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Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition (A5E)
Class Balance In A5E: How Much Damage Should A Damage Dealer Deal?
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<blockquote data-quote="NotAYakk" data-source="post: 8113662" data-attributes="member: 72555"><p>And bard via magical secrets.</p><p></p><p>A cleric hitting things with a stick is doing abysmal damage output, getting increasingly bad as you gain levels.</p><p></p><p>So 3 full caster classes.</p><p></p><p></p><p>On a hasted (someone else) level 11 fighter over a single 3 round fight that is 15 swings. It lasts an hour, so could easily last through 3 fights for 40 swings.</p><p></p><p>40 swings times 2.5 is 100 damage if they hit.</p><p></p><p></p><p>So, the proper use of grappling is you grapple your foe, then knock it prone.</p><p></p><p>When enlarged, you can grapple Huge foes.</p><p></p><p>So take a Huge dragon or whatever. Grapple it. Knock it prone.</p><p></p><p>It now has 0 movement, so cannot stand up without escaping, and has disadvantage on all attacks, and any adjacent character has advantage on attacks on it.</p><p></p><p>Any creature that (a) cannot teleport, (b) cannot force movement on the wrestler, and (c) cannot beat the athletics checks of the grappler is basically done for.</p><p></p><p>Usually grapple only works on up to large size foes. Enlarge makes the limit huge. Polymorph giant ape makes it unlimited.</p><p></p><p></p><p>So cleric (full caster) and bard (full caster) via magical secrets.</p><p></p><p>10 attack rounds, on a fighter that is 30-40 attacks, times 1d6, is on the order of 100 damage.</p><p></p><p>A out of combat spell that grants 100 damage isn't a bad use of a slot. It does require concentration; so you will use a <strong>better</strong> concentration spell if you have it and have the slots to burn.</p><p></p><p></p><p>If your allies have GWM or SS, advantage turns it from marginal to amazing on every single AC range plausible (short of zombies with their 8 AC).</p><p></p><p>And faerie fire is a 20 foot cube, 1st level spell.</p><p></p><p>If you drop it on multiple foes and 1 or 2 fail their save, those two foes get burned down in a blink.</p><p></p><p>Ottos is no save to land. You get 1 full round of enemy suckage. And they have to burn an action to even get a save.</p><p></p><p>Drop it on a dragon, pit fiend, kracken (film at 11), or whatever big bad right after their turn.</p><p></p><p>Your entire team gets a volly of advantage fire. If you are coordinated, you can pull off more than one; allies can ready an attack round for someone's attack after you cast the spell, get that one, then get another when their turn comes around.</p><p></p><p>Done properly, a single cast of Ottos kills a BBEG by magnifying the damage of every attacker in the party. And even if it doesn't, it buys you an entire turn where the enemy sucks.</p><p></p><p></p><p>Yes, it isn't 3.5 broken.</p><p></p><p>A 5th level hold person is a 4 target save-or-lose. A 6th level hold monster is a 2 target save-or-lose.</p><p></p><p>Now, before burning a 6th level slot, you could get a bard or cleric to drop a bane on 3-4 targets, fishing for up to 2 failed saves. Then drop hold monster on those two.</p><p></p><p>Once on a target, your weapon users get auto-crits and auto-advantage. This can easily more than double their damage output.</p><p></p><p></p><p>So by "caster" you mean "wizards and sorcerers".</p><p></p><p>Note that if you have animate objects running and the bard whispers, they all get another attack as well. If you don't have magic arrows (or magic stones) or the like to animate, half damage is still good on animate objects.</p><p></p><p>Use your words man. I went through a pile of spell lists to find damage boosting spells and it was a waste of time because to you "caster" means "wizard and sorcerers"</p><p></p><p>An AoO from every ally, and they lose their action. And you get 1 target per spell level.</p><p></p><p>So you drop a 4th level slot and 4 enemies get to try to save. Maybe you go grovel if they aren't in a great AOO spam position; now 1 out of 4 is on the floor. Your allies focus-fire it with advantage, and it drops. You burned a 4th level slot to boost your allies damage to a significant degree.