Architect Of Ruin Illrigger: D&D 5e Subclass Optimisation Guide

Weave spells with swords with this third caster illrigger subclass.

The architect of ruin is one of the subclasses of MCDM’s illrigger class. As adherents of Asmodeus, they follow his precepts, combining magical arts with swordsmanship.

Architects of ruin will not just rely on their combat capabilities though. Instead, they use knowledge to their advantage. They will gather information about their quarry and use that to exploit weaknesses. They will also use deception to make enemies feel that a battle is hopeless.

As martial magic wielders, the architect of ruin is a third caster like the eldritch knight or arcane trickster. Their spells only go up to level 4, but they can weave them alongside their powerful weapon attacks.

In this article, I’ve looked at how you can optimise your own architect of ruin as well as assessing just how good I think they are and the tactics you can use with them. Just remember, the illrigger and its subclasses are 3rd party content (created by MCDM) so check with your DM before you use them. If you want to play an illrigger, they’re available available on D&D Beyond or as a PDF.

At a glance

Frontline warriors with enhanced attacks
Make solid party faces
Cast spells alongside weapon attacks
Possess spells primarily for utility, protection and debuffs

5/5 – The architect of ruin capably combines swordsmanship and spellcraft, allowing you to easily cast spells and use weapons, even in the same turn. There’s a lot of resource management and some planning ahead to be had, but if you can wrap your head around this, then the architect of ruin is a strong subclass and one of your best options for an illrigger.

Architect of ruin features

Asmodeus’s blessing (Lv3) – 2/5

A knowledge skills and a new language learned is fine, but these are very much ribbon features and just a nice bonus.

Spellcasting (Lv3) – 5/5

Spellcasting is a strong option, but unlike the eldritch knight and arcane trickster, the architect of ruin gets a more limited and personalised spell list (rather than just pulling from the wizard’s spell list).

This list doesn’t go heavy on damage dealing, but it does go reasonably big on protection, debuffs and utility. Uniquely, the architect of ruin has access to both the shield and shield of faith spells. Vengeful blade is probably their most potent cantrip (working a bit like booming blade) and they get the likes of fly and haste at level 3 for some big enhancements. At late levels, they get aura of desecration giving them a spirit guardians-like effect.

They lack big AoE damage dealers like fireball, but have plenty in their arsenal to work with.

Charisma is their spellcasting ability for this which should work well alongside their other charisma needs.

Invoke hell (Lv3) – 4/5

You can choose to inflict vulnerability on a damage dealing spell. Architects of ruin don’t have many damage dealing spells beyond cantrips. Probably your best option is scorching ray here, especially if you hit the target with all the rays. At later levels, blight might be a strong option too.

However, there is no expiration to this feature. One approach could be to use a spell that has a multi-turn duration so you can keep hitting your target with the spell’s damage and benefitting from their vulnerability. Architects of ruin don’t have many of these, but hell’s lash could be a good option here. Aura of desecration could be used for the same kind of effect at later level’s too.

The alternative is spell blade. Combining an attack with a spell in the same turn can be useful, but the potential damage of enervating spell is just better here. Maybe the exception here is if you want to apply a seal, burn it and apply an interdict boon like bedevil to aid the spell you cast (bedevil will reduce the saving throw roll of the target).

Hellish versatility (Lv7) – 5/5

Replacing an attack with a cantrip is a decent damage boost as something like vengeful blade will enhance the damage of a standard attack and enhance this more as you increase in levels. A really handy option for upping damage levels as long as you have a strong charisma.

Asmodeus’s interdiction (Lv7) – 5/5

More damage from burning seals is handy, especially for high charisma characters (which you should aim to be).

Spellbreaker means a potentially large number of counterspells you can expend on targets. You’ll need to plan targets ahead, but counterspell is a powerful option for keeping spellcasters in check.

Hell mage is perhaps the least effective of all the subclass level 18 interdictions. Adding boons to enemies is decent, but less potent than most top tier interdictions. With the other options though, this is still an excellent feature.

Submit (Lv11) – 4/5

Imposing disadvantage on saving throws against a spell is strong, but the setup is harder and requires effort. It also conflicts with other seal burning features like spellbreaker or enervating spell. This does create a complex interplay of resource management and preparing ahead for spells you want to cast.

