I've had an idea and it's pretty cool, it's no where near sorcadin levels but I'm gonna try it soon since I haven't seen any discussion on it.
The build is a grave cleric + battle master fighter and it entirely revolves around the channel divinity of the grave cleric which gives vunerability to the next attack.
You go 5+fighter/3-4 cleric.
Against humanoids you can use hold person for 100% Crit chance. You confirm the hold person then you action surge your channel divinity. Next turn you attack using great weapon master, menacing attack, feinting attack(bonus action), trip attack on second attack and with whatever heavy d12 weapon that floats your boat.
Assuming we are a half orc with 18 strength that should be 1d12 + 2d8 + 14 + (1d12 from savage attack) and another attack that's not effected by the vunerability which is 1d12 + 1d8 + 14 + 1d12 (savage attack)
As I believe you double the dice damage, add the flat number then double it again with vunerability.
This should come out to an average of
103 damage on the first hit and 42.5 on the second.
For a total of 145.5 points of non resistable damage coming from a level 7 charecter.
Cool thing is that this all minus the spells recharge on short rests.
You get the utility of a cleric and armour, weapons and other fighter shenanigans.
Against humanoids you can use hold person for 100% Crit chance. You confirm the hold person then you action surge your channel divinity. Next turn you attack using great weapon master, menacing attack, feinting attack(bonus action), trip attack on second attack and with whatever heavy d12 weapon that floats your boat.
The rules could've worded this more clearly but the intent is you can't have two maneuvers associated with 1 attack; you're not supposed to be able to use another maneuver on an attack that's already benefiting from Feinting Attack.
Also, this requires that no one else hit the enemy until your next turn, which is risky because the target gets a save against Hold Person every turn and could end the spell before your next turn.
For a total of 145.5 points of non resistable damage coming from a level 7 charecter.
Vulnerability doesn't negate resistance or immunity.
If you want big damage on Path to the Grave, get a Hexblade 11/Paladin 2 friend with Pact of the Blade. They can use all three 5th level slots on Banishing Smite (5d10 force), Eldritch Smite (6d8 force) and Divine Smite (5d8 radiant, 6d8 against fiends/undead), plus some extra damage from Hexblade's Curse and Improved Pact Weapon. For 1 more Paladin level they can also get Vow of Enmity from Oath of Vengeance, which'll give them advantage; if they also happen to have Elven Accuracy, rolling 3 dice with a 19-20 crit range gives them 27% chance of scoring a crit.
If you want big damage on Path to the Grave, get a Hexblade 11/Paladin 2 friend with Pact of the Blade. They can use all three 5th level slots on Banishing Smite (5d10 force), Eldritch Smite (6d8 force) and Divine Smite (5d8 radiant, 6d8 against fiends/undead), plus some extra damage from Hexblade's Curse and Improved Pact Weapon. For 1 more Paladin level they can also get Vow of Enmity from Oath of Vengeance, which'll give them advantage; if they also happen to have Elven Accuracy, rolling 3 dice with a 19-20 crit range gives them 27% chance of scoring a crit.
Wow, that's amazing! I've learned a lot just from checking your builds against the books!
I like the idea of improving quarterstaff/longsword results with Great Weapon Fighting from the fighter dip. I'm not about to try requiring averages with it, but it would certainly help. I did consider Hunter's Mark, but that only applies to weapon attacks, and as I currently understand the rules, monks' fists don't officially count as weapons (if they did, I'd be all over a monk/paladin multiclass!).
As for the WotFE, yes, those non-spell disciplines are great for nova while retaining the simplicity of the build. I hadn't thought of the possibility of a monk spending all their ki for, say, 21d10 damage by itself at level 20. The thing is that hex would only add a single d6 to that. But if you dipped 2 of your levels in fighter instead, you'd still get to use Action Surge to attack (allowing you to hold a ki point and activate Flurry of Blows), and you'd get more damage and better utilize hex: 24d10 + 5d6 + (4 x DEX), average 169.5 with 20 DEX and blowing the average for meteor swarm out of the water. It does require maxed DEX and WIS to pull off effectively, though.