</p><p></p><p>I don't think you understand how good auto-advantage is.</p><p></p><p>Let us take a level 11 PAM+GWM fighter using a +2 glaive. We'll make it a champion to keep it easy.</p><p></p><p>They get 4 attacks/round at +4 (prof) +2 (magic) +5 (dex) = +11 to hit.</p><p></p><p>Their damage dice are 3d10+1d4 (21.9 after GWF) and their static damage is 28.</p><p></p><p>Against an AC 18 foe they hit on a 7+ and crit on a 19-20 for 0.7 hits and 0.1 crits per swing.</p><p></p><p>28*.7 + 21.9*.8 = 37.1 damage per round.</p><p></p><p>Now they get advantage and switch to -5/+10.</p><p></p><p>Their static damage grows to 68.</p><p></p><p>They hit on a 12+ and crit on a 19+, but with advantage this is 70% hit rate 19% crit rate.</p><p></p><p>21.9*.89 + 68*.7 = 67.1 damage per round.</p><p></p><p>Advantage gave this character +30 damage per round. So even if you cannot pre-buff greater invisibility, your one cast of it contributes 90 damage over the next 3 rounds.</p><p></p><p>Without your greater invisibility, your ally would have done 37.1 * 3 = 111.3 damage With it, they do another 90. If we attribute that damage to you, that means to keep up you need only do 21.3 damage over the next 2 rounds to have matched their contribution to the fight.</p><p></p><p>"Helping a rogue sneak attack" is not the goal.</p><p></p><p></p><p>Invisibility is a pre-buff, so it doesn't cost a combat action -- it lasts over an hour.</p><p></p><p>It grants advantage on the first attack of every PC, and makes ambushes easier to do.</p><p></p><p>A 3rd level pre-buff to generate 2 advantage attacks; if they are -5/+10 characters that is a pretty combat-action-efficient no-concentration-in-combat use of a spell slot.</p><p></p><p></p><p>Of course, I am talking about massive buffs. They almost all have concentration.</p><p></p><p>Toss polymorph (giant ape) on an ally and they soak 100+ points of damage and put to very respectable damage, especially at level 7. They also break the game in fun ways, like the fact that giant apes can grapple ancient dragons.</p><p></p><p></p><p>Yes, it does?</p><p></p><p>12.5% of swings are converted from a miss into a hit.</p><p></p><p>If each ally swings twice per round, and the fight lasts 3 rounds, and there are 3 allies, this generates:</p><p>.125 * 2 * 3 * 3</p><p>= 2.25 additional hits on average.</p><p></p><p>If your allies have a 60% hit rate, they get 1.2 hits/round. So your cast of bless was 1.88x as good as their action (ok, a bit less because of crits). And it gave a bonus to their saving throws.</p><p></p><p>With a 1st level spell slot and concentration.</p><p></p><p>That means your next 2 actions only need to be 3/4 as good as theirs for your contribution to match theirs.</p><p></p><p>Bless is a cheap way to use your concentration resource. A divine soul sorcerer (for example) should grab it, and burn 1st level slots with it when they don't have better things (see above and below) to use concentration on.</p><p></p><p>Every single example in this answer is giving cases where 1 action + 1 spell slot + concentration swings combat more than the action of a non-spellcaster does (or the action is out of combat). If you can pull off an action that is 2x as good as an ally's actions in a 3 round combat, your remaining actions need only be half as good as theirs to match the total contribution.</p><p></p><p></p><p>True; the poisoned condition just makes a monster useless.</p><p></p><p>The pre-errata version (depending on interpretation) did a better job at making damage output skyrocket. But this version is less broken. Sorry about that.</p><p></p><p>I included spells that shut down single big bad monsters (like ottos) and spells that make hordes useless (like divine word).</p><p></p><p>Which one is more useful depends on what kind of foes you are fighting.</p><p></p><p>Can your vs-AC attackers move foes around? If so, zone spells count</p><p></p><p>It isn't subject to elemental resistance; it removes it.</p><p></p><p>Zone damage.</p><p></p><p>Restrained, no save.</p><p></p><p>Cast tiny servant with a 4th level slot for 3 servants. Cast magic stone, and your bonus action does decent damage.