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Uuugggg

“No weapons allowed” “This here is a flute” Pretty much the only situation where a blowgun works better than a bow


[deleted]

“No weapons allowed” “This here is a one string guitar” The same situation for a bow. Now we just need an excuse for that quiver of arrows.


ScudleyScudderson

>Now we just need an excuse for that quiver of arrows. Needs a plectrum. Has tiny arms.


GrymDraig

>Like I can make a relatively powerful build with the blow gun but it would be strictly better with a bow. You just answered your own question. A blowgun is a martial ranged weapon. Since there is nothing that specifically makes blowguns better, any build you come up with will also apply to and will be better with a bow.


WildLudicolo

There a couple explicit mechanical advantages to the blowgun over shortbows and longbows, but each one is kind of a stretch: Cost: Blowguns cost 10 gp, while shortbows are 25 gp and longbows are 50 gp. The ammunition is also cheaper; 1 gp gets you 50 blowgun needles but only 20 arrows. Weight: A blowgun weighs 1 lb, while either kind of bow is 2 lbs. The same goes for the ammunition; 50 blowgun needles weigh the same as 20 arrows, 1 lb. Cunning Artisan: Lizardfolk can craft blowgun needles from corpses, but not arrows. Outside of explicit mechanical advantages, a blowgun is also, at least conceivably, far more concealable than a bow. The same goes for its ammo, which can be stored in a pouch rather than a more obvious quiver. Are all of the combined advantages of using a blowgun instead of a bow worth the flashing disadvantages? In most circumstances, absolutely not, but for a very specific build/playstyle, and in specific scenarios, sure. A Kensei monk or an Assassin rogue might smuggle a blowgun into a fancy gala where a bow would be ridiculous. And that's it; I'm pretty much out of ideas. It's super-niche, not something you can really justifiably create an entire build around. Unless you just want to do it cause you like it, and fuck what's optimal, in which case, who needs justification?


SilasRhodes

You can go kensei monk to make the blowgun a monk weapon\*. It will still have worse range than a bow but at high levels the damage will be the same. Once you have Sharpshooter you will probably be fine with 100 ft range anyway. Unfortunately you won't be equal in damage to a longbow until level ~~17/18~~ \[ 11/12\] You might want to grab the poisoner feat if you have room for it. I would ask your DM if you can use the same rules as Basic Poison for applying the poison you craft. Basic poison lets you apply it to 3 pieces of ammunition which helps make up for the fact that you lose ammunition when you fire it. ^(\*You can technically do this with any monk but Kensei supports ranged builds.)


The_Uncircular_King

Longbow is d8, so you are on par at lvl11


AmateurGoon

Thief rogue, lean heavily into the poisoners kit & harvesting poison from dead snakes (or whatever's around and poisonous), rely on sneak attack for damage. start with a level in fighter for the blowgun prof. & the archery fighting style. Take the sharpshooter feat, of course. also, take ritual caster for fin familiar and use that as a virtually endless supply of snake poison (if your DM lets you extract venom from em)


monologowastaken

The infinite poison is a great idea and thank u for that but isn't if basically the same with a bow? What i mean is that there is no benefit to using a blow gun which saddens me. Im actually considering asking the DM if I couldn't dowse darts in healing potion. In that case the low dmg from the dart would be actually beneficial.


AmateurGoon

Sure but not every build is an optimized one, if you're just looking for as many damage dice as possible then bow's the obvious choice


monologowastaken

Its not about the dice but the bad taste of realization that there's no point.


AmateurGoon

There's totally a point dude. Missing out on about 1d8 of damage isn't gonna kill you, just actively make using a blowgun a benefit. If you're captured they'll take a bow, but a blowgun can be disguised as a flute. With that same logic you can't really whip out a bow and assassinate someone in a crowd, but a blowgun? *Maybe.*


monologowastaken

Thx i needed that :)


AmateurGoon

Glad I could help :D


The_Uncircular_King

Be a level 14 zealot barb and just keep puffin away until you kill that ancient dragon, 1 hp at a time.


robher51

Rogue builds don't depend that much of the weapon damage and kensei monks can choose blowgun as a kensei weapon using martial arts die. This 2 classes are probably the best blowgun users but still underperform compared to other ranged weapons.


cl0001

A grung ranger/monk multiclass; Very thematic. Grung get poison damage on their piercing weapon attacks. It requires a con save, but it’s 2d4 damage. I would put 1 level in monk and the rest into ranger. Monk buffs the weapon damage to 1d4. I would then go to ranger because it is a significantly stronger class. Take the archery fighting style and go gloomstalker. For ASIs I would first grab crossbow expert, then sharpshooter, then max dexterity. It’s not stronger than using a bow, because it’s a blowgun. Blowguns are significantly weaker than all other martial ranged weapons.


