How to Play as Constantine in DnD 5e
I was asked to try and build Constantine next, and I’m glad my next commission was so easy on the eyes. So, as I add Constantine x King Shark to my fleet of ships, let’s dissect how to play as this bad boy demon hunter. To clear the air, yes I have seen Tulock the Barbrarian’s build and, frankly, I disagree with his approach. I don’t do builds that are just retreads of Tulock’s builds, so I wouldn’t be making this post if I didn’t have a different angle to approach his build from.
John Constantine is a Human from Liverpool, England, but magic runs in his family. As such, we’ll make Constantine a Variant Human. As a Variant Human, we’ll give John +1 INT, +1 CON. We’ll give him Deception as his free skill of choice. For his free feat, we’ll give him Resilient for +1 CON and proficiency with CON saving throws. Not only will this let him concentrate on spells better, but CON saves will also ensure we can see straight, even when we’re 42% gin, and 58% regrettable life choices.
For his background, we’ve got a few options here. Constantine is a close-up magician and a punk rock musician which sounds like an Entertainer for Sleight of Hand and Performance, but he’s also an occultist detective, which is more of an Investigator for Insight and Investigation, and he’s also something of a con artist, which would make him a Charlatan for Deception and Sleight of Hand. Pick your poison, but for the purposes of this build, I’ll be treating him as an Entertainer for Sleight of Hand and Performance.
For his alignment, Constantine may not care about taking care of himself, but he does care about protecting others, making him Chaotic Good.
SCHOOL OF THEURGY (Knowledge)
There really was no other option for building Constantine. He has a wide utility belt of spells like a wizard, and deals with religious magic like a cleric. The School of Theurgy is the only way to combine the two. However, there are two domains that fit Constantine: Arcana and Knowledge. If Constantine was a Cleric, he’d be an Arcana Domain Cleric for sure, as they focus on banishing extra planar creatures and removing spell effects on others, which feels right in Constatine’s wheelhouse. But Knowledge Domain Clerics get added skill expertise, mind reading, and glimpsing the past, which is something Constantine also does. He’s able to tell just by entering a room that something terrible has happened there, and the Knowledge Domain is a good fit for a detective. Both work, but as Arcana overlaps with Wizard in many key ways, I’ll build Constantine as a Knowledge Domain Theurgist. Obviously though, Arcana fits him just as nicely, and there’s no problem if you prefer Arcana. For your Wizard skills, you gain expertise in Arcana and Religion from the Knowledge Domain, and you can take Insight and Investigation as your skills of choice from the Wizard skill list.
STATS
STR 8 DEX 10 CON 20 INT 20 WIS 14 CHA 10
SAVING THROWS
STR -1 DEX 0 CON +11 INT +11 WIS +8 CHA 0
COMBAT STATS
HP: 222
AC: 10
Initiative: 0
SKILLS
Arcana (+17)
Deception (+6)
Insight (+8)
Investigation (+11)
Performance (+6)
Religion (+17)
Sleight of Hand (+6)
FEATS
Resilient (CON)
Tough*
LANGUAGES
Abyssal**
Celestial
Common
Infernal**
*I gave Constantine Tough because as a Wizard, he’s bound to have a smaller HP bar, and thus, the Tough feat helps make him better for a fight. However, other excellent options include Metamagic Adept which gives him 2 sorcery points and 2 metamagic options to alter his spells, or Eldritch Adept, which gives him an Eldritch Invocation with no pre-existing requirements. Options like Armor of Shadows, Eldritch Mind, Eldritch Sight, Eyes of the Rune Keeper, Fiendish Vigor, or at later levels, Witch Sight to see through extra planar disguises.
**Constantine only gets Common and Celestial from his starter class, but through study, he can learn to read and write the languages of devils and demons as well. If he cares enough to talk to all extra planar enemies, he can also choose to study Deep Speech, Primordial, and Sylvan.
JOHN CONSTANTINE’S SPELL BOOK
C Fire Bolt, Light, Minor Illusion, Prestidigitation, Sacred Flame
1 Command, Detect Evil and Good, Guiding Bolt, Identify, Mage Armor, Protection from Evil and Good, Shield
2 Arcane Lock, Augury, Detect Thoughts, Hold Person, Locate Object, Phantasmal Force, Suggestion
3 Bestow Curse, Dispel Magic, Fireball, Magic Circle, Nondetection, Protection from Energy, Remove Curse, Speak with Dead
4 Arcane Eye, Banishment, Confusion, Fire Shield, Greater Invisibility, Locate Creature, Phantasmal Killer
5 Dispel Evil and Good, Hallow, Hold Monster, Legend Lore, Scrying, Wall of Force
6 Arcane Gate, Fizban’s Platinum Shield, Forbiddance, True Seeing
7 Divine Word, Plane Shift
8 Illusory Dragon
9 Invulnerability, Weird
CONSTANTINE’S EXTENDED SPELL BOOK
One lovely thing about the Wizard is that they can learn even more spells than their class already gives them. So, here’s basically the area for Constantine’s spill over spells because his magical chalice runneth over. These are spells that either give him more type coverage damaging spells, or fit his abilities, but didn’t make the first string. The reason for all of the summoning spells is because Constantine has summoned The Phantom Stranger against his will, so clearly summoning extra planar help is within his abilities. And with his +17 in religion checks, knowing the true names of celestials and fiends seems well within his wheelhouse.
