 Howdy how's it going, my name's DavyChappy and I'm gonna do things a little bit differently this time. See, somehow, in this weird expanse of a world, it has come to pass that I've spent the majority of my 5e player career actually playing a paladin instead of, well, a class that I actually really prefer to play. The paladin is the only class that I've leveled all the way from 1 to 20. And I'd like to think that I'm a pretty good Soros on what spells are good and what spells are balls. But I'm realizing more and more of that, more than anything, people just don't agree on how spells should be rated. I say fuck guidance, you say fuck me, I say what time, it's a vicious cycle and we're all gonna be disappointed when you find out that I'm not showing up to your party. But fuck the rating system, fuck Davy's Davy Meter, let's talk about the paladin spells in a way that matters so that you can play your paladin how you want without feeling like a chump because the internet funny man poo pooed on your favorite cantrip. As always, keep in mind that a lot of this is just my opinion, and if you feel like God isn't on your side, don't worry, I've still got your back. But with that out of the way, let's begin. So the paladin is a halfcaster of epic proportions, given that, like the ranger, it has a lot of unique spells that give much needed flavor and finesse to the class's ability list. And also like the ranger, it has a nightingale level reliance for concentration spells that makes even hunters mark blush. The paladin spell list is made up of four things, smite, healing, sensory abilities, and random bullshit that the developers put in there to make the class feel more heroic. If your perception score is high enough, then you'll notice that three of those things were already found in the class's kit, and the last thing is just a grab bag of utility that the devs thought were neat. What, magic circle? Nah, give it to them, they'll make up their own reasons why. And the reason for this goes back to the thing that I've been saying about halfcasters all along. Your spells are not your focus, your spells are just the icing. For instance, you got the paladin's signature move, it's mighty smite, and then you've got the street level poses that saw the smite get a successful YouTube channel and thought, I can do that too. And now you've got legally nebulous branding smites and thunderous smites and searing smites running around, but with the paywall of bonus actions and concentration to get access to all the cool shit. Not to say that the smite spells aren't cool shit, but it gets really finicky when you have to maintain concentration for the split second that it takes to cast and blast your attacks. Also the smites tend to scale well, for being a halfcaster at least, and I honestly defaulted to thunderous smite most of the time unless the bad guy seemed too chunky, at which point I'd switch to banishing smite because if it ain't broke, banish it. Now when it comes to healing, you're in a weird spot. Not only are you a halfcaster, which means that your healing spells have a much higher opportunity cost, but you also have a really good heal built straight into your class called Lay on Hands, which for those of you who don't know, gives you a pool of healing equal to your paladin level times five that you can just pull from as an action to heal whoever you touch. That usually serves the purpose that cure wounds does pretty handily, and sure, you may run out of the healing pool, but you also may run out of spell slots, and those are better spent putting in the fear of God in people. So healing spells are taken more as a luxury than as a need, and if you don't want to be a healer, if people are saying that paladins are made to be healers on account of their kit, just remember that you can spend all your Lay on Hands to boost yourself back up to full health after you're charged into a sea full of skeletons and get royally boned, so they don't have to get anything. Besides that, you've got utility. What utility, I hear you ask. Paladins are only good for resurrections and erections. Well, there's one other thing that paladins are good for, and that's detections. The paladin has its own aura of detecting things, so it knows when you're lying. It knows when you've been bad or good. So be good, or you're going to hell. Jokes don't look from the resist with guns, please make them famous. Your detections and your auras are your spell slots best friends, at least when they're not with their side hosts smuggy, and the only thing holding them back is, like I said, that pesky concentration bringing you down and keeping you from layering every buff aura and debuff aura and rebuff aura on you until you're a shining beacon of pen and paper stat line whiplash. The constant flipping back and forth between concentration spells means that you either have to devote yourself to one spell that's going to keep you alive, or a lot of spells that are going to do damaging status effects. It's for that reason that you have to see your concentration as a blessing in disguise. No, you can't stack aura of vitality and binding smite at the same time, but that just means that you get to keep using your defensive concentration spells, which means that you're throwing out more spell slots into your normal smites, which do more damage, so you're not worrying about how long you gotta keep your longsword crackling with magic before you finally wipe it off on somebody, because normal smite goes off whenever it wants to. Concentration is the responsible parent that just wants what's best for you. Oh, you're going into a fight, not without your shield of faith you're not, and don't look at me like that. You can have your smites back when you finished your homework. You just gotta make sure that your parents don't get hurt. If you know anything about me, you know my biggest pet peeve is concentration spells that involve characters running into the fight to get hurt until they lose that concentration, and that's all the paladin is. One moment you've casted protection from evil and good on yourself, and six seconds later every evil and good thing in an 80-foot radius is coming to tell your Christian rock music that it's too loud, and also, it sucks. Sure, you can cast it again, but at what cost? The cost of another spell slot, and another action, and the sickening feeling that everybody wants to peel back your Mormon underwear to bite your shiny metal ass. That's why you, as the tank, have to be powerful enough to endure it. Don't play smart, smart's not for paladins, that's why you're lawful good. Play tough, go where the DM can't reach you, your AC. Once your AC is high enough, bulk up on protein and get those bonuses to con for all of those AOE attacks that you're gonna get thrown at you. Also, consider taking Warcaster and or the Resilient fee. Yeah, I know Resilient is terrible, but this is the only thing it's good for. Once you've done that, you'll be the one kid in school that brings knee pads and a helmet to gym class, but hey, at least your parents won't be dead. Finally, the paladin's list is topped off with utility spells. Now these utility spells are wrapped up pretty tightly in a bow of use where necessary, because you are a paladin, and for some reason that makes you the only one qualified to summon a horse, but not the only one qualified to ride over a victim's mind with chaos. Are you the only one who can do it? Good, but does that mean the party actually needs it? You're not helping anyone by casting daylight in a bedroom at night when everyone's trying to sleep. You're just that one asshole who unironically says wakey, wakey, eggs and bakey. Stop it, get some help. Remember that your spell slots, if they're not being used, is new hats with the word concentration written on them, are probably being used as ammunition for your divine smites. So the question really becomes, are you doing something that's worth one less goblin with brain damage? If the answer is no, then don't worry about it. Somebody else can handle being the utility. You've just got to worry about being the best God sworn smite machine that you've got to be. But that'll about do it. I hope you enjoyed this video. I know I changed the format, but let me know what you think about it. Social media is down below. Maybe check out my Twitch streams every Tuesday and Saturday. And maybe support me on Patreon so that I can afford all the down payments I put on more slots to smite with. But yeah, Davy out.