Order of the Lycan – D&D 5e Blood Hunter Subclass Guide

Embrace lycanthropy with this beastial, melee subclass for the blood hunter.

At a glance

Order of the lycan features

Heightened senses – Lv3

You gain advantage on perception checks that rely on hearing and smell. This helps the order of the lycan a little to fulfill the role of a scout.

Hybrid transformation – Lv3

How it works

As a bonus action, you can transform into a hybrid lycanthrope form. This grants the following traits:

• Feral might: Advantage on strength checks and saving throws and +1 to melee damage rolls. This damage increases to +2 at level 11 and +3 at level 18.
• Resilient hide: Resistance to bludgeoning, piercing and slashing from non-magical or silvered attacks. You also get +1 AC when not wearing heavy armor.
• Predatory strikes: You can apply your crimson rite to unarmed strikes. These deal 1d6 damage (increasing to 1d8 at level 11). You can also use dexterity instead of strength for unarmed strikes. You can also make an additional unarmed strike as a bonus action when using unarmed strikes with the attack action.
• Bloodlust: If you’re in your hybrid form and below half hit points, then you need to take a wisdom saving throw or attack the nearest creature.

Tactics

• Lycan blood hunters are more powerful in their hybrid form. Typically, you’ll want to use this form in combat.
• You’ll be reliant on melee attacks to take full advantage of your heightened damage and resilience. This means building heavily for melee attacks (dexterity is your best option here so it can enhance AC as well).
• Resilience becomes more important for lycans too with a greater reliance on melee combat, but also because you’ll want to avoid dropping below half hit points if you can. This means growing constitution and dexterity.
• You’ll want to avoid hitting allies due to bloodlust though. There are several things you can do here. The first is not to multiclass into a barbarian as rage will guarantee bloodlust (unless you can position yourself away from allies). A spellcasting multiclass can be problematic too due to spell concentration.
• You can also increase your wisdom (pick this as your hemocraft ability), make sure you aren’t too close to allies when in combat, ensure you’re the recipient of regular healing and temporary hit points (aid is good for this) and enhance your saving throws (bless can help here). Some of these things mean having a cleric ally is useful.

Stalker’s prowess – Lv7

How it works

You gain an extra 10ft movement speed and increased jump distances. Your hybrid form also gains +1 to attack rolls (+2 at level 11 and +3 at level 18) and crimson rite makes your unarmed strikes magical for overcoming resistances and immunities.

Tactics

• An extra 10ft speed is quick, helping you close down the distance between yourself and enemies in melee.
• There are ways to enhance your speed further if you want. This can come through your race (like by playing a Wood Elf or a Centaur). The mobile feat can help here or spells like longstrider or even multiclassing as a monk.
• You should usually have a crimson rite active anyway, but this is a greater reason to ensure this.

Advanced transformation – Lv11

How it works

You can transform into your hybrid form twice per rest now and when in hybrid form, you regenerate a few hit points if below half hit points at the beginning of each turn.

Tactics

• There should be few times when you can’t be in hybrid form for combat now. Especially if you’re wise with your short rests.
• As already mentioned, a heightened constitution will really help you out. Especially as it means higher regeneration.

Brand of the voracious – Lv15

How it works

You now have advantage on saving throws against your bloodlust and advantage on attack rolls against creatures with your brand of castigation.

Tactics

• As with all uses of brand of castigation, you’ll want to focus it on powerful enemies for multiple rounds of benefits.
• This also means you’re even more specialised at taking down single, tough enemies.
• Bloodlust will also be less likely and less of a concern.

Hybrid transformation mastery – Lv18

How it works

You have an unlimited number of uses of hybrid transformation and it lasts until you fall unconscious or die. You also gain blood curse of the howl which lets you attempt to frighten all creatures you choose within 30ft (60ft if amplified) and can potentially stun enemies too.

Tactics

• No need now to use short rests to keep up uses of your hybrid form.
• Blood curse of the howl is a strong crowd control curse. Use it when surrounded by enemies to prevent yourself getting overwhelmed.

How good is the order of the lycan subclass?

The order of the lycan really doubles down on the melee aspects of the blood hunter. They’re tougher and deal more damage than other blood hunters, and the features handle this really well!

You get 1 more attack, higher damage, better attack rolls and advantage against branded creatures alongside other benefits. It’s significant that by level 5, you can perform 3 attacks (albeit with one using a bonus action).