1 Burning Hands, False Life, Inflict Wounds, Magic Missile, Silent Image, Tenser’s Floating Disk, Sanctuary, Shield of Faith, Sleep
2Â Earthbind, Invisibility, Knock, Levitate, Magic Weapon, Misty Step, See Invisibility, Scorching Ray, Warding Bond
3 Counterspell, Glyph of Warding, Major Image, Spirit Shroud, Summon Lesser Demons, Summon Shadowspawn
4 Death Ward, Dimension Door, Divination, Guardian of Faith, Resilient Sphere, Secret Chest, Summon Aberration, Summon Construct, Summon Greater Demon
5 Commune, Far Step, Flame Strike, Holy Weapon, Immolation, Modify Memory, Passwall, Planar Binding, Seeming, Summon Celestial, Teleportation Circle, Wall of Light
6 Flesh to Stone, Globe of Invulnerability, Guards and Wards, Harm, Otherworldly Guise, Power Word: Pain, Summon Fiend, Sunbeam, Word of Recall
7 Conjure Celestial, Forecage, Mordenkainen’s Magnificent Mansion, Sequester, Symbol, Teleport, Temple of the Gods
8 Holy Aura, Demiplane, Power Word: Stun Sunburst
9 Foresight, Gate, Imprisonment, Power Word: Kill, Time Stop
Arcane Initiate - You can learn both Wizard and Cleric spells, so long as you learn all of your Domain Spells
Arcane Recovery - Recover up to 10 spell slots of 5th level or lower on a short rest once per day
Channel Divinity: Knowledge of the Ages - Spend a Channel Divinity to gain proficiency with one skill or tool for 10 minutes.
Channel Divinity: Read Thoughts - Force a creature to make a Wisdom saving throw. If it fails, you can read its surface thoughts. It automatically fails Suggestion’s saving throw while under this effect.
Resilient (CON): +1 CON, Proficiency with CON saving throws
Signature Spells: Magic Circle and Protection from Energy are always prepared and can be cast once without using a spell slot.
Spell Mastery: Shield and Phantasmal Force can be cast without requiring spell slots.
Tough: Gain 2 HP per Level (+40 HP)
Visions of the Past: After meditating or prayer for 1 minute, you can glimpse dreamlike visions of past events for 14 minutes.
  Object Reading: You learn an object’s prior owner, how they acquired and lost it, and the most important thing that happened involving the owner and the object. If the object has been owned by more than 1 person in the last 14 days, you can also read the object for those other owners as well.
  Aura Reading: Glimpse the events of a location within a 50 ft cube up to 14 days ago, and learn up to 14 details about the events in this location.
I must say, after researching John Constantine, he went from being a kind of cool superhero I knew a little bit about to one of my new favorites. He was really fun to build, and I’ll admit, I’d be curious to see how he’d play in a real campaign. I do wish I could have made his DEX and CHA a little higher, but as he’s a Wizard, his CON stat needs a lot of love and attention so that his HP isn’t a sorry, soggy disaster. The guy even stared down Trigon and asked Him to light his cigarette. As for the build itself, John’s got a lot of versatility. Even without his secondary list of spells to add to his book on his adventure, Constantine has a fair deal of divination spells to ask God, Satan, and everyone in between for clues about a case he’s working. He has a nice selection of warding spells, as even God himself could not break one of Constantine’s seals. We also made sure he had plenty of ways to find, defend against, seal, banish, and ward off extra planar foes, regardless of whether they’re celestials or fiends. Constantine also has a wide selection of illusion spells, as he has used illusions to force criminals to face their victims, make their deceased loved ones scold them, or just haunted them with terrible nightmare imagery. His only major drawback is that Constantine’s primary spell list focuses more on banishing and protecting against extra planar threats, and he doesn’t have many spells for damaging his enemies. The secondary spell list has a few more options, but it’s still a shortcoming of his build. Still, it’s all-around a good character to use, especially if you know your DM is interested in running a religious-focused campaign or is planning a campaign that focuses on extra planar threats.
