Again. No. That does not address the personal element. Some people are not willing to accept the same risks. There are some things they will do when that says 70% chance versus 60% chance for example that a simple spread of numbers cannot acount for that affects DPR.
No matter how much you push for you tools and stuff. This particular detail will never be addressed. WoW used to spend 100's of hours trying to address it with things like timing on using abilities but the math and the human factor never lined up. And that's an example of extreme mathematical effort to try and do so.
We cannot let a factor like a person's aversion to risk, or personal preference, get in the way of dictating something like calculated DPR. I'm gonna use a terrible example, but one I think will highlight what I'm saying: Let's say a distant relative dies, and you inherit their successful casino and all their assets, and it falls to you to keep it running with the given assets. Will losses occur? Yes, but overall, you're going to win cause "the house always win." That conclusion would not change if the inheritor was afraid of losses, and in fact, would keep them from earning more in the long run if they decided to avoid running it.
Likewise, the player who chooses to not power attack due to risk aversion, despite when the math says you should, is simply playing in a sub-optimal manner. Nothing wrong with that, it's okay. It's perfectly fine and okay to be sub-optimal. This is not a competitive game nor is it a high stakes game. Not everyone cares to optimize, and that's okay! But, numbers are numbers and the math doesn't lie. DPR is nothing more than math.
I do want to emphasize, however, that DPR is not everything. Battlefield control and tactics are equally important, if not more. That is something we'd have a much harder time calculating, but has a concrete effect on the outcome of encounters.
We cannot let a factor like a person's aversion to risk, or personal preference, get in the way of dictating something like calculated DPR. I'm gonna use a terrible example, but one I think will highlight what I'm saying: Let's say a distant relative dies, and you inherit their successful casino and all their assets, and it falls to you to keep it running with the given assets. Will losses occur? Yes, but overall, you're going to win cause "the house always win." That conclusion would not change if the inheritor was afraid of losses, and in fact, would keep them from earning more in the long run if they decided to avoid running it.
Likewise, the player who chooses to not power attack due to risk aversion, despite when the math says you should, is simply playing in a sub-optimal manner. Nothing wrong with that, it's okay. It's perfectly fine and okay to be sub-optimal. This is not a competitive game nor is it a high stakes game. Not everyone cares to optimize, and that's okay! But, numbers are numbers and the math doesn't lie. DPR is nothing more than math.
I do want to emphasize, however, that DPR is not everything. Battlefield control and tactics are equally important, if not more. That is something we'd have a much harder time calculating, but has a concrete effect on the outcome of encounters.
I do agree DPR isn't everything but it can be calculated very easily was my only point.
We cannot let a factor like a person's aversion to risk, or personal preference, get in the way of dictating something like calculated DPR. I'm gonna use a terrible example, but one I think will highlight what I'm saying: Let's say a distant relative dies, and you inherit their successful casino and all their assets, and it falls to you to keep it running with the given assets. Will losses occur? Yes, but overall, you're going to win cause "the house always win." That conclusion would not change if the inheritor was afraid of losses, and in fact, would keep them from earning more in the long run if they decided to avoid running it.
Likewise, the player who chooses to not power attack due to risk aversion, despite when the math says you should, is simply playing in a sub-optimal manner. Nothing wrong with that, it's okay. It's perfectly fine and okay to be sub-optimal. This is not a competitive game nor is it a high stakes game. Not everyone cares to optimize, and that's okay! But, numbers are numbers and the math doesn't lie. DPR is nothing more than math.
I do want to emphasize, however, that DPR is not everything. Battlefield control and tactics are equally important, if not more. That is something we'd have a much harder time calculating, but has a concrete effect on the outcome of encounters.
Your Right. it is a terrbile example. Because the Reality is that your Not the Casino Owner that inherited a Casino as an example of using things like GWM.