Despite the bloodlust (which should be rare and easily mitigated) I think the order of the lycan is a very strong subclass. It’s all about raw power and resilience and accomplishes this well with bloodlust being a solid negative feature that is able to be mitigated with a little care.

5/5

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Optimising the order of the lycan

Lycan blood hunters are melee specialists. You should expect to throw them into the midst of combat. As such, increasing damage output and resilience will be hugely important for a lycan blood hunter.

Below I’ve given a load of advice on how you can build and optimise your order of the lycan character.

Ability scores

Recommended options

• Dexterity: You can use dexterity for unarmed strikes. This makes it superior to strength as you’ll need dexterity anyway to help your AC. This means you’ll want this high for maximum damage, especially with 3 attacks able to be made by level 5, you can deal a fair bit of damage even at early levels. As a front line martial, you’ll also need the resilience that comes from a decent dexterity.
• Constitution: You want to avoid going down to half hit points as much as possible. High hit points will help here. Later on, a higher constitution will help you regenerate more.
• Wisdom: Your bloodlust saving throws are based on wisdom. Wisdom saving throws are also some of the most common. Because of this, it’s worth making your hemocraft ability wisdom and ditching intelligence.

Options to avoid

• Strength: There’s little benefit to investing in strength for a lycan blood hunter. Dexterity will be just as good for your unarmed strikes and there’s little point in using any weapons other than ranged weapons which use dexterity (which you already need for your AC) as hybrid form should regularly be available. The only exception is if you intend on taking a grapple build. In which case, you can take medium armor, 14 dexterity and then beef up your strength. Lycans are natural grapplers with advantage on strength checks, but a lack of heavy armor means still investing somewhat in dexterity.
• Intelligence: You need wisdom for bloodlust saving throws so I’d invest in that and not bother much with intelligence. Especially as you can choose wisdom for your hematurgy ability.
• Charisma: You’re very dependant on many ability scores. There’s just no space for being charismatic with a blood hunter.

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

Skills

Recommended options

• Acrobatics: Lycans should focus on dexterity over strength. That makes this the superior skill to invest in.
• Arcana: Good knowledge skill. You probably don’t have a high intelligence, but this is a decent option if you don’t have an intelligence caster in the party.
• History: Another good knowledge skill.
• Investigation: An often used skill, even if your intelligence won’t be that high.
• Religion: Also a decent knowledge skill.

Options to avoid

• Athletics: Take acrobatics as you should be investing in dexterity, not strength. That is, unless you want to play a grappler.
• Insight: This is more of a face skill and as you’re definitely not a good party face, I wouldn’t bother with this.
• Survival: Not a hugely used skill and you already get advantage on this sometimes.

Race

I’d consider the following when picking a race for a Lycan:

• Toughen up: You’re going to be hurting yourself and probably throwing yourself into harm’s way a lot too. Plus you want to avoid dropping to half hit points if you can avoid it. The more hit points, resistances and other protective traits you can grab, the better.
• Damage dealing: You’re also there to deal damage. Any race that can enhance this will be useful.
• Stealthiness: Most lycans should have a good dexterity but lack the skills for things like stealth, perception and sleight of hand that go hand in hand with stealthiness. And yet blood hunters make a good fit for a potential scout or stealth role. If you lack a party rogue, you could use your race (and your background or feats) to have a lycan compensate in this area.