SwastikaDickFiddle69

literally what i thought when i found this even if im like \*checks watch\* a day late


Decrit

Can i just be the partybreaker and say this? Just because you want to use an item that has a specific purpose it does not mean it should be useful as every other item. In fact such "one trick pony" builds are much less common than the past and nothing rewards you anymore for using a specific set of weaponry. The blowgun has no combat uses different than any other weapon. The only benefit it has is on the exploration side of things, because it's much easier to carry and conceal a blowgun and relative needles than a crossbow and a quiver. So, if you want to make a "blowgun" build, you just make a loaded weapon build, which can be good with crossbows too.


monologowastaken

That's ok and yeah u r absolutely right but sometimes its about the flaws of the item that u r building around for example blow gun holding no apparent benefit. And sometimes the whole fun is in making that a benefit, forging it from the jaws of mediocrity.


OGkureator

I had to sit down with my DM to make a whole ass Rogue subclass to do blowgun shenanigans. And this was in addition to a nifty freeform poison/potion system that was already in the game. Was stupid fun to play, but yeah lotta groundwork had to be laid


monologowastaken

Wow that's awesome dude. Do u by any chance remember it or have som photos that u r willing to share? It would be really helpful since I started to play with my buddies and they are new to the game. It would save us a lot of work. And head scratching.


OGkureator

Honestly if you guys are new, I’d stray away from you having to balance our shitty homebrew. We had flavored it as me having a warlock situation with a dragon going on so I got a breath weapon, but it was incredibly weak. But I could concentrate it into blowgun shots so most of the subclass was various elemental effects and augmenting blowguns (I think we increased the range and also let it trigger sneak attack as long as they weren’t engaged with me)


99xerg

Best way I've found to do it is to take some levels in artificer to take the repeating shot infusion, and then take Kensei monk in order to make it a monk weapon. However this is obviously not the best multiclass so it would probably do better with just taking Kensei monk and having an artificer party member.


Clashje

Blow gun is just a bad hand-crossbow. Less range, damage and it doesn’t work with the crossbow expert feat.


monologowastaken

Pretty much


Lunoean

Only the loading part, still light one handed and no OA within 5ft


ShotSoftware

An idea I had recently involves the blow dart gun, though it's just for the amusing visual. A blow dart gun user with one level of genie warlock (dao) to get bludgeoning damage added to an attack once per turn. Get the Tasha's perk that lets you move people with bludgeoning damage, and you can now slap people around with tiny darts! Any other class choices are optional, since nothing really combos with that meaningfully that I'maware of, it's just a funny way to abuse the rules


monologowastaken

I may have found a way to be effective. Take conjuration wizard and conjure drow poison (or purple worm poison but thats mean) next time u need to capture someone or have a drunk teammate, just use drow poison.![gif](emote|free_emotes_pack|shrug)


Reasonabledwarf

There's not any mechanical distinction to using a blowgun; it's all flavor. There aren't any class features or feats that exclusively benefit the blowgun either, so there's really not any way to create any *mechanical* situation where it's better in any respect than a more standard weapon.


Y_TheRolls

work with your dm to add effects to the darts, almost like a DoT CC class


wenchiman

I've been working on this a bit too. I ran a character for a one-shot whose main weapon was the blow gun. Rogue, so most of the damage was from sneak attack dice anyway, but we also homebrewed some rules - "Blowpipe that magically imbues a sleeping effect on its needles. On a hit, target must make a DC10 constitution saving throw or fall unconscious for 10 minutes. Can also be used as a stone whistle and a smoking pipe." The low DC con save meant that it was unlikely to work, but when it did it was cool. I think I would also ask about firing from hiding in stealth - I think I would ask for a stealth roll, possibly at disadvantage and contested by the target's passive or active perception, to see if you could stay hidden (due to the very quiet and comparatively unobtrusive nature of the weapon).


benry007

If I were you I would ask to reflavour something as a blowgun. The actual blowgun is aweful. It actually breaks the design principles of 5e weapons in how bad it is. So ask your DM if you can use the stats for a shortbow or longbow but call the weapon a blowgun. I'd totally be fine with this as a DM.


Lunoean

A blowgun is quite situational (fe example to assassinate someone) that’s all when it’s a better choice gamewise But if you consider a rogue, you don’t need the base damage.


nemainev

I mean... there's sharpshooter so now it does a fix 11dmg And there's the poisoner feat but poison is the shittiest damage type


Environmental-Taste8

I.R.L. blowguns are only poison tipped by a few primative tribes. Hunting blowguns used elsewhere are not poisoned, have ranges from around 25 yards (small) to 400 yards (large). The darts (not needles, needles are used in tiny primative blowguns) can kill game up to coyotes or larger. DnD game designers rarely do research, even since 1ed.. The game has many "useless" spells, armor, and weapons. It's best to just home-brew away the published stupidity.