Your the Gambler walking up to the Slots or sitting down at the card table. Your hoping that you know the variables enough to know exactly what your odds are. But there are Acceptable Odds and unacceptable odds and there are always variables that you can't be certain what they are. Like an Enemies AC. You can make a guess at what it is. But you can't truely be sure. Most People can't remember all the stats and abilities of every possible stat'd NPC at all times (the rpg equivalent of counting cards). We can make rough guesses of what the average is but not always know when when we are facing something that is on the high side or the low side of that Average Or when other Factors might come in and alter things. Your just hoping that you know "The House's" margin enough to mostly come out ahead.
We cannot let a factor like a person's aversion to risk, or personal preference, get in the way of dictating something like calculated DPR. I'm gonna use a terrible example, but one I think will highlight what I'm saying: Let's say a distant relative dies, and you inherit their successful casino and all their assets, and it falls to you to keep it running with the given assets. Will losses occur? Yes, but overall, you're going to win cause "the house always win." That conclusion would not change if the inheritor was afraid of losses, and in fact, would keep them from earning more in the long run if they decided to avoid running it.
Likewise, the player who chooses to not power attack due to risk aversion, despite when the math says you should, is simply playing in a sub-optimal manner. Nothing wrong with that, it's okay. It's perfectly fine and okay to be sub-optimal. This is not a competitive game nor is it a high stakes game. Not everyone cares to optimize, and that's okay! But, numbers are numbers and the math doesn't lie. DPR is nothing more than math.
I do want to emphasize, however, that DPR is not everything. Battlefield control and tactics are equally important, if not more. That is something we'd have a much harder time calculating, but has a concrete effect on the outcome of encounters.
Your the Gambler
You gotta know when to hold them. Know when to fold them. Know when to walk away. Know when to run. You never count your money while you're sitting at the table, there'll be plenty time for countin' when the dealin's done.
Not all characters are choosing, or in a position to to choose, to just do damage all of the time on each turn. The tide of battle can turn and a win can be secured by NOT attacking (and adding to DPR) because the life of an ally or allies was saved. A monk, rogue, barbarian, and fighter might be better served with just attacking outright, but a ranger, cleric, especially a paladin and battle smith artificer, and even some warlocks and sorcerers now, would be doing a disservice to the party and the adventure by not weighing the greater benefit of damage, healing, protection, controlling, and reviving, the rest of the party.
The Internet personalities tell us the baseline at level 20 is 35.4 DPR. A PC focused on dealing damage should do at least that. The great DPR is 53.1. And the excellent DPR is 70.8. That is for sustained average damage per round over a long adventuring day with many (6-8), I’ll be it only medium to hard, combat encounters. I believe it is 8 combats at 4 rounds each between long rests with only 1 short rest. That’s 32 rounds of combat with only 1 short rest.
I feel like guardian of nature (XGtE) doesn’t get enough love for these theory crafting damage discussions. It’s literally bonus action auto advantage with other stuff. You get it at level 13. Doubles for beast masters. Works great with -5/+10 feats. You’d have this 5 times a day at level 20.
The Internet personalities tell us the baseline at level 20 is 35.4 DPR. A PC focused on dealing damage should do at least that. The great DPR is 53.1. And the excellent DPR is 70.8. That is for sustained average damage per round over a long adventuring day with many (6-8), I’ll be it only medium to hard, combat encounters. I believe it is 8 combats at 4 rounds each between long rests with only 1 short rest. That’s 32 rounds of combat with only 1 short rest.
Also remember that at level 20 vs Favored enemies, Foe Slayer makes the Ranger on par with all other Martials (if not more).
Overall you are looking at pretty niche application of damage boost which averages to about 16 points of extra damage and means you get to take no other feats as you need to max WIS and DEX.
You need to be fighting your favored enemy for one and if you take favored foe you can't concentrate on any better spells like Conjure Animals.
The Internet personalities tell us the baseline at level 20 is 35.4 DPR. A PC focused on dealing damage should do at least that. The great DPR is 53.1. And the excellent DPR is 70.8. That is for sustained average damage per round over a long adventuring day with many (6-8), I’ll be it only medium to hard, combat encounters. I believe it is 8 combats at 4 rounds each between long rests with only 1 short rest. That’s 32 rounds of combat with only 1 short rest.
Btw I hate this metric personally. It heavily favors long rest and at will abilities.
