There are several GWM calculators over there. IIRC conventional lore says that GWM starts getting risky against AC 15+ creatures. Of course Advantage, Precision Attack and other ways to mitigate -5 can be considered as well.
IMHO, however, I believe the main benefit of a Glaive is the 10 ft reach. This is particularly useful if paired with Sentinel (classic combo) and I personally find this combination more powerful than GWM.
Yesterday at my table, we fought against a Balor. These fiends have a nasty ability called Fire Aura. Basically every time that you touch or hit him at melee range (5 ft), you take 3d6 fire damage automatically (there’s not even a save!). Our PAM Sentinel Fighter holding a Glaive attacked him without any issues. At least in my campaigns, 10 ft reach is always a very good competitive edge.
It’s also going to depend on party composition. If you’re the main tank, you’ll want that shield. If you’re mostly the single target dpr, then the glaive gets more interesting. And as DJ said, the reach is an important factor. Couple that with sentinel, and go cavalier and you can lock down a large chunk of the battlefield, which is useful no matter your role.
It really depends on what you're going after. Assuming you've already worked out your character's roleplaying aesthetics and just want some additional thoughts on optimization or thinking about future possibilities...
Glaives have reach. They are also better on critical hits (especially if you are a half-orc or a barbarian to get additional critical hit dice, or for a champion fighter that will crit more often). Feats like Polearm Master + Sentinel are great because they can stop a enemy in its tracks 10' away if you can hit with your opportunity attack--assuming that the enemy doesn't have reach itself, you can effectively prevent it from attacking if you are out of range.
Spears allow you to use a shield... and a +2 to AC is really quite strong. Polearm Master of course works great with a spear (just not at 10' reach, but it is still great). You can also use the Shield Master feat to deliver a push attack on your first attack if you want to knock an enemy prone and deliver the rest of your attacks at advantage. There are some other mean tricks which will help with this, such as taking proficiency in Athletics--or even better somehow getting Expertise with it (e.g. if you multiclass a level of Rogue, pick up a feat that gives you expertise, etc.) so you add double your proficiency bonus.
Using a Glaive can help you with having a free hand to cast spells, throw a weapon, etc., though this is usually not that much of a consideration depending on if you can just drop your spear, cast a spell, then pick it back up. Spears are also simple weapons (count as monk weapons). It is also easier to work some combos with the Spear, such as the polearm master + warcaster feat to deliver Booming Blade opportunity attacks... if you were using a Glaive you would have to get Polearm Master + Warcaster + Spell Sniper to use it at 10', but with a spear you just need Polearm Master + Warcaster and the ability to cast Booming Blade. These are relatively esoteric considerations for specific builds.
Both options are probably going to be pretty fun, honestly. Can't go wrong, it's more of a decision of emphasis.
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I am looking at the numbers comparing Spear to Glaive.
Glaive with Polearm Master and Great Weapon fighting compared to Spear and Shield with Polearm Master and Dueling.
It terms of average damage at level 5 with 18 strength considering 2 Attack and 1 Bonus Attack and assuming all attacks hit.
Glaive does average damage per turn of 26.4
Spear does average damage per turn of 27.5
Great Weapon Master changes this adding a potential +10 to damage for the Glaive (edit - per attack at -5 to hit).
The question is how situational is Great Weapon Master.
How often is Great Weapon Master useful and is it worth the opportunity Cost of not using a shield.
There are several GWM calculators over there. IIRC conventional lore says that GWM starts getting risky against AC 15+ creatures. Of course Advantage, Precision Attack and other ways to mitigate -5 can be considered as well.
IMHO, however, I believe the main benefit of a Glaive is the 10 ft reach. This is particularly useful if paired with Sentinel (classic combo) and I personally find this combination more powerful than GWM.
Yesterday at my table, we fought against a Balor. These fiends have a nasty ability called Fire Aura. Basically every time that you touch or hit him at melee range (5 ft), you take 3d6 fire damage automatically (there’s not even a save!). Our PAM Sentinel Fighter holding a Glaive attacked him without any issues. At least in my campaigns, 10 ft reach is always a very good competitive edge.
It’s also going to depend on party composition. If you’re the main tank, you’ll want that shield. If you’re mostly the single target dpr, then the glaive gets more interesting.
And as DJ said, the reach is an important factor. Couple that with sentinel, and go cavalier and you can lock down a large chunk of the battlefield, which is useful no matter your role.
It really depends on what you're going after. Assuming you've already worked out your character's roleplaying aesthetics and just want some additional thoughts on optimization or thinking about future possibilities...
Glaives have reach. They are also better on critical hits (especially if you are a half-orc or a barbarian to get additional critical hit dice, or for a champion fighter that will crit more often). Feats like Polearm Master + Sentinel are great because they can stop a enemy in its tracks 10' away if you can hit with your opportunity attack--assuming that the enemy doesn't have reach itself, you can effectively prevent it from attacking if you are out of range.
Spears allow you to use a shield... and a +2 to AC is really quite strong. Polearm Master of course works great with a spear (just not at 10' reach, but it is still great). You can also use the Shield Master feat to deliver a push attack on your first attack if you want to knock an enemy prone and deliver the rest of your attacks at advantage. There are some other mean tricks which will help with this, such as taking proficiency in Athletics--or even better somehow getting Expertise with it (e.g. if you multiclass a level of Rogue, pick up a feat that gives you expertise, etc.) so you add double your proficiency bonus.
Using a Glaive can help you with having a free hand to cast spells, throw a weapon, etc., though this is usually not that much of a consideration depending on if you can just drop your spear, cast a spell, then pick it back up. Spears are also simple weapons (count as monk weapons). It is also easier to work some combos with the Spear, such as the polearm master + warcaster feat to deliver Booming Blade opportunity attacks... if you were using a Glaive you would have to get Polearm Master + Warcaster + Spell Sniper to use it at 10', but with a spear you just need Polearm Master + Warcaster and the ability to cast Booming Blade. These are relatively esoteric considerations for specific builds.
Both options are probably going to be pretty fun, honestly. Can't go wrong, it's more of a decision of emphasis.