I haven't actually explored the paladin in depth, so reading your breakdown of the potential of smites led me to look it up, and wow. It looks like for 3 spell slots you can actually stack the Divine Smite feature on Banishing Smite and do an Extra Attack with Divine Smite. Am I reading this wrong? Just with a straight level 20 paladin build and Great Weapon Mastery (with Devotion subclass's Sacred Weapon to offset the attack roll, and Holy Nimbus at work as well), that could be as much as 7d10 + 30 + 12d8 + (2 x STR), average 132.5 with 20 STR, completely ignoring the potential for hex, Action Surge, or Hunter's Mark, and with more spell slots to burn. I'm not going to try to build that today...
Your idea of multiclassing into 4 Warlock & 4 Sorcerer was amazing too! A quickened Eldritch Blast with Agonizing Blast invocation as a bonus action...since it's a cantrip, it works with melee attacks, and you can smite with any of the extra slots! That's quite an incredible combo...
I guess the strength of my Frankenstein build was that it ran off of maxed DEX only and left ki open to use on other things, but I didn't build with those limitations in mind. There was a lot I hadn't realized, particularly about the WotFE non-spell disciplines, paladins in general, and the synergy of partial and full casters! I still think that monk + Flurry of Blows + hex + Action Surge is a really strong combo at a wide range of levels, but I have many new things to consider. Thanks!
An Unarmed Strike absolutely counts as a Melee Weapon Attack. But your fists do not count as weapons. The difference being an Attack is always either a Weapon Attack or a Spell Attack. Features that apply to Weapon Attacks, like Smite. Can absolutely apply to an Unarmed Strike. Features that apply to Weapons, like the spell Magic Weapon can not be applied to fists. Weapons are objects and can be the target of a wide variety of spells like Light or Catapult. Fists are part of a creature and can be the target of a different variety of spells (along with the rest of the creature), like Bless or Bane.
An errata to the PHB clarified: "Melee Attacks (p. 195). The rule on unarmed strikes should read as follows: “Instead of using a weapon to make a melee weapon attack, you can use an unarmed strike: a punch, kick, head-butt, or similar forceful blow (none of which count as weapons). On a hit, an unarmed strike deals bludgeoning damage equal to 1 + your Strength modifier. You are proficient with your unarmed strikes.”
Unfortunately that's still not all that clear until you read it 6 times...
The Frankenstein Build is more versatile than some others. Particularly WotFE. The idea of using all of my resources to barely keep up with other builds for one round of combat is frankly unappealing. WotFE has that one huge downfall in all of its features costing so much ki.
It's important to note an ability like Fist of Unbroken Air does not improve with Hex or any feature that requires you to hit with an Attack. The word Attack is narrowly defined by the rules, to not include offensive spells and abilities that don't include an Attack Roll.
The trouble you'll encounter with a Smiting Monk is spell slots. A 5th level spell slot isn't available to a Paladin until level-17! The Monk levels won't add any spell slots. Likewise the monk features need ki and your pool will be very limited without levels. Just the same, you only need 2 levels to use Flurry of Blows twice per short rest.
You could probably beat out Quickened Agonizing Blast with a Flurry of Smites, if you have the spell slots for it. What I like about Quickened Agonizing Blast, is it doesn't require much in the way of resources. You can recover your 4 expended Sorcery Points from Pact Magic on a short rest. This pairs better with a Ranged Weapon than it does with Smite in reality. Earlier in the thread I mentioned Archy the Archer. Combining the EB with Fighter Eldritch Knight 12 for Extra Attack (2), allowing for three Attacks per Action, with Action Surge, and EB totalling 10 attacks (and 10 hexes).
Of Course in Reality with many options available it wouldn't likely come off that way, you may want another source for your concentration, or you may cast another spell... You might Quicken a Level-5 Scorching Ray instead, or Darkness ... Or you might Dash and cast Expeditious Retreat to escape your DM's wrath...