The DMG says 6-8 per long with 2 short rests. This means no more than 2-3 encounters per short and 6-8 per long. This is kind of the way the balance is intended to work and I have always felt we should judge things by if they are "working as intended" or not.
This individuals that utilize this metric are pushing long rest abilities to their recommended limits but pushing short rest abilities far beyond the recomendation at 4 per short. This is 100% over the medium cap of 2 and 33% over the top cap of 3.
I have seen an increase in dms trying single class builds as the number of books and subclasses gets released. I also have run into a dm that Adds to the CR/xp budget for every optional rule turned on.
at the very least comparing a 20th level character is a standardized comparison assumption. that is a Hard thing to get with all the math DPR systems. We might even be able to Graph adjusted shortrest Vs long rest classes and find the MEAN intersection points. finding the optimal comparison point for short VS long rest mechanics.
IF we even got an average DPR for 20th level with just the PHB we could have an established baseline for measuring "Optional feature" and "new subclass" power Creep. we might even be able to infer some values for Currently unmeasurable "ribbon features"
The Internet personalities tell us the baseline at level 20 is 35.4 DPR. A PC focused on dealing damage should do at least that. The great DPR is 53.1. And the excellent DPR is 70.8. That is for sustained average damage per round over a long adventuring day with many (6-8), I’ll be it only medium to hard, combat encounters. I believe it is 8 combats at 4 rounds each between long rests with only 1 short rest. That’s 32 rounds of combat with only 1 short rest.
Btw I hate this metric personally. It heavily favors long rest and at will abilities.
The DMG says 6-8 per long with 2 short rests. This means no more than 2-3 encounters per short and 6-8 per long. This is kind of the way the balance is intended to work and I have always felt we should judge things by if they are "working as intended" or not.
This individuals that utilize this metric are pushing long rest abilities to their recommended limits but pushing short rest abilities far beyond the recomendation at 4 per short. This is 100% over the medium cap of 2 and 33% over the top cap of 3.
That might be the case, however usually is done this way due to their own experience and reports by their community of how many short rests they actually get to take. So while it's not correct in terms of how it's intended to be played, it's definitely more correct in terms of what you can expect.
That being said, OP compared things in a completely niche and unrealistic scenario to begin with anyway. Level 20 without multiclass? It's incredibly rare for people to play level 20 characters in the first place and I don't think I've ever actually witnessed a level 20 character without multiclass in 5e myself nor heard of them outside of purely theoretical debates. Assuming every character uses all their resources right away doesn't make much sense when comparing sustained damage output either since there are always things that you can burn through during your first encounter that increase the total DPR but then don't have available for the remaining encounters anymore. That's not what people mean when talking about DPR. Also there should be gimmicky builds with higher DPR available even without multiclassing. Like utilizing Spike Growth with spells/attacks that let you push/drag enemies through it all the time (grappling, crusher, Swarmkeeper, etc), utilizing summons properly or such. OP used extremely generic builds that mostly rely on attacking regularly and that's it.
Having over the course of 35 years achieved level 20 in a campaign 19 times and done so without multiclassing 7 times. I can tell you it exists and is not solely theoretical.
Campaigns that meet in person vs online statistically and historically tend to run longer and fall apart less.
As to "gimmicky builds with higher DPR without multiclassing" I can assure you, those also exist. Though in the instance of this, it is seemingly that you haven't yourself tried to acheive a level 20 character without multiclassing, so mayhaps you never did the full research or looking into how this can be achieved. In your "maybe like spike growth.." random thought, I will point out 5th level ranger spell "wrath of Nature" I will now point out the 3rd level spell "plant growth". I will then encourage you to think about how many trees you can have overgrown and be thick within the 100 ft radius of plant growth that you can then put your 60 foot wrath of nature cube. Magically difficult terrain where 4 feet of movement moves you 1 foot. Beginning of your turns 4d6 slashing damage per failed dex save per tree within 10 feet of targetS (emphasis on plural), the end of each of your turns during the spell a strength save on creature in it of your choice or its restrained, and a bonus action to throw rocks for nonmagical 3d8 damage and knocking prone on failed strength save.