Vile transmogrification (Lv15) – 3/5

You can trade seals for spell slots and spell slots for seals. The exchange rate is a bit wonky, but it can be good for ensuring you have the right amounts of different things. If you have seals to spare before a short rest, you can exchange them all for spells slots and regain all your seals during the short rest where you wouldn’t normally be able to recover spell slots.

It’s still a bit weaker than most of the final subclass features for the illrigger, but considering how strong spellcasting is, that’s probably OK.

How good is the architect of ruin subclass?

The architect of ruin manages to combine spellcraft and swordsmanship competently. You can easily play a utility caster, a gish or something in between. Spells to a large extent, can easily be woven into combat and there’s plenty of little extras like enhanced seal damage, counterspell from seals and so on.

The main challenge is knowing how to make use of your many options for burning seals as well as some of the setup required for certain features. It’s a good headache to have and perhaps just means more options rather than too much complication. But it’s a challenge to be aware of.

If you’re OK with a slightly more complex subclass to work with and plenty of spellcasting, then the architect of ruin is a top tier subclass.

5/5

Building an architect of ruin illrigger

Architects of ruin must consider merging spellcasting into the illrigger’s usual weapon focus. This means building into charisma, especially as the most optimal build will combine things like cantrips with weapon attacks. This can be a bit resource heavy, but below I’ll take you through how you can manage this.

Ability scores

Recommended options

Dexterity: You’re going to want to invest heavily in an attack ability score, constitution and charisma. If you use strength for weapon attacks, then you’ll still need to invest a bit in dexterity for the medium armor AC boost. Instead, I’d focus on finesse or perhaps ranged weapons and use dexterity for your attacks.
Constitution: You’re a martial and will likely be in the midst of combat. A high constitution will help with your durability.
Charisma: This affects your DC for things like interdict boons as well as your face skill capabilities. Perhaps more importantly is it’ll affect your spellcasting too which you’ll need to be fairly good at.

Options to avoid

Strength: A strength build is possible for an architect of ruin, but you will have to sacrifice ability scores somewhere unless you can grab heavy armor proficiency from somewhere. It’s easiest to make a strong build if you use dexterity for attacks as you can use it for your AC too.
Wisdom: You should dump wisdom, you’ve got too many other ability scores to focus on.
Intelligence: The same goes for dumping intelligence.

Ability score	Point Buy	Standard Array
Strength	8	10
Dexterity	15	15
Constitution	15	13
Intelligence	8	8
Wisdom	8	12
Charisma	15	14

Skills

Recommended options

Athletics: Only good on a strength build, otherwise not worth splitting athleticism and acrobatics.
Deception: Really important face skill if you intend to do a lot of deceiving.
Insight: Your wisdom likely won’t be great, but you will likely be the party face, in which case, a decent insight can be useful.
Intimidation: Another good face skills, especially for an evil leaning class.
Persuasion: Usually the most important face skill and another important one for a party face.
Stealth: Works well on a dexterity build.

Options to avoid

Arcana: Your lack of intelligence means there are likely to be better options for knowledge skills, especially as you’re better off focusing on face skills. Of course you do have to take a knowledge skills and this or religion are your better options, but I wouldn’t take this as one of your 2 illrigger skills.
Investigation: Similarly, you’ll lack the intelligence to be much good at this.
Religion: This is the same situation as arcana. You don’t have the intelligence to be really good at this, but you do have to choose 1 knowledge skills anyway.

Races

As an architect of ruin, you’ll likely want your race to help you with certain aspects of your build including:

Party face: You’ll likely be used as the party face, but you don’t have loads of skill proficiencies to throw at face skills. Your race can help here though.
Toughen up: Architects of ruin remain martials that will likely take a bit of a beating. That means anything you can do to increase resilience will be beneficial.
Damage dealing: You also want to deal as much damage as possible meaning traits that can improve this will help.
Innate spellcasting: You should have a strong charisma and can repeat cast spells. You won’t have loads of spell slots or spell options so bolstering this through your race can be a good option.

