Among the countless new rules and exciting builds available in the Players’ Handbook 2024 (PHB), two cantrips have been reworked into a powerful synergistic combo every min-maxing spellcaster should be aware of. These cantrips are the iconic Druid cantrip Shillelagh, and the (previously) disappointing arcane spell True Strike. Let’s look at how these spells have changed, and how they come together to change melee combat for spellcasters.
A Note on Multiple Attacks Per Turn
This combination of cantrips only works if you don’t have the multi-attack feature. Most mage classes don’t get multi-attack, but some options like the Valor Bard subclass or the Eldritch Invocation Thirsting Blade can give some mages multi-attack, which doesn’t work with this combo. This is because True Strike is a weapon attack, but it doesn’t use the “Attack” action. Instead, it uses the “Magic” action, which does not benefit from multi-attacks. This also affects features such as the Nick Mastery and the Light weapon property.
Isn’t True Strike Useless?
Since the 2014 rules were released, True Strike has been one of the most widely hated cantrips available. Using an action to get advantage on your next turn’s attack isn’t great to start with. When you factor in the fact that it’s a concentration effect which can be ended before you get a chance to use it, it’s easy to see why players rarely made the mistake of using this cantrip. Thankfully, this spell has been retired, and the spell with the same name in the 2024 PHB is completely new.
The new version is an arcane attack with a weapon, as a Magic action, with any weapon with which you have proficiency and that is worth 1+ copper. This attack replaces your usual use of Strength or Dexterity for the attack and damage with your spellcasting modifier. This means you can, at level 1, have an effective melee attack which deals more damage than any ranged cantrip, thanks to the reliable addition of your spellcasting modifier to the damage, which cantrips don’t typically benefit from. As an added bonus, this also allows you to deal radiant damage instead of the weapon’s normal type, helping you skip resistances to non-magical damage.
If True Strike is Great, Why do You Need Shillelagh?
The advantage of Shillelagh is that, much like its former iteration, it isn’t an attack. Instead, it infuses a club or staff with magical energy, effectively creating a magic weapon for your True Strike to use. This also introduces the option of dealing force damage instead of bludgeoning or radiant, which gives each of your weapon attacks a great range of coverage for different kinds of damage resistance.
The True Value: Scaling Up
A pain point for spellcasters who wish to wade into combat is the fact that they lack core class features, such as Extra Attack which allow them to scale their melee attacks at higher levels. The new version of True Strike actually scales similar to other cantrips, meaning you get an additional 1d6 radiant damage at level 5, and scaling at higher levels as usual. Added to Shillelagh’s scaling, which increases the base damage of the weapon, all the way up to 2d6 at level 17, and you get some seriously powerful melee weapon attacks. For example, your melee attacks at level 17 would have a base damage of 2d6+(modifier)+3d6, for an average of 16+(modifier) damage per attack.
How to Get True Shillelagh
With the 2024 rules, getting access to both True Strike and Shillelagh can happen at level 1. Bards, Sorcerers, Warlocks, and Wizards can all learn True Strike at level 1, and Druids can learn Shillelagh. The only spellcaster who doesn’t have either is the Cleric, but even that class can get both. No matter which class you’re playing, you only need to take a background which grants the relevant Magic Initiate feat (Sage for Wizard and/or Guide for Druid). Clerics can do this only by choosing Human as their species, and either Sage or Guide as their background, using the Versatile trait to gain the other Magic Initiate feat. All other classes need only take one version of Magic Initiate to have both cantrips.
Best Classes for True Shillelagh
If you’re looking for both damage and a high armor class, Cleric and Druid are likely your best picks. Each allows you to choose an Order, which allows you to gain proficiency with medium armor (Druid) or heavy armor (Cleric). Either way, at level 7 and 15, you deal additional damage when you “hit a creature with an attack roll using a weapon” which does not specify the range or type of action. This means at level 17, Cleric and Druid casters using True Shillelagh can increase their damage to 2d6+(modifier)+3d6+2d8, for an average of 25+(modifier) damage per attack.
How Does this Compare to Just Playing a Melee class?
I’ve crunched some numbers for average damage/action for different classes below. For each example, we are assuming that by level 17 every class has a 20 in their primary stat, and these calculations do not consider other spells or limited use features which may deal damage. The idea is to just see how much damage we can put out reliably on every turn, not the peaks we can reach with bonus action spells and similar features, because it becomes much harder to objectively compare damage and utility at that point.