Recommended options

• Bugbear: This makes the most of your high dexterity with stealth proficiency and bonus damage when you attack before an opponent. Long limbs are great for better reach too and will allow you to easily engage in hit and run tactics.
• Hill Dwarf: Wisdom and constitution ability score increases suit a lycan well and you get extra HP to aid your durability.
• Hobgoblin: Blood hunters benefit from the support of allies as well as being close to others to dole out damage on those that attack allies. The hospitality fey gift is especially useful as hematurgy can just drain your temporary hit points which can easily be replenished. You’ll make plenty of attacks rolls and saving throws so chances to turn failures into successes is very useful too.
• Human (variant): A skill of your choice can give you some scout skills and a feat is very useful and will sometimes compensate for the slightly lower ability score with an increase from the feat.
• Goblin: Extra damage on creatures larger than you is useful and a bonus action to disengage can be good for hit and run tactics. The challenge will be when to hit with your bonus action and when to disengage, but having the option is useful.
• Goliath: You’re mainly here for the damage reduction which will help you last longer in combat. Cold resistance is useful here too.
• Orc: Survive a bit longer when knocked to 0HP. This does combine with rite revival too so you can use this initially to keep your crimson rites working a little bit longer. You also get dash as a bonus action to get to your enemies sooner and temporary hit points suit a lycan nicely for more durability.
• Shifter: Regular temporary hit points and you can take beasthide for even higher AC (which will stack with your hybrid form) and even more temporary hit points. Wildhunt also makes you more durable by preventing advantage on attacks rolls. There’s nothing to say that you can’t be in both a beast form and a hybrid form which makes for a very unique build.
• Simic Hybrid: Constitution increase plus another ability score increase of your choice will suit you well. I’d go for the carapace enhancement for extra AC.
• Tortle: If you want to play a grappling lycan, a Tortle is your best bet. They have a base AC of 17 (equal to your best medium armor and +2 from dexterity). This allows you to invest in strength and dump dexterity, giving you the best build for grappling.
• Warforged: +2 constitution and another ability score increase are great for a blood hunter. You also get +1 AC, some resistances and a skill and tool proficiency (allowing you to partially fill the role of a rogue). The idea of a warforged blood hunter (especially one infected with lycanthropy) is bizarre, but I imagine there are lore ways to work around this. There’s certainly nothing mechanical to stop you doing this.
• Yuan-ti Pureblood: Advantage against spell saving throws makes you very resilient to any kind of saving throw plus you’re tough against poison. The innate spellcasting isn’t much help, but you’re not really here for that.

Backgrounds

You’ll mainly want your background for some extra skills. I’d recommend trying to grab things like stealth, sleight of hand and perception to make you into something of a scout, especially as you should be going for a dexterity and wisdom build.

Below I’ve included the backgrounds that work well for a lycan.

Name	Skill proficiencies	Tool proficiency	Languages	Equipment
Imvestigator	2 of insight, investigation or perception	Disguise kit, thieves’ tools	None	Magnifying glass, evidence from a past case, common clothes, 10gp
Sailor	Athletics, perception	Navigator’s tools, vehicles (water)	None	A belaying pin, 50ft of silk rope, lucky charm, common clothes, belt pouch containing 10gp
Urchin	Sleight of hand, stealth	Disguise kit, thieves’ tools	None	Small knife, city map, pet mouse, token to remember your parents by, common clothes, pouch containing 10gp

If you do really want to go down the route of a scout, the urchin background gets you the closest to fulfilling that ambition.

Feats

Instead of taking an ability score improvement, you can opt to take a feat (if your DM allows it). A variant Human can also take a feat at first level and some DMs will grant these to characters at level 1.

I’d suggest the following feats for a lycan:

• Lucky – Turn potential successes or failures in your favour with an extra d20 roll. Great option for any class.
• Mage slayer – Get better at dealing with spellcasters.
• Mobile – Great for hit and run tactics if you don’t want to be left too vulnerable.
• Shield master – Great for shield wielding blood hunters to increase your durability.
• Skilled – Great way to help you fulfill your potential as a scout class.
• Tough – More hit points is a great option for the often damaged lycan that’s trying to avoid going below half hit points.

Weapons

The best option for a lycan is unarmed strikes. They gain an additional attack through their bonus action and get other bonuses with their unarmed strikes. The exception here is when you’ve expended your uses of hybrid form. However, sensible uses of short rests should minimise this. Grab a rapier and shield for when you can’t be in hybrid form (your highest damage finesse weapon).

You should have a high dexterity which does mean you can wield a ranged weapon capably too. You’ll likely rarely use ranged weapons so it’s not worth investing feats in using things like firearms and crossbows with your extra attack. This means a longbow is your best option here.

Armor

I’d generally opt for medium armor until your dexterity hits about 18-20, at which point, you can switch to light armor and potentially outperform medium armor (or at least not suffer from stealth disadvantage).

Grab a breastplate if stealth is important for you or halfplate if it isn’t. Once your dexterity is high enough, you can take studded leather instead.

There’s nothing to say that you need to use both hands for all your unarmed strikes. This means you can wield a shield in one hand and make 3 attacks with the other (once you have extra attack and you’re using your bonus action attack). It’ll make you a decent bit more durable and has very little in the way of drawbacks.

Other class guides

Not sure a lycan blood hunter is for you. Not to worry. Why not check out one of our other class and subclass guides.