6 (the latter from his Superior Technique fighting style). Given how few and far between rests have been for the Hells, any ability refills like this one go a long way. One more Bait and Switch might be the difference between a caster going down and not, and Orym’s strategic use of that particular Battle Master maneuver is one of the many reasons that Bell’s Hells have seen significantly fewer KOs[2] at this point in their story than either of the previous two parties.

Footnotes

  1. Making my way ↑
  2. By episode 114 of Campaign 1, according to CritRoleStats’ data, Vox Machina had gone unconscious 84 times. By episode 114 of Campaign 2, the Mighty Nein had gone unconscious 67 times. Bell’s Hells thus far have only gone down a total of 55 times. These numbers exclude familiars, as they can be resummoned without incident, but include other animal companions as well as guest stars. ↑