- Cleric: True Shillelagh: 30 damage/Magic Action
- Druid: True Shillelagh: 30 damage/Magic Action
- Fighter: Two extra attacks (greatsword 2d6) 36 damage/Attack Action
- Paladin: Extra Attack (longsword 1d8) + Radiant Strikes: 28 damage/action
- Rogue: Nick Mastery (scimitar and shortsword 2x1d6) + sneak attack: 48 damage/action
As you can see, this puts Clerics and Druids very nearly equal to martial focused classes, without sacrificing any spellcasting features. Rogues continue to be ideal for single-target, and Fighters, Rangers, and Paladins continue to be better equipped for melee combat in other ways, such as mitigation, multi-target, or control, but mages don’t sacrifice any of their spellcasting scaling to make this combo work, so they still have their own class’s powerful array of spells. Bards, Sorcerers, Warlocks, and Wizards lack the additional 2d8 damage that Clerics and Druids have access to, but that loss of an average of 9 damage may be worth the features those classes offer, such as recovering spells, eldritch invocations, bardic inspiration, etc.
Example Build for This Combination
This is my own take on a level 1 melee character using the True Shillelagh combination. Because of its use of Shillelagh and Mage Armor, this build will rely on nearly zero equipment, because a club can be obtained from any number of sources, and Mage Armor frees up our concern for anything else beyond clothing. We take Healing Word to give us spellcasting with a bonus action, and all other spells/cantrips are up to you.
Species: Orc for Relentless Endurance
Background: Sage – True Strike, Prestidigitation, Mage Armor
Class: Druid (Primal Order – Magician)
Cantrips: Druidcraft (Magician), Shillelagh, Thorn Whip
Spells: Cure Wounds, Goodberry, Healing Word, Purify Food and Drink
Abilities (With point buy and +1 Con and +2 Wis from Sage):
Strength: 10
Dexterity: 14
Constitution: 14
Intelligence: 10
Wisdom: 16
Charisma: 12
Beyond Level 1
- Level 3: Circle of the Sea gives you maximum damage for your bonus action, and powerful enemy movement.
- Level 4: Pick up the War Caster Feat to be able to use True Strike as a reaction. This also gives us advantage on concentration saving throws, making it easier to keep up Concentration for spells which give us bonus actions to optimize our action economy.
- Level 7: Choose Primal Strike for extra weapon damage. Note that taking Potent Spellcasting will not affect True Strike, as it isn’t a Druid Cantrip, and Shillelagh already gets your Wisdom modifier. At level 15, Primal Strike doubles its damage, and Potent Spellcasting’s level 15 improvement doesn’t affect melee spells.
- Level 8: Take a feat which boosts your Wisdom, such as Fey-Touched, which also gives you access to Misty Step for superior mobility if being in Melee becomes too dangerous.
- Level 9+: You can choose to go straight Druid to get the best spellcasting progression, or you can dip into 3 levels of a class which gives you more combat features. If you do this, it will delay your Ability Score Increase progression, but you can take a 4th level in that class at combined character level 20 to get access to a second Epic Boon Feat.
A Note on Ranged Attacks
Shillelagh only affects clubs and quarterstaves, but True Strike’s stacking with Primal Strike means that you can still use True Strike to deal effective damage with ranged weapons, especially if you have access to Martial Weapons. This will require taking a feat at higher levels or losing Thaumaturgist or Magician in favor of their martial counterparts, but not needing Shillelagh frees up your cantrips for other choices, and you can get access to longbows and crossbows at level 1. The biggest downside to this is the lack of scaling Shillelagh offers, but this is offset by having access to attacks which deal 1d10 base damage, plus your modifier, at early levels.
TL;DR:
By combining the cantrips True Strike and Shillelagh, we have access to a powerful magic weapon at level 1, and an attack which does more damage than any other available single-target cantrip, and is immediately comparable to a melee character of similar levels. Since both cantrips scale at higher levels, and scale with class features such as Divine Strike or Primal Strike, this combination stays relevant into the late game, and truly shine for Druids or Clerics. If you don’t have a copy yet, you can order the Player’s Handbook 2024 via Amazon, as it is now available there cheaper than other options.
