I had a lot of fun with a “muscle wizard” rune knight. He failed wizard school but figured out how to use parts of certain spells by drawing them real big in crayon. His whole thing was finding more magic items to supplement his abilities, and observing different spellcasters to inspire new runes.

I’ve played a goliath rune knight in the Rime of the Frostmaiden and it’s a powerful and fun subclass. I’ve used the cloud, stone, hill and storm runes to protect the party and myself.

You wouldn‘t lose the passive effects of your runes if you invoke them. „Your rune remains on an object until you finish a long rest“ „While wearing or carrying an object inscribed with this rune“ (you get passive effect) „In addition, when you or a creature you can see within 30 feet of you is hit by an attack roll, you can use your reaction to invoke the rune“ (in addition to the passive buff)

In one of my ongoing campaigns, I'm playing a Guardian Barbarian / Rune Knight Goliath, and it is super fun. The class/ subclasses really complement each other, and the Goliath racials are thematically on point and are very powerful. People need to talk about Stones Endurance more. It's a very powerful ability when combined with rage and runes.

To me, the rune knight is a better version of the barb's rage. -no need to take or give damage, you just stay large for a minute, -adv on strength (stay the same) -1d6 of damage once per turn (a d10 later) -can't be shut down by spells -speaking of spells, you can cast some if you multi class! -also you can wear armor!

Well, at level 3 you have 2 runes and 2 uses of giant's might, plus the runes are once per short rest, so you can recover them fairly easily in a dungeon crawl, plus you still have uses of action surge and second wind. You might not use runes all of the time but still you are using them. The frost giant rune active effect is my favorite, you can use it both in and out of combat, in combat is essentially you become an unstoppable and unbreakable force, out of combat you become unstoppable, essentially a demolishing ball, seriously with expertise in Athletics I rolled, at level 7, a 32 (with advantage), what was I doing? To request such drastic measures? A statue was incapacitating my comrades so… I decided to throw it to the horizon, later I managed to break off a wall gaining surprise on our enemies.

I played one of these once for a very short time but he was fun. He was a primary swarm keeper ranger with 4 levels of rune knight and the abilities it added to him both for exploration and combat was a good time. And honestly thinking back on it it makes a decent ant man build

9:58 For intimidation checks you could ask your DM if you could use Str. instead of Cha., specially if you're a soldier who lived life/death situations and have reputation of brutality

I'd make a couple house rules that could really make this subclass shine at my table. 1) I'd say you know Cloud, Fire, Frost, and Stone at 3rd level but can only inscribe 2. Then at 7th level you also learn Hill and Storm and can inscribe up to 3. Following the original Runes Known table, you can inscribe 4 at 10th level and 5 at 15th level. You're still restricted on the Runes you chose after the last long rest so there's still room for consideration when playing. 2) There's a few possible paths. One is to make it so you get more uses of each rune sooner and call it a day by switching Master of Runes and Great Stature as you mentioned. Another is to let you activate each rune a number of times equal to your PB, which I think might prove a bit busted at later levels, but given how powerful casters become, it might not be so unreasonable. A middle ground option would be to give you double your PB in activations to use between rests. This would be shared across all runes. For example, at level 3 you could activate Fire 3 times and Cloud once, or Cloud and Fire both twice. This might feel more akin to spell slots where you can use all the proper spell slots for the same spell, or spread out as you see fit. 3) I'd make a few changes to improve damage/viability, starting with the runes. The first would probably occur anyway at most tables via DM fiat: any checks made, even if made with a different Ability Score such as Strength (Intimidation), would still receive benefits from the rune despite it explicitly stating Charisma (Intimidation). I would make the Fire Rune activate to 2d6 x your PB. That would give it double the power of the Rogue's Sneak Attack at level 3 but with much fewer uses and of a commonly resisted type. At level 5, it'd still be double, slightly under double at level 9, about 50% stronger at level 11, and only 33% stronger at level 17. - As an aside, if that doesn't scale well enough, you could try d6 equal to your Fighter level which will consistently remain about double the Rogue's Sneak Attack but be less friendly to multiclassing. Increasing to a d8 or d10 is also an option but that's probably just overcomplicating it. The other change I might consider for damage would be to let Giant Might affect all attacks. I would need to playtest it because it feels like it could easily eclipse less versatile Fighters, and I think it's reasonable to give up some damage for the versatility offered by the runes. Depending on the solution I choose from the options listed for section 2, I might write up something new for level 15, but it's rare any of my games actually get that far so it's not exactly high on my priorities.