</p><p></p><p>Zone damage.</p><p></p><p>Zone damage.</p><p></p><p>You seem to think I'm suggesting casting all of these in row or soemthing?</p><p></p><p>(a) half damage is still damage.</p><p>(b) did you see magic stone above? They can throw those stones.</p><p>(c) they can do the help action, giving advantage to a weapon user.</p><p></p><p></p><p>It is closer to a 80% damage boost than 25% on someone with GWM or SS.</p><p></p><p>Advantage is a huge, hugely powerful magnifier of damage.</p><p></p><p></p><p>You are welcome, person whose name is a caustic chemical.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="NotAYakk, post: 8113662, member: 72555"] And bard via magical secrets. A cleric hitting things with a stick is doing abysmal damage output, getting increasingly bad as you gain levels. So 3 full caster classes. On a hasted (someone else) level 11 fighter over a single 3 round fight that is 15 swings. It lasts an hour, so could easily last through 3 fights for 40 swings. 40 swings times 2.5 is 100 damage if they hit. So, the proper use of grappling is you grapple your foe, then knock it prone. When enlarged, you can grapple Huge foes. So take a Huge dragon or whatever. Grapple it. Knock it prone. It now has 0 movement, so cannot stand up without escaping, and has disadvantage on all attacks, and any adjacent character has advantage on attacks on it. Any creature that (a) cannot teleport, (b) cannot force movement on the wrestler, and (c) cannot beat the athletics checks of the grappler is basically done for. Usually grapple only works on up to large size foes. Enlarge makes the limit huge. Polymorph giant ape makes it unlimited. So cleric (full caster) and bard (full caster) via magical secrets. 10 attack rounds, on a fighter that is 30-40 attacks, times 1d6, is on the order of 100 damage. A out of combat spell that grants 100 damage isn't a bad use of a slot. It does require concentration; so you will use a [b]better[/b] concentration spell if you have it and have the slots to burn. If your allies have GWM or SS, advantage turns it from marginal to amazing on every single AC range plausible (short of zombies with their 8 AC). And faerie fire is a 20 foot cube, 1st level spell. If you drop it on multiple foes and 1 or 2 fail their save, those two foes get burned down in a blink. Ottos is no save to land. You get 1 full round of enemy suckage. And they have to burn an action to even get a save. Drop it on a dragon, pit fiend, kracken (film at 11), or whatever big bad right after their turn. Your entire team gets a volly of advantage fire. If you are coordinated, you can pull off more than one; allies can ready an attack round for someone's attack after you cast the spell, get that one, then get another when their turn comes around. Done properly, a single cast of Ottos kills a BBEG by magnifying the damage of every attacker in the party. And even if it doesn't, it buys you an entire turn where the enemy sucks. Yes, it isn't 3.5 broken. A 5th level hold person is a 4 target save-or-lose. A 6th level hold monster is a 2 target save-or-lose. Now, before burning a 6th level slot, you could get a bard or cleric to drop a bane on 3-4 targets, fishing for up to 2 failed saves. Then drop hold monster on those two. Once on a target, your weapon users get auto-crits and auto-advantage. This can easily more than double their damage output. So by "caster" you mean "wizards and sorcerers". Note that if you have animate objects running and the bard whispers, they all get another attack as well. If you don't have magic arrows (or magic stones) or the like to animate, half damage is still good on animate objects. Use your words man. I went through a pile of spell lists to find damage boosting spells and it was a waste of time because to you "caster" means "wizard and sorcerers" An AoO from every ally, and they lose their action. And you get 1 target per spell level. So you drop a 4th level slot and 4 enemies get to try to save. Maybe you go grovel if they aren't in a great AOO spam position; now 1 out of 4 is on the floor. Your allies focus-fire it with advantage, and it drops. You burned a 4th level slot to boost your allies damage to a significant degree. I don't think you understand how good auto-advantage is. Let us take a level 11 PAM+GWM fighter using a +2 glaive. We'll make it a champion to keep it easy. They get 4 attacks/round at +4 (prof) +2 (magic) +5 (dex) = +11 to hit. Their damage dice are 3d10+1d4 (21.9 after GWF) and their static damage is 28. Against an AC 18 foe they hit on a 7+ and crit on a 19-20 for 0.7 hits and 0.1 crits per swing. 