Recommended options

Autognome: Improved AC without having to take bravado (so can grab a different combat mastery instead) is great on a dexterity build. Built for success means more reliable attacks or even saving throws and resistances and advantage on saving throws makes you more resilient.
Bugbear: Potentially more damage on the first round of combat, better reach for melee attacks and great at sneaking are all great on an illrigger, especially a dexterity build with high initiative.
Changeling: If you want to lean into the party face aspect of the class, then Changeling is a great option. Grab a couple of face skill proficiencies and be able to change your appearance.
Dragonborn: Breath weapon gives you some crowd control and only costs one of your attacks. You also get a resistance and more depending on the type of Dragonborn you take.
Dwarves: The extra constitution and resistances are welcome to toughen you up. Hill Dwarf will get you more hit points, but you’ll have to take an extra wisdom which won’t be useful. Mountain will get you +2 strength which probably won’t be the best for you, and armor training is no good on an illrigger that already has those proficiencies so I’d go with Hill Dwarf.
Githzerai: Some decent resilience and a few innate spells including the ever useful mage hand, shield for some string protection and detect thoughts which can be good for a utility caster.
Forest Gnome: Even more resilience for saving throws, the minor illusion cantrip and the ability speak with small beasts.
Goliath: Cold resistance and some reduced damage is handy for the extra resilience.
Hobgoblin: Help as a bonus action with extra bonuses works well for the illrigger which tends to be light on bonus action options unless you take certain interdict boons. Plus you can grab some resilience, damage or speed from this. A boost to failed d20 rolls is great for more resilience and damage too.
Human (variant): An extra skill proficiency and a feat are handy, especially as that skill can help you flesh out those face skills.
Orc: Bonus action dash and temporary hit points to close the gap in melee and for some extra resilience and survive being knocked to 0HP too.
Shifter: Grab intimidation proficiency, a bunch of temporary hit points and some bonus effects like an AC boost, a bonus action attack or improved wisdom saving throws.
Warforged: Warforged have a bunch of resilience features like improved AC, resistance to poison, advantage against the poisoned condition and more.

Backgrounds

Primarily, you want your background to pad out your skills and with a party face requiring quite a few face skills, you’ll likely want to enhance this through your background.

I’d recommend the following backgrounds for an architect of ruin:

Name	Skill proficiencies	Tool proficiency	Languages
Courtier	Insight, persuasion	None	2 of your choice
Faceless	Deception, intimidation	Disguise kit	1 of your choice
Faction agent	Insight and 1 intelligence, wisdom or charisma skill	None	2 of your choice
Gambler	Deception insight	Gaming set	1 of your choice
Smuggler	Athletics, deception	Vehicles (water)	None
Soldier	Athletics, intimidation	Gaming set, vehicles (land)	None

Feats

From level 4 (or at level 1 if you’re playing a Human) you can grab a feat in place of an ability score increase. I’d suggest the following are some of your better options for an architect of ruin:

Fey touched: A couple more spells known and spells to cast. Misty step is always useful for moving around.
Fighting initiate: Grab a fighting style to complement your combat mastery.
Heavily armored: If you want a strength build without the dexterity investment, then you can grab this for a high AC and low Dex build.
Inspiring leader: Quite a lot of temporary hit points for the party every rest, especially if you’re a high charisma build.
Lucky: More reliable d20 tests.
Magic initiate: More spells known and another slot to cast with is handy for a third caster.
Resilient: Some more resilience for another saving throw.
Sentinel: More opportunity attacks means you get the effects of terrorising force more often and with swift retribution, you can do this more often too.
Shadow touched: Similar to fey touched, you can cast more spells and invisibility is a great option.
Tough: More hit points means more resilience, great for a melee martial.

Weapons

Illriggers are capable of fighting with any type of weapon they want. Much of your choice will depend on the combat mastery you take. Brutal will mean using two handed weapons, inexorable means taking any kind of melee weapons and unfettered is good for ranged builds.

Dual-wielders can be a good option if you want more attacks, perhaps to maximise on terrorising force.

You’ll still need to match this with your dexterity build if that’s the route you’ve gone. That means finesse and ranged weapons. Rapiers are a good option for a finesse build and a longbow will allow you to use your extra attack. You could use a heavy crossbow from level 7 onwards if you intend to always use a cantrip instead of a 2nd attack.

Armor

If you’re a strength build, get your dexterity up to 14 and grab some half plate for maximum AC. If you want to do some stealthing, grab a breastplate instead.

For a dexterity build, you can go for studded leather and get your dexterity as high as possible. A shield is a solid option if you want to go for more defence over damage.

Your highest AC option is to go unarmored, but that will require considerable investment. You’ll need to take the bravado combat mastery and get your dexterity and charisma as high as possible (20 if you can). This gives you a 22AC potential with a shield though, or more with magic items.