I genuinely love the Rune Knight subclass. Its utility and defensive capabilities helped out my team (mostly composed of Squishies) throughout the earlier levels. I've def gotten less powerful as the spellcasters started getting their reality-warping abilities, but it's so much fun to play regardless that I'm happy to push forth until my character dies or the campaign ends

You need to tell us more about that hag rune knight your player reflavored. That sounds like a really cool way to reskin the rune knight!

I'll be playing a Rune Knight soon. She was originally a Duergar, but the DM asked me to change her to a regular Dwarf. No becoming Huge at 3rd level for me. 😂

Thank you for your information video

Speaking of reflavouring, a friend made a half orc, half duergar character (just a half orc with a couple of cosmetic changes) and he used dwarven runes. Their runes were based on creatures of the underdark and abilities like Giant might were renamed to things like Umber Hulk might.

My favorite character I've ever played was a gnome rune knight. Being a little guy that can get big is just so satisfying.

I agree that the usefulness of some of the runes are dependent upon the DM. At our table , we have to roll animal handling checks to ride horses or drive a cart. This can lead to a range of fun and creative outcomes from arriving at the destination quicker to being dragged by the horse, or other story the players describe.

I plan to bring back a Fighter of mine who was heavily Viking inspired that was murdered by the party (who decided they wanted to be Evil the previous session I was away) and was going to bring him back as a Rune Knight-Grave Cleric as a Half-Dead warrior and reskin his Fighter abilities being powered by Grave Runes and his Giant's Might as Draugr's Might. The idea is that he ended up in the Shadowfell since he didn't die in battle and go to Ysgard and was offered a deal by the Raven Queen for a second chance while also acting as one of her champions on the Material Plane. Think of a Norseman Ghost Rider.

I do in a CoS campaign, he’s a Firbolg rune knight fighter called Osric Harrow. And tbf he’s a beast lol, great subclass.

The DM for my Frostmaiden campaign agrees with the amount of Runes known or in the character's repertoire. So he treats the runes like spells for a wizard. You still only have a certain amount of runes that can be active but after a long rest you can swap them out if you need to. I get around not having to replace the runes daily but carving them into something that the character wears. This way I just need to activate the ones that I'm using. XD

What COULD improve the Rune Knight, is how it interacts with the Rune Shaper feat that can be picked up with the Rune Carver background. Rune Shaper feat lets you learn more runes from a list that include the 6 rune that show up on the Rune Knight's list, and from the way I'm reading them, nether the Rune Shaper or Rune Knight say that the benefits gained only come from the runes learned from the specific feature, so RAW (maybe not RAI), it looks like you could double up on benefits from both feature for each rune learned.

Clearly you haven't seen a grappler RK in action. Encounters can highly become a joke when you have a unarmed fighting (bugbear if you want to go nuts) behemoth of a character. Melee party members having constant advantage, you having essentially doubling your hit points in the majority encounters if we're talking purely early levels. They knocked this subclass out of the park with versatility and power potential.

Buffs proposed to rune knight: Runes equal to your proficiency bonus, might not look like much but you get 3 runes way earlier The 1d6 from giant might? Yeah no, make it every hit not every turn, we want a giant meatgrinder here As easy as that

what people seem to be missing about the rune knight (and the enlarge spell for that matter) is that when using oversized wepaons, they deal an additional damage die for each additional size of creature they are made for now the spell and the subclass also increase your weapons' size, meaning that the rule above applies if this rule is used, rune knight would be more than sufficient in terms of offense

I took this and the 2 ua rune feats with clancrafter background I was a bugbear raised by dwarfs seeking revenge ( later I went hard on phantom rogue) using runes and ghostly wail sneak attacks it was real fun

starting as a guild merchant lands you a donkey and a cart a mighty fine mount .

I think a character that has around 3 to 4 levels of Ancestral Gaurdian Barbarian and the rest in Rune Knight FIghter makes a perfect tank. (even though it might take a couple of rounds to come online). Barb gives you a boost to health plus resistance to most attacks when raging, and the AG can give an enemy disadavantage to attacking others while having advantage to attacking you with RA. Plus your advantage to attacking them will mean that you hit harder. Add on top of that the Sentinel feat, and RK, now you have a giant size raging warrior that has fantastic battlefield control capabilities.