A magic weapon quickly fixes the resistance issue.
We are comparing a level 8 (7 if i drop it to 2 cleric and let someone else use hold person/monster) PC vs. a level 13 PC
Assuming no crits and I hit; just path to the grave, action surge, 2 attacks, 2 manuver dice and GWM I'm still doing 1d12 + 1d8 + 14 X2 plus another attack which evens out to about 85 damage in one round.
I could just create a 17 open hand monk and 2 divination wizard and just force a creature to fail its quivering palm save and one shot anything that's out of legendary resistances.
Really! That changes things...with an 11 Kensei Monk/4 Paladin/6 Sorcerer and the MI (warlock) feat, you could potentially Divine Smite twice at max 5d8 and twice at 4d8 for great damage. With longsword, using Sharpen the Blade for 3 ki points (and hex of course), that would be 2d10 + 21d8 + 4d6 + 6 + (4 x DEX), average 145.5 with more for the next turn. You could do all sorts of things with that already, but replace 2 levels of paladin with fighter and you'll net a ton more from Action Surge! Action Surge would allow that fusion of WotFE nova with the paladin smite damage...I'll have to calculate that later! This build would be MAD though, maxed in DEX and CHA and 13+ in WIS and STR. A smiting monk is a terrifying thought...
*Note*: edited to omit Devotion paladin subclass. I checked the Channel Divinity feature and it improves the attack roll, not the damage dealt.
A magic weapon quickly fixes the resistance issue.
In most cases, yeah. It is possible for a monster to have resistance to piercing, slashing or bludgeoning damage with no caveats for magical attacks. Like a Treant.
We are comparing a level 8 (7 if i drop it to 2 cleric and let someone else use hold person/monster) PC vs. a level 13 PC
I get that, but requiring 2 failed saves in a row and that no one else attack the monster between your turns still makes it pretty impractical.
I like the Hold Person/Monster builds in theory. But I always try to treat the theory with a bit of practicality. So we're looking at a Cleric Grave/Fighter Battle Master. Channel divinity to double your damage is Practical and effective. You use your maneuvers to increase damage dice and get some secondary benefits. It's definately solid.
There's a couple of problems with the presentation though, if you want to compare to other builds. If one build does 3 attacks and calculates the average damage if all hit and notes that it also has advantage in most scenarios. Its good. You've got the numeric result and side benefits, but if the average damage calculation has assumptions outside of the assumed hits or assumed failed saves *against the damage* It complicates things. Its difficult to really compare with other results.
So don't assume humanoids, and don't assume the enemy starts the round paralyzed. Then lay out the damage and add plus if its a humanoid I can cast Hold Person on the first round and get guaranteed criticals after.
Otherwise the result is "Well, lots of characters can cast Hold Person. Shall they all assume their target is paralyzed?" Rather than letting them be incomparable just drop that one assumed spell and see where it goes:
8d6+4d8+16=62 when you use action surge. On top of that if you Paralyze an Enemy with Hold Person you gain advantage and guaranteed crits, add in GWM for 16d6+8d8+56=148 at Level-7! That'll give a 20 ki FoUA a run for its money. Or the better comparison 7 ki for 8d10=44.
I'm going to propose the FoUA as our unit of measure. The Grave Robber hits for up to 1.4 FoUAs at level-7 but possibly up to 3.36 in the right conditions
Sorcerer 9, Congratulations, you can cast 5th-level spells, which is different from casting spells at 5th level.
Sorc 9/Paladin 6, you got Extra Attack and Smite; you also took the Dueling Style, but you stuck around for one more level to pick up another spellcaster level (12) and you got that sweet Aura of Protection everyone's talking about.
Sorc 9/Pally 6/Fighter 2, you can Act twice! But only once.
Sorc 9/Pally 6/Fight 2/Monk 2 you are no longer allowed to use any of your equipment, remember back when you were a Sorcerer? Well here's your stick. Flurry of Blows twice between rests.
One left. Warlock? Maybe. Barbarian? That's dumb. Rogue? Meh... Druid!