"But you cannot always be in a forest with trees and vines..." Do you have pockets? Are you capable of carrying plants, bamboo, wyrmwood, acorns, seeds, vines, rocks, pebbles, etc?
Everyone likes to focus on "foe slayer" for level 20 rangers when it comes to DPR discussions. a lot of people sleep on their spells, or only look at hunter's mark or arrow related spells.
Again. No. That does not address the personal element. Some people are not willing to accept the same risks. There are some things they will do when that says 70% chance versus 60% chance for example that a simple spread of numbers cannot acount for that affects DPR.
No matter how much you push for you tools and stuff. This particular detail will never be addressed. WoW used to spend 100's of hours trying to address it with things like timing on using abilities but the math and the human factor never lined up. And that's an example of extreme mathematical effort to try and do so.
I mean, I get what you're saying.
But
We cannot let a factor like a person's aversion to risk, or personal preference, get in the way of dictating something like calculated DPR. I'm gonna use a terrible example, but one I think will highlight what I'm saying: Let's say a distant relative dies, and you inherit their successful casino and all their assets, and it falls to you to keep it running with the given assets. Will losses occur? Yes, but overall, you're going to win cause "the house always win." That conclusion would not change if the inheritor was afraid of losses, and in fact, would keep them from earning more in the long run if they decided to avoid running it.
Likewise, the player who chooses to not power attack due to risk aversion, despite when the math says you should, is simply playing in a sub-optimal manner. Nothing wrong with that, it's okay. It's perfectly fine and okay to be sub-optimal. This is not a competitive game nor is it a high stakes game. Not everyone cares to optimize, and that's okay! But, numbers are numbers and the math doesn't lie. DPR is nothing more than math.
I do want to emphasize, however, that DPR is not everything. Battlefield control and tactics are equally important, if not more. That is something we'd have a much harder time calculating, but has a concrete effect on the outcome of encounters.
I do agree DPR isn't everything but it can be calculated very easily was my only point.
Here are a couple of great videos I think everyone here should watch and would enjoy.
https://youtu.be/tTiRbko-o9Y
https://youtu.be/qnKc64ADYf8
Your Right. it is a terrbile example. Because the Reality is that your Not the Casino Owner that inherited a Casino as an example of using things like GWM.
Your the Gambler walking up to the Slots or sitting down at the card table. Your hoping that you know the variables enough to know exactly what your odds are. But there are Acceptable Odds and unacceptable odds and there are always variables that you can't be certain what they are. Like an Enemies AC. You can make a guess at what it is. But you can't truely be sure. Most People can't remember all the stats and abilities of every possible stat'd NPC at all times (the rpg equivalent of counting cards). We can make rough guesses of what the average is but not always know when when we are facing something that is on the high side or the low side of that Average Or when other Factors might come in and alter things. Your just hoping that you know "The House's" margin enough to mostly come out ahead.
You gotta know when to hold them. Know when to fold them. Know when to walk away. Know when to run. You never count your money while you're sitting at the table, there'll be plenty time for countin' when the dealin's done.
Not all characters are choosing, or in a position to to choose, to just do damage all of the time on each turn. The tide of battle can turn and a win can be secured by NOT attacking (and adding to DPR) because the life of an ally or allies was saved. A monk, rogue, barbarian, and fighter might be better served with just attacking outright, but a ranger, cleric, especially a paladin and battle smith artificer, and even some warlocks and sorcerers now, would be doing a disservice to the party and the adventure by not weighing the greater benefit of damage, healing, protection, controlling, and reviving, the rest of the party.
Wow. Has it really been that long since this thread saw a comment?
At any rate, I saw some of y'all were running damage calcs on this post and I figured this would be a better place for that.
Use it or not, that's entirely up to you.
Thanks for re-pointing this out I will enjoy reviewing the concepts.
The Internet personalities tell us the baseline at level 20 is 35.4 DPR. A PC focused on dealing damage should do at least that. The great DPR is 53.1. And the excellent DPR is 70.8. That is for sustained average damage per round over a long adventuring day with many (6-8), I’ll be it only medium to hard, combat encounters. I believe it is 8 combats at 4 rounds each between long rests with only 1 short rest. That’s 32 rounds of combat with only 1 short rest.
