Battle Smith Artificer: D&D 2024 Optimisation Guide

Combine artificer ingenuity with martial skill with the updated battle smith subclass for D&D 2024.

Battle smiths are trained for combat with both weapon training and healing capabilities available to them. They combine this with their own pet construct known as a steel defender. This is both a protector and a damage dealer giving battle smiths better damage dealing than most artificers.

The battle smith was a strong subclass in D&D 2014, and it remains that way in the 2024 edition. It gets a few minor buffs with the odd, slight debuff that overall means they’re a slightly better subclass than before.

Below I’ll go into detail on the D&D 2024 version of the battle smith including everything that’s changed, how to use them, how good they are and how best to build one.

At a glance

Half caster with lots of utility
Martial subclass with a construct companion for extra damage and defence
Make decent backup healers

5/5 – The battle smith was a strong subclass already and it remains that way with some quality of life improvements in the mix. With enhanced damage, defence and healing, they can do a fair bit quite well. They lack a bit of durability for a front line martial, so some care is needed, but there’s enough here to make them last, especially if you build for the martial archetype. On top of this, battle smiths have an excellent option for their spell storing item in the form of conjure barrage, rounding this out into a top tier artificer subclass.

How has the battle smith changed?

The battle smith was already a strong subclass and didn’t need much in the way of changes. While the list below is reasonably long, most of these are tweaks making your steel defender capabilities based more on your intelligence modifier than your proficiency bonus. While some of these technically make the battle smith a tiny bit worse, most of these improve them in some decent ways making these changes an overall net positive. Here’s what’s changed:

Quicker weapon crafting: Crafting weapons now takes half the time.
Weapons as a spellcasting focus: You can now use a weapon you’re proficient in as a spellcasting focus.
Steel defender changes: It now acts during your turn rather than after, the mending spell doesn’t explicitly heal the defender, its AC is usually improved as it scales with your intelligence modifier, HP is likely slightly lower as it’s no longer boosted by your intelligence modifier, passive perception has been lowered, can now be surprised, slightly higher damage attacks in most cases, repair healing is boosted by intelligence modifier instead of proficiency bonus, better saving throws other than for dexterity and constitution which are slightly worse and better ability checks other than for athletics and perception.
Extra attack trading: When you get extra attack, you can now let your steel defender use your extra attack instead.
No AC boost with improved defender: The 2014 steel defender got +2 AC at level 15 which no longer happens. However, this is secretly a buff as steel defender AC is calculated based on 12 + intelligence modifier instead of a flat 15. This means you can hit 17 AC several turns earlier if you invest highly in intelligence (which is easy to do and definitely recommended) making this an overall buff.

Battle smith features

eberron — Artificer: Wizards of the Coast

Tools of the trade (Lv3) – 2/5

Proficiency with Smith’s tools and half crafting time for weapons are decent enough ribbon features, but nothing major here.

Battle smith spells (Lv3) – 5/5

Lots of excellent spell options here including great defensive options like shield and fire shield. Smites offer extra bonus action damage when your steel defender can’t be used while conjure barrage is an excellent AoE spell with a huge area and the ability to miss allies in the area. This makes it an excellent option for your spell storing item. The likes of heroism, aura of vitality, aura of purity and mass cure wounds are all good options for protection/healing, but will require your actions to setup, but can be worth the extra durability they grant.

Battle ready (Lv3) – 4/5

Intelligence attacks makes you much more viable as a martial option. You can easily dump strength and limit dexterity to 14 on an optimal build and still make strong attacks. This makes it much easier to focus on your all important intelligence and then constitution (or feats).

Using your weapon as a spellcasting focus gives you options for combining weapon attacks and spellcasting.

Steel defender (Lv3) – 5/5

This grants extra damage with your bonus action as well as another body for enemies to focus attention on and some protection to nearby allies too. With so many stats now based on your intelligence modifier, this is even more of a reason to focus on improving your intelligence.

I’d generally keep your steel defender close so it can use it’s reaction to protect you. However, you can use it to protect allies of you’d rather step away from the fray.

One important question is whether shining smite is a better use of your bonus action than commanding your steel defender to attack. The steel defender will generally do more damage (average 9.5-11.5 vs 7), but shining smite will definitely work if you’ve already hit, and it prevents invisibility and grants advantage on attack rolls against the target.

I’d say it could be worth it against tougher creatures that will require a lot of attacks, especially creatures that can turn invisible. It will take up concentration and a spell slot, but in the meantime, your steel defender will be dodging which is also useful.

Extra attack (Lv5) – 5/5

A good amount of extra damage here and you have the flexibility of having your steel defender use this instead of you too. With a +1 or +2 weapon, you’ll deal similar damage to the steel defender per attack, but you’ll also be more accurate, even if you don’t deal higher damage (assuming a d8 damage dealing weapon).

For this reason, I’d typically make the extra attack yourself unless you can’t for some reason or are disadvantaged (maybe from something like the poisoned condition).

