Do you love using items? What about magical items? Consider rolling an artificer. These magical tinkerers always have something up their sleeves, creating a versatile option for new and veteran players alike.

The Artificer class is typically in Gnomish territory, with its focus on tinkering. However, Elves can give this class even more of a magical flair.

The Artificer class can be found in either Eberron: Rising from the Last War OR Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything. Click here to pick up your copy of Eberron: Rising from the Last War OR click here to pick up your own copy of Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything!

The Elf Race can be found in the Player’s Handbook. Click here to pick up your own copy of The Player’s Handbook!

How to Make an Elf Artificer

Elves are great artificers – one of the best racial options in the game. Start by choosing the High Elf subrace for bonuses to Dexterity and Intelligence, both of which are very important to Artificers.

As previously stated, you’ll want to focus on INT, as it’s a priority for most of your class features. The next to focus on are CON and DEX, but this changes depending on how your playstyle. Whether you want to be a bit beefier and better at concentration checks (CON) or if you’d rather be harder to hit (DEX).

Once you reach 3rd level, you get to choose a subclass. The artificer is a relatively new class, so it doesn’t have as many subclass options as other classes.

Your options are the ranged & DPS-focused Artillerist, the healing and elemental damage-focused Alchemist, the melee-focused Battle Smith, or you can don a magical suit of armor with the Armorer archetype. Each option is a great way to augment your playstyle as you see fit.

How to Play an Elf Artificer

Artificers can be a bit complicated to understand at first, but they have a lot of very useful class features.

You automatically know all the spells on the artificer’s limited spell list. You also select a small number of cantrips, and rather uniquely you can swap out a cantrip if you’d like whenever you level up.

Magical Tinkering – This is where your imagination comes into play. Cobble together small magical gizmos that can help you along your journey. Enchant some stones with a putrid scent to act as a stink bomb or create a makeshift tripwire by enchanting a string with an alarm. 

Tinkering adds flavor to your session.  

Artificer Infusion – Artificers get to infuse magical items. You get a bunch of different choices, but most of them boil down to creating specific magic items from a list or making +1 versions of things. These items can be made during long rests, and you can even let other players use them.

Flash of Genius – At level 7, you can use your reaction to add your Intelligence bonus to a check or saving throw for yourself or anyone in your party. That’s huge. Your Intelligence should hopefully be a +4 by level 7, and +4 can easily save yourself or an ally from certain death. You get to use it a number of times per long rest equal to your Intelligence mod, giving your character a ton of utility.

Want to know more about playing an Artificer? Check out this guide for more info:

How to Roleplay as an Elf Artificer

Artificers are all about the infusion of magic into the world around them, making Elves a great fit for the class. Maybe your character was lost as a child and brought up by a lone artificer in the woods. Your character could have been a diplomat on a visit with a college of Dwarven artificers and became completely enchanted with the magical craft.

No matter what you choose, be creative and have fun as an Elf Artificer.