Tl;dr: a ruling on page 276 of the DMG may allow a Rune Knight to multiply their weapon's damage dice during Giant's Might. (2d8 with a large rapier, 3d8 with a huge rapier.) I would rate damage higher with overall rating at least an 8/10. Because of an obscure ruling on page (I think it was) 276 to 277 of the DMG about creating monsters (which I was first made aware of thanks to a video from Zee Bashew) under base damage of weapons, it says specifically about weapons, "If a monster wields a manufactured weapon, it deals damage appropriate to the weapon. For example, a greataxe in the hands of a Medium monster deals Id 12 slashing damage plus the monster's Strength modifier, as is normal for that weapon." "Big monsters typically wield oversized weapons that deal extra dice of damage on a hit. Double the weapon dice if the creature is Large, triple the weapon dice if it's Huge, and quadruple the weapon dice if it’s Gargantuan. For example, a Huge giant wielding an appropriately sized greataxe deals 3d 12 slashing damage (plus its Strength bonus), instead of the normal 1d12." At first one would think, "That's monsters because of the section it's found.", but it continues to say, "A creature has disadvantage on attack rolls with a weapon that is sized for a larger attacker. You can rule that a weapon sized for an attacker two or more sizes larger is too big for the creature to use at all." I see no problem with allowing the Rune Knight with a Greatsword to do 4d6 damage after using Giant's Might, as part of the feature says, "If you are smaller than Large, you become Large, along with anything you are wearing." If the DM wants to use the exact wording to allow your Greatsword to increase in size with you, you would first use Giant's Might as a bonus action, draw your now large Greatsword as a free action with 'interact with object', and profit as the best single target damage dealer in the party.

Rune knight with expertise in athletics make the best grapplers

I'm looking to play a rune knight for a while (starting at level 8). Just something a bit different for a bit. I'm also pairing it with a Rune Carver Background (from Bigby's Gathering of the Giants).

Sense it sounds like the new giant book will allow weapons with runes, a possible homebrew could be to permitaly add a rune to an item to give yourself one extra rune to use.

Giant's Might's bonus damage is for one attack per turn, so multiclassing into monk doesn't really benefit from the feature.

I built a goliath Rune Knight fighter/circles of stars druid who wields a sword-in-stone as a Warhammer he carved from the mountain he lives on. His background is as a stonemason who builds shrines to the stars (think Stonehenge) in honor of his stone giant ancestors. He hopes to one day be a hero so great, his story is written among the stars as a constellation. The build itself is wild. Dragon constellation + proficiency in con saves + war caster = never losing concentration on moonbeam or buff spells like stoneskin or guardian of nature to enhance melee combat. Crusher lets me knock enemies back to make the ranged spell attack from archer constellation without disadvantage or move dudes into my moonbeam or spike growth. Powerful build+ Giant's might + enhance ability and/or enlarge = grappling dragons. Also a great healer when need be. Druid and fighter doesn't usually work super well but these two classes are like chocolate and peanut butter.

I played a Rune Knight and used Potions of Growth frequently to Grapple Huge creatures. It was a lot of fun.

What’s your problem with short rests?

Time to feed the almighty algorithm. I like the Rune Knight overall, and I agree with a lot of your points. I also agree with what you said in the RP section, that they're limited in their presented flair, all about Giants, but flavor is free I guess. The main thing that irks me about the subclass is the damage on Giant Might. Only triggering on one attack per turn not only doesn't work mechanically, with the Fighter being one of the classes known for having most attacks, but it also doesn't work thematically either. I'm BIG, my weapon is BIG, why is it only hitting harder 1/turn?

As a DM a allow use 1/2 of strength or Constitution bosun for martial classes as a bonus to the Intimidation check. The tell results and ask to describe player what they do and plat an NPS part

Need more runes!

I'm currently playing a duergar rune knight in CoS, so I have the sunsword, thing is I asked my dm if I could use oversized weapons rules (I know they are not raw or rai) but he was ok with it, so once per day in an encounter I can deal 3d10+str+2 radiant damage each attack, + 6 from giants might once per turn, +4 from enlarge, +2d6 fire rune, +1d4 cloud strike (from giants foundling bg) so I think im absolutely fine with damage, PS. I won't take any feat, only ASI to get 20 in con and 18 in str.