Arcane jolt (Lv9) – 4/5

Some extra damage or healing when you hit a few times per long rest is pretty good. The healing can be used to recover allies at 0HP or just to bolster them. The fact it doesn’t require an action or bonus action means that unlike most healing, there’s no conflict with your action economy making this a really strong option for recovering allies on 0HP and even better than healing word.

The damage is an equally good option and just depends on your priorities at the time. I’d be inclined to at least save some uses for healing downed allies as it’s juse one of the best and most fluid ways for the party to do so. Higher intelligence means you can use this more, but you should already be making this as high as possible anyway.

Improved defender (Lv15) – 4/5

Better damage and healing from arcane jolt and your steel defender does a bit of damage when it uses deflect attack. All of this makes you a decent bit more potent and helps your abilities scale with higher levels.

How good is the battle smith subclass?

The battle smith is a combination of melee damage dealer and healer. Its steel defender that allows for the equivalent of 3 attacks per turn and some extra hit points on the battlefield. You also have some decent healing capabilities for backup healing.

The big challenge for a battle smith is durability. Your steel defender helps here by imposing disadvantage on some incoming attacks. You also have the shield spell and your own personal healing to help too, but you do still need to be aware of your relative vulnerability for a melee warrior. You can just send your steel defender ahead to support more tanky allies, or you’ll need to make sure you’re not getting overwhelmed by enemies.

Some of your spells also lend themselves well to being on the front lines. Conjure barrage and aura of vitality are especially strong examples of this, as are your smite spells. As such, I’d still lean towards a melee build which means compensating by building for durability.

It’s also worth mentioning that conjure barrage is an excellent use of your spell storing item that can be given to a homunculus servant or some other ally for a lot of extra damage dealing.

Ultimately, like the artillerist, the battle smith is a top tier artificer subclass, if a little trickier to play safely due to their more melee nature.

5/5

Building an optimised battle smith

Warforged — Artificer: Wizards of the Coast

Battle smiths, alongside armorers, are the only artificer subclasses built for melee combat. Artificers aren’t the hardiest of classes on their own, and even with some resilience features, you’ll definitely find you’ll need to build for durability to make your battle smith survive in the midst of combat.

To help you with this, I’ve gone into detail on how you can build an optimised battle smith.

Ability scores

Recommended options

Intelligence: Your spellcasting ability and the one you’ll use for a lot of your best features like flash of genius and spell storing item as well as for attack rolls and for many aspects of your steel defender’s stats.
Dexterity: You’ll want this at least to 14 to maximise on the defence from medium armor. You can take this higher, especially if you want to
Constitution: All classes benefit from more resilience and battle smiths even more so than most as they need this to survive in melee combat. It’ll also help with any concentration spells you’re maintaining.

Options to avoid

Strength: Dump, you’ve got no use for strength.
Wisdom: Only useful for some skills and saving throws, otherwise, not worth investing in.
Charisma: This is mostly for face skills and these don’t come naturally to an artificer so I wouldn’t invest much here either.

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

Skills

Recommended options

Arcana: Common knowledge skill and you have the intelligence to back it up.
History: Another common intelligence skill.
Investigation: Investigation comes up a fair bit and as one of the few intelligence based classes, you’re in a good place to help here.
Nature: This feels like the domain of rangers and druids, but as an intelligence skill, this is another that an artificer is well placed to focus on.
Perception: Perception is always useful, especially if you’ll be filling in for a rogue.
Sleight of hand: Great option if you don’t already have a rogue with this.

Stealth isn’t on the artificer list of skills, but I’d consider it for a battle smith if you don’t have another more natural rogue. You can grab this through your background or from something like the skilled feat or Human species.

Species/race

I’d look for species with the following qualities:

Resilience: Make yourself tougher or more evasive through things like more hit points, resistances or flight. As a relatively vulnerable martial subclass, you’ll need as much resilience as you can get.
Innate spellcasting: The more spells you possess the better. And as a utility caster, an expanded range will benefit you a fair bit.
Damage dealing: Primarily, battle smiths are there to deal damage. Traits that can enhance this are a great option for a battle smith.

Recommended options

Aasimar (2024): Damage resistances as well as some light healing for recovering allies are solid. Temporary flight will be good for when you’re a bit more battered and need to get off the front lines and to relative safety.
Dragonborn (2024): A resistance for better defence and the breath weapon works well with extra attack for another AoE option. Temporary flight is great like it is for an Aasimar.
Gnome (2024): Extra magic resilience is great as you’ll undoubtedly be the target of some spells. Minor illusion and speak with animals are better options than what the Rock Gnome gives.
Goliath (2024): Lots of great options that can either help you enhance damage, defence or movement, all of which are useful for a battle smith.
Human (2024): If you need to boost your skill proficiencies to take full advantage of all those knowledge skills or add in stealth proficiency, then Human’s a good option. The consistent supply of heroic inspiration is handy too. However, the extra origin feat is probably the trait you want most, especially if you want to grab something like the tough origin feat, which is normally only available with backgrounds that don’t work for the artificer.
Shifter (2024): Temporary hit points and a choice of benefits. Beasthide for the extra AC, wildhunt for some better resilience and swiftstride for the faster movement and the extra safety. Longtooth doesn’t really work as battle smiths who rely on intelligence for attacks so the unarmed attack will be relatively weak due to a low strength. It’s also worse than what your bonus action can achieve through your steel defender or shining smite. The skills aren’t the best for an artificer, but everything else works well.
Warforged (2024): More AC, poison resilience, a skill and tool proficiency and a few other buffs all work really well for a battle smith that wants to be tougher and have more skills at their fingertips.