You make 6 attacks and use 3 4th-level slots, 2 5th-level slots and your 6th to roll over them with max damage Divine Smites. You pre-buffed with Divine Favor and did...
34d8+8d4+42=215 or 1.86 FoUA
Now with this set up you don't need all those Paladin levels. Or is it the Sorc levels? Well you can drop a single level from one of Druid, Paladin, or Sorcerer to take Warlock just for Hex and that regenerating level-1 spell slot. Go ahead, sell your soul. Your thinking "Hex is a d6 and Divine Favor is a d4." Or Hex lasts 24 hours! Well lets split hairs, or lets not.
With Shillelagh a staff is a 1 hand d8 Monk Weapon, so is a Yklwa for that matter, but that thing's dumb. You can get the +2 Dueling Style and keep the d8. Really I just don't want to spend every single high level spell slot on one round. With one additional spellcaster level you you get an extra 5 and 4 and a 7 to boot. Shillelaghs are better than Yklwas because sometimes they are a Staff of Power or something.
Also note: You can cast Hold Person at Sorc 3 to guarantee criticals for you and your allies.
I've had an idea and it's pretty cool, it's no where near sorcadin levels but I'm gonna try it soon since I haven't seen any discussion on it.
The build is a grave cleric + battle master fighter and it entirely revolves around the channel divinity of the grave cleric which gives vunerability to the next attack.
You go 5+fighter/3-4 cleric.
Against humanoids you can use hold person for 100% Crit chance. You confirm the hold person then you action surge your channel divinity. Next turn you attack using great weapon master, menacing attack, feinting attack(bonus action), trip attack on second attack and with whatever heavy d12 weapon that floats your boat.
Assuming we are a half orc with 18 strength that should be 1d12 + 2d8 + 14 + (1d12 from savage attack) and another attack that's not effected by the vunerability which is 1d12 + 1d8 + 14 + 1d12 (savage attack)
As I believe you double the dice damage, add the flat number then double it again with vunerability.
This should come out to an average of
103 damage on the first hit and 42.5 on the second.
For a total of 145.5 points of non resistable damage coming from a level 7 charecter.
Cool thing is that this all minus the spells recharge on short rests.
You get the utility of a cleric and armour, weapons and other fighter shenanigans.
It's not perfect but it's a hella cool finisher.
Whoops double post
The rules could've worded this more clearly but the intent is you can't have two maneuvers associated with 1 attack; you're not supposed to be able to use another maneuver on an attack that's already benefiting from Feinting Attack.
Also, this requires that no one else hit the enemy until your next turn, which is risky because the target gets a save against Hold Person every turn and could end the spell before your next turn.
Vulnerability doesn't negate resistance or immunity.
If you want big damage on Path to the Grave, get a Hexblade 11/Paladin 2 friend with Pact of the Blade. They can use all three 5th level slots on Banishing Smite (5d10 force), Eldritch Smite (6d8 force) and Divine Smite (5d8 radiant, 6d8 against fiends/undead), plus some extra damage from Hexblade's Curse and Improved Pact Weapon. For 1 more Paladin level they can also get Vow of Enmity from Oath of Vengeance, which'll give them advantage; if they also happen to have Elven Accuracy, rolling 3 dice with a 19-20 crit range gives them 27% chance of scoring a crit.
This is...scary. Now I must try to build this lol
Wow, that's amazing! I've learned a lot just from checking your builds against the books!
I like the idea of improving quarterstaff/longsword results with Great Weapon Fighting from the fighter dip. I'm not about to try requiring averages with it, but it would certainly help. I did consider Hunter's Mark, but that only applies to weapon attacks, and as I currently understand the rules, monks' fists don't officially count as weapons (if they did, I'd be all over a monk/paladin multiclass!).