The multiclass with monk Is wrong. You can add a d6 once per turn in once attack only

I will say, You take a racial feat that has resistance against fire, And then you just go a regular stop build for a strength-based fighter. You can almost certainly 1v1 a young red dragon at level 10. Push it down grapple it, and you'll succeed because you have better strength scores than it with your proficiency, on top of your advantage, And then just start beating the snot out of it it'll hit you only like 42% of the time give or take I don't quite remember the number, And you have like 30 less hit points than it but considering how you're hitting it basically every time and it hits you at less than half the time and you have the advantage of oversized weapons upping you're damage, you'll win. And if it tries to get up to flea it needs to take its whole action to try and ungrouple from you before it can even stand up and standing up would take half its movement, And on grappling from you is a strength roll at disadvantage because it's on the ground, while you have advantage yourself. You throw in your own party, And you're easily going to wipe out a young red dragon.

I play a half-orc half giant(at the dms okay) ruin fighter, I got a belt of giants with it and oh my god is it just a power house, using a magical sword that adds another plus 2 to my atk bonus rolling a two, will still get me a 17 over all roll.

My Rune Knight saved one of our party members from triple damage with Runic Shield vs a Balor crit

Great statue is incredibly underpowered but other than that the subclass is really good imo

I been playing a dhampir hexblade runeknight

my fave character was a rune knight minotaur

I'm planning a warforge rune knight, I'ma be a transformer

The Rune Knight could be re-flavored as Dwarven Runes.

I’d love to see you get to Rangers and why they aren’t just worse fighters :( I love my nature gish boys

damn, i didn't make it 1/3 of the way into the video and i was like welp, I'M CONVINCED! this is my next character!! lmao

I have a MTF Duergar Urchin Rune Knight that my DM let me swap out my redundant proficiencies with Tasha's Customize Your Origin rules. With proficiency in Disguise Kit, Thieves' Tools, Brewer's supplies, Smith's Tools, Herbalist Kit, Tinker's Tools, Forgery Kit, Poisoner's kit and the Cloud and Fire Runes, I have Fighter that fights like Kaiju Barbarian with Tavern Brawler and the Unarmed Fighting Style but outside of combat acts like a Rogue. Makes most of his downtime money by dumpster diving, jury-rigging whatever he can find to look good as new, then pawning it off like a snake oil salesman before it breaks again.

Some commenters have pointed out the oversized weapon rules arguing that the Rune Knight can deal more damage. I don't like this for a number of reasons. Firstly, because the weapon doesn't grow with the Rune Knight, you're lugging around a large weapon that you attack at disadvantage with when not large. You've got to use Giant Might else that weapon is pretty useless. Secondly, you don't start with a large weapon in the game so relying on this requires some DM input. Whether or not you can find a large weapon is campaign dependent. Finally, there's the matter of getting a MAGIC large weapon. After 5th level (ideally a few levels before), any fighter is going to need a magic weapon. Finding a magic greatsword that is 10ft long or getting one enchanted is again, not uniform across campaigns. While the Rune Knight CAN do a lot more damage with these oversized weapon rules, it is so game and DM dependent that I didn't put it in the basic guide. Maybe you still don't agree with a lower offensive rating and that's fine. This video is my personal rating of the Rune Knight via my own experiences in game with it. If you want more information and a full breakdown of the oversized weapons rules for the Rune Knight, RPG Bot made a great post about it: rpgbot.net/dnd5/characters/multiclassing/oversized-weapons/

How is there not a verdant wind rune that let's you fly for s turn

Gonna play a halfling RK as my next character so he's gonna Hulk out lol. Might even be human sized by the end of the campaign

I play rune knight on a 5 ft heragon, i just say to the dm i grow 5 inches with giant mights ability lmao

It's weird to me that when you grow to giant size, your strength doesn't increase above your base stats. Doesn't make any sense.

You read what you put. Once use of the runes you said. Read, is once use for shorts rest....

Why are you wrong on alot of these rulings?

Honestly about the lack of runes I just have two words to say… Short rest

9:12 100% wrong. Rune Knight is the highest damaging single class in the game. Every weapon attack roles double weapon dice at 3rd lvl triple at 18th and you can always get enlarge/reduce from fairy race or from a party member. Look at oversized weapon rules on tabletop builds. At 5th lvl and with a great sword every single weapon attack does 4d6+STR. Full round with action surge is 4 attacks. 16d6+(4•STR)+1d6 from giant might + 40 if you have great weapon master and to top it off if you use fire rune on the first hit +2d6 and possibility for target to be restrained, meaning all future stacks have advantage.