The 10 best abilities for a fighter in Baldur's Gate 3

Do you know what the most exquisite aspect of a world filled with magic and monsters is? Embracing the role of a humble warrior and wielding your steadfast weapon to vanquish everything that crosses your path. Baldur's Gate 3 presents numerous opportunities to explore various classes, yet there exists an undeniable and delightful pleasure in launching three to nine attacks per turn, depending on your level.

To ensure that your precious combatant attains their true potential, you can enhance them through talents, bestowing upon them special attributes for offense or defense—especially noteworthy is the fact that you can acquire more talents than other classes, up to a maximum of four. However, it is worth mentioning that this list provides commendable options for paladins and barbarians, although they are not currently our main focus.

10 Great Weapon Master

If your objective is to inflict as much damage as possible, the Great Weapon Master is a commendable starting point. You must wield a two-handed weapon (it can be a versatile weapon as long as you use it with both hands). This implies that you cannot employ shields.

The first part states that whenever you reduce a person's hit points to zero or achieve a critical hit, you can perform an additional attack using your bonus action. This represents a delightful augmentation to your overall damage output.

There is also a gambling mechanic at play here; you can impose a penalty of -5 on your attack rolls, but your damage will increase by ten. Make sure to capitalize on advantages in your attacks, such as knocking down opponents or receiving support through spells like Bless.

9 Polearm Master

The Polearm Master is somewhat more secure than the Great Weapon Master, as you can always make an attack with your bonus action when you use your main action to attack and wield a polearm. However, the bonus action attack is executed with the butt end of the weapon and always deals a d4 plus your strength bonus.

Nevertheless, there is another advantage to consider here. Polearms have a greater reach compared to other melee weapons, and with this talent, you can strike individuals with an opportunity attack when they enter your reach, instead of only when they leave it. This talent also synergizes exceptionally well with the Sentinel feat.

8 Sentinel

The Sentinel feat accomplishes several things. It triggers an opportunity attack when an ally near you is hit, allowing you to strike the enemy and gain advantage on opportunity attacks. However, the other clever trick here is that hitting individuals with opportunity attacks reduces their movement to zero, preventing them from escaping your reach.

This is a popular combination with the Polearm Master, which also triggers an opportunity attack when someone enters the reach of your weapon, allowing you to prevent them from approaching you completely. And since you receive four feats, you can acquire both of these feats while simultaneously increasing your strength to 20—or another ability score. Alternatively, you can acquire additional feats.

7 Mage Slayer

The Mage Slayer can be quite helpful when your conflict involves spellcasters on a personal level. You gain advantage on saving throws to resist spells (when the enemy is within melee range of you), granting you more opportunities to avoid being "held person" once. Additionally, you gain an opportunity attack.

Lastly, let's assume the wizard is concentrating on a spell—let's say they have cast "Hold Person" on a companion. Every time you hit them, they have disadvantage on their concentration saving throw, increasing the chances of interrupting the spell. You become deadlier and provide a certain level of protection to your allies.

6 Tough

Suppose you prefer to focus on creating a tank instead of a damage dealer. "Resilient" would be a good option for you as it doubles your hit points at each level and grants you two additional hit points every time you level up. That's all.

Although it only provides increased health, this is a beneficial attribute for tanks as they often find themselves at the center of attention and targeted by attacks. Formidable adversaries rarely miss or employ spells where you still take half the damage even if you succeed on the saving throw, so it does make a difference. Additionally, gold dwarves gain an extra hit point per level, so combining this race with the "Resilient" feat results in an additional three points per level.

5 Shield Master

Continuing on the path of tanks, you will likely wield a shield during your adventure. By combining your shield with this feat, you gain a plus two bonus to Dexterity saving throws and can reduce damage with your reaction.

Normally, in such situations, you would take full damage if you fail and half damage if you succeed—for example, when someone casts a Fireball at you. However, by using your reaction to protect yourself, you only take half the damage if you fail and no damage if you succeed. It's like the evasion ability of a rogue, but with a shield. And it utilizes your reaction.

4 Heavy Armor Master

This feat is straightforward yet helpful. Firstly, you gain a +1 bonus to your strength, potentially increasing your overall bonus. If you intend to choose this feat, leave your strength score at an odd number like 17, which will be sufficient to increase your bonus later on.

Lastly, when you are attacked by a non-magical source, such as a sword, the damage you take is reduced by three—provided you are wearing splendid heavy armor, as the name of the feat suggests. While three may sound insignificant, it applies to every non-magical attack. If the enemy manages to hit you three times, you have just saved nine hit points.

3 Alert

A good option for most characters is vigilance. It will help you if you have neglected your dexterity or wisdom during character creation. It makes you immune to surprises, so failed perception checks for hidden enemies will have no effect on you. This allows you to protect your friends and attack your enemies.

It also gives you a +5 bonus to initiative, ensuring that your mighty tank will no longer act last in the turn order without dexterity. However, if you have high dexterity, it is almost guaranteed that you will strike first.

2 Sharpshooter

Sniper is essentially the grand weapon master, but with arrows. You have the same game system here, with a -5 penalty to your attack and a +10 bonus to damage if you hit the target. However, you do not gain additional attacks on kills or critical hits.

Instead, it ignores elevated terrain and eliminates annoying disadvantages caused by the environment. If you want to create an archer, this is a good starting point.

1 Crossbow Expert

Crossbows are powerful weapons here, and they come with a talent. Whenever someone is within melee range of you, your ranged attacks suffer a disadvantage. The Crossbow Expert talent negates this disadvantage, allowing you to shoot people at close range.

Piercing Shot, a special crossbow attack, sometimes causes Gaping Wounds that increase the damage from piercing weapons. With the Crossbow Expert, this effect also lasts a bit longer.