28*.7 + 21.9*.8 = 37.1 damage per round. Now they get advantage and switch to -5/+10. Their static damage grows to 68. They hit on a 12+ and crit on a 19+, but with advantage this is 70% hit rate 19% crit rate. 21.9*.89 + 68*.7 = 67.1 damage per round. Advantage gave this character +30 damage per round. So even if you cannot pre-buff greater invisibility, your one cast of it contributes 90 damage over the next 3 rounds. Without your greater invisibility, your ally would have done 37.1 * 3 = 111.3 damage With it, they do another 90. If we attribute that damage to you, that means to keep up you need only do 21.3 damage over the next 2 rounds to have matched their contribution to the fight. "Helping a rogue sneak attack" is not the goal. Invisibility is a pre-buff, so it doesn't cost a combat action -- it lasts over an hour. It grants advantage on the first attack of every PC, and makes ambushes easier to do. A 3rd level pre-buff to generate 2 advantage attacks; if they are -5/+10 characters that is a pretty combat-action-efficient no-concentration-in-combat use of a spell slot. Of course, I am talking about massive buffs. They almost all have concentration. Toss polymorph (giant ape) on an ally and they soak 100+ points of damage and put to very respectable damage, especially at level 7. They also break the game in fun ways, like the fact that giant apes can grapple ancient dragons. Yes, it does? 12.5% of swings are converted from a miss into a hit. If each ally swings twice per round, and the fight lasts 3 rounds, and there are 3 allies, this generates: .125 * 2 * 3 * 3 = 2.25 additional hits on average. If your allies have a 60% hit rate, they get 1.2 hits/round. So your cast of bless was 1.88x as good as their action (ok, a bit less because of crits). And it gave a bonus to their saving throws. With a 1st level spell slot and concentration. That means your next 2 actions only need to be 3/4 as good as theirs for your contribution to match theirs. Bless is a cheap way to use your concentration resource. A divine soul sorcerer (for example) should grab it, and burn 1st level slots with it when they don't have better things (see above and below) to use concentration on. Every single example in this answer is giving cases where 1 action + 1 spell slot + concentration swings combat more than the action of a non-spellcaster does (or the action is out of combat). If you can pull off an action that is 2x as good as an ally's actions in a 3 round combat, your remaining actions need only be half as good as theirs to match the total contribution. True; the poisoned condition just makes a monster useless. The pre-errata version (depending on interpretation) did a better job at making damage output skyrocket. But this version is less broken. Sorry about that. I included spells that shut down single big bad monsters (like ottos) and spells that make hordes useless (like divine word). Which one is more useful depends on what kind of foes you are fighting. Can your vs-AC attackers move foes around? If so, zone spells count It isn't subject to elemental resistance; it removes it. Zone damage. Restrained, no save. Cast tiny servant with a 4th level slot for 3 servants. Cast magic stone, and your bonus action does decent damage. Zone damage. Zone damage. You seem to think I'm suggesting casting all of these in row or soemthing? (a) half damage is still damage. (b) did you see magic stone above? They can throw those stones. (c) they can do the help action, giving advantage to a weapon user. It is closer to a 80% damage boost than 25% on someone with GWM or SS. Advantage is a huge, hugely powerful magnifier of damage. You are welcome, person whose name is a caustic chemical. [/QUOTE]
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