As for the WotFE, yes, those non-spell disciplines are great for nova while retaining the simplicity of the build. I hadn't thought of the possibility of a monk spending all their ki for, say, 21d10 damage by itself at level 20. The thing is that hex would only add a single d6 to that. But if you dipped 2 of your levels in fighter instead, you'd still get to use Action Surge to attack (allowing you to hold a ki point and activate Flurry of Blows), and you'd get more damage and better utilize hex: 24d10 + 5d6 + (4 x DEX), average 169.5 with 20 DEX and blowing the average for meteor swarm out of the water. It does require maxed DEX and WIS to pull off effectively, though.
I haven't actually explored the paladin in depth, so reading your breakdown of the potential of smites led me to look it up, and wow. It looks like for 3 spell slots you can actually stack the Divine Smite feature on Banishing Smite and do an Extra Attack with Divine Smite. Am I reading this wrong? Just with a straight level 20 paladin build and Great Weapon Mastery (with Devotion subclass's Sacred Weapon to offset the attack roll, and Holy Nimbus at work as well), that could be as much as 7d10 + 30 + 12d8 + (2 x STR), average 132.5 with 20 STR, completely ignoring the potential for hex, Action Surge, or Hunter's Mark, and with more spell slots to burn. I'm not going to try to build that today...
Your idea of multiclassing into 4 Warlock & 4 Sorcerer was amazing too! A quickened Eldritch Blast with Agonizing Blast invocation as a bonus action...since it's a cantrip, it works with melee attacks, and you can smite with any of the extra slots! That's quite an incredible combo...
I guess the strength of my Frankenstein build was that it ran off of maxed DEX only and left ki open to use on other things, but I didn't build with those limitations in mind. There was a lot I hadn't realized, particularly about the WotFE non-spell disciplines, paladins in general, and the synergy of partial and full casters! I still think that monk + Flurry of Blows + hex + Action Surge is a really strong combo at a wide range of levels, but I have many new things to consider. Thanks!
An Unarmed Strike absolutely counts as a Melee Weapon Attack. But your fists do not count as weapons. The difference being an Attack is always either a Weapon Attack or a Spell Attack. Features that apply to Weapon Attacks, like Smite. Can absolutely apply to an Unarmed Strike. Features that apply to Weapons, like the spell Magic Weapon can not be applied to fists. Weapons are objects and can be the target of a wide variety of spells like Light or Catapult. Fists are part of a creature and can be the target of a different variety of spells (along with the rest of the creature), like Bless or Bane.
An errata to the PHB clarified: "Melee Attacks (p. 195). The rule on unarmed strikes should read as follows: “Instead of using a weapon to make a melee weapon attack, you can use an unarmed strike: a punch, kick, head-butt, or similar forceful blow (none of which count as weapons). On a hit, an unarmed strike deals bludgeoning damage equal to 1 + your Strength modifier. You are proficient with your unarmed strikes.”
Unfortunately that's still not all that clear until you read it 6 times...
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The Frankenstein Build is more versatile than some others. Particularly WotFE. The idea of using all of my resources to barely keep up with other builds for one round of combat is frankly unappealing. WotFE has that one huge downfall in all of its features costing so much ki.
It's important to note an ability like Fist of Unbroken Air does not improve with Hex or any feature that requires you to hit with an Attack. The word Attack is narrowly defined by the rules, to not include offensive spells and abilities that don't include an Attack Roll.
The trouble you'll encounter with a Smiting Monk is spell slots. A 5th level spell slot isn't available to a Paladin until level-17! The Monk levels won't add any spell slots. Likewise the monk features need ki and your pool will be very limited without levels. Just the same, you only need 2 levels to use Flurry of Blows twice per short rest.
You could probably beat out Quickened Agonizing Blast with a Flurry of Smites, if you have the spell slots for it. What I like about Quickened Agonizing Blast, is it doesn't require much in the way of resources. You can recover your 4 expended Sorcery Points from Pact Magic on a short rest. This pairs better with a Ranged Weapon than it does with Smite in reality. Earlier in the thread I mentioned Archy the Archer. Combining the EB with Fighter Eldritch Knight 12 for Extra Attack (2), allowing for three Attacks per Action, with Action Surge, and EB totalling 10