Backgrounds

Backgrounds are much more important now in D&D 2024 with ability score increases, origin feats and skills all now linked to your background.

For a battle smith, I’d prioritise intelligence and then one of dexterity or constitution with the below being your best options:

Name	Ability scores	Origin feat	Skill proficiencies	Tool proficiency
Criminal	Dexterity, constitution, intelligence	Alert	Sleight of hand, stealth	Thieves’ tools
Merchant	Constitution, intelligence, charisma	Lucky	Animal handling, persuasion	Navigator’s tools
Sage	Constitution, intelligence, wisdom	Magic initiate (wizard)	Arcana, history	Calligrapher’s tools
Scribe	Dexterity, intelligence, wisdom	Skilled	Investigation, perception	Calligrapher’s tools

I’d go with criminal for a stealth build or sage if you want more knowledge skills and spellcasting.

Feats

Origin feats

I’d say the below are your best origin feats for an artificer. Ironically, crafter is a poor option for an artificer who can do the things the crafter feat suggests in better ways usually:

Lucky: Advantage on d20 tests and disadvantage on your aggressors is universally useful. Especially as avoiding getting hit is one of the best ways to not lose concentration.
Magic initiate: Grab some extra spells known from another spell list. A good way to make yourself even more flexible with spellcasting.
Musician: A generally excellent origin feat for helping your allies out with some heroic inspiration (kind of like a slightly better lucky, you give to your friends).
Skilled: If the party needs a bit more proficiency in knowledge skills or you need to fill in for a rogue, then this works well for you. This can bump up your number of skill proficiencies a decent bit.
Tough: Really valuable extra hit points for a class on the lower end of these.

General feats

At level 4, you can start picking up general feats. These are some of the better options for a battle smith:

Fey touched: Misty step and another spell with free castings is pretty good and misty step makes a decent safety spell.
Genie magic: Another spell to cast and there’s plenty of utility here as you can simply choose any that’s on the sorcerer spell list.
Mage slayer: Great for disrupting spellcasters and gives you something similar to legendary resistance.
Medium armor master: If you can afford to get your dexterity up to 16, then this is worth +1AC for you which is decent. That extra dexterity will be helpful for a lot of skills, but not for weapon attacks which rely on intelligence.
Ritual caster: If you feel like you’re struggling to have enough of the spells you want available to you, then this is the best way to boost your utility with more spells gained through this feat than any other. You can check out my full guide to ritual casting for more tips.
Shadow touched: Invisibility and an illusion spell are great for a caster class. Especially one built for stealth.
Shield master: A free push or prone attempt when you make attacks and battle smiths can definitely benefit from a shield for that extra resilience. It also makes you better against dexterity saving throws, which is especially useful for nasty AoE spells, but it works better with a higher dexterity.
Speedy: A good option for martial artificers that want to use hit and run tactics.
War caster: Most artificer spells require somatic components which means a hand free to perform the spell. War caster removes this restriction, allowing you to have a shield while casting somatic spells. The better concentration is great too. It sort of boils down to how often you expect to cast spells in combat. If it’s just occasionally, then a bit of shield juggling isn’t too big a problem, if it’s more often, then you may want this.
Weapon master: Grab a weapon mastery property which can then enhance your attacks further.

Weapons

There’s nothing about a battle smith that requires them to be a melee subclass. However, their repertoire of spells does lean into close combat quite heavily. Your steel defender does need a nearby ally to really make the most of its defensive skillset, but that doesn’t need to be you. This means ranged weapons are an option, even if melee is where you’re most effective and how you’ll deal the most damage. I think there’s a few decent options here:

Sword and shield: The most defensive option. Grab a d8 damage dealer like a longsword or perhaps a thrown weapon like a trident. You will need to make sure you’re wielding a returning weapon if this is the case (as you’re only effective wielding magic weapons). War caster can help with item juggling if you want more easy options for spellcasting.
Two handed weapon: You could go for the bigger damage with something like a greatsword. No item juggling required here and it’s more damage, but also less defence.
Ranged weapons: You may want one of these available anyway, but the most powerful ranged weapon that works with extra attack is a longbow.

Armor

Go for medium armor and at least 14 dexterity. Half plate for maximum protection, breast plate if you want to be using stealth. A shield is a good option i for some extra defence, just be aware of some potential item juggling for casting spells.