I feel like guardian of nature (XGtE) doesn’t get enough love for these theory crafting damage discussions. It’s literally bonus action auto advantage with other stuff. You get it at level 13. Doubles for beast masters. Works great with -5/+10 feats. You’d have this 5 times a day at level 20.
I agree. Guardian of Nature is a fantastic tool for Rangers when it comes to supplementing their DPR.
Also remember that at level 20 vs Favored enemies, Foe Slayer makes the Ranger on par with all other Martials (if not more).
This thread isreally helpful, much thanks!
BoringBard's long and tedious posts somehow manage to enrapture audiences. How? Because he used Charm Person, the #1 bard spell!
He/him pronouns. Call me Bard. PROUD NERD!
Ever wanted to talk about your parties' worst mistakes? Do so HERE. What's your favorite class, why? Share & explain
HERE.For an alternative take read the responses to this when it's posted in another forum:
https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?612195-Foe-Slayer-Damage-Calculation-Spreadsheet/page2
Overall you are looking at pretty niche application of damage boost which averages to about 16 points of extra damage and means you get to take no other feats as you need to max WIS and DEX.
You need to be fighting your favored enemy for one and if you take favored foe you can't concentrate on any better spells like Conjure Animals.
So grain of salt for sure.
Overall it's ok.... It's not great but it's good.
Btw I hate this metric personally. It heavily favors long rest and at will abilities.
The DMG says 6-8 per long with 2 short rests. This means no more than 2-3 encounters per short and 6-8 per long. This is kind of the way the balance is intended to work and I have always felt we should judge things by if they are "working as intended" or not.
This individuals that utilize this metric are pushing long rest abilities to their recommended limits but pushing short rest abilities far beyond the recomendation at 4 per short. This is 100% over the medium cap of 2 and 33% over the top cap of 3.
I have seen an increase in dms trying single class builds as the number of books and subclasses gets released. I also have run into a dm that Adds to the CR/xp budget for every optional rule turned on.
at the very least comparing a 20th level character is a standardized comparison assumption. that is a Hard thing to get with all the math DPR systems. We might even be able to Graph adjusted shortrest Vs long rest classes and find the MEAN intersection points. finding the optimal comparison point for short VS long rest mechanics.
IF we even got an average DPR for 20th level with just the PHB we could have an established baseline for measuring "Optional feature" and "new subclass" power Creep. we might even be able to infer some values for Currently unmeasurable "ribbon features"
Having over the course of 35 years achieved level 20 in a campaign 19 times and done so without multiclassing 7 times. I can tell you it exists and is not solely theoretical.
Campaigns that meet in person vs online statistically and historically tend to run longer and fall apart less.
As to "gimmicky builds with higher DPR without multiclassing" I can assure you, those also exist. Though in the instance of this, it is seemingly that you haven't yourself tried to acheive a level 20 character without multiclassing, so mayhaps you never did the full research or looking into how this can be achieved. In your "maybe like spike growth.." random thought, I will point out 5th level ranger spell "wrath of Nature" I will now point out the 3rd level spell "plant growth". I will then encourage you to think about how many trees you can have overgrown and be thick within the 100 ft radius of plant growth that you can then put your 60 foot wrath of nature cube. Magically difficult terrain where 4 feet of movement moves you 1 foot. Beginning of your turns 4d6 slashing damage per failed dex save per tree within 10 feet of targetS (emphasis on plural), the end of each of your turns during the spell a strength save on creature in it of your choice or its restrained, and a bonus action to throw rocks for nonmagical 3d8 damage and knocking prone on failed strength save.
"But you cannot always be in a forest with trees and vines..." Do you have pockets? Are you capable of carrying plants, bamboo, wyrmwood, acorns, seeds, vines, rocks, pebbles, etc?
Everyone likes to focus on "foe slayer" for level 20 rangers when it comes to DPR discussions. a lot of people sleep on their spells, or only look at hunter's mark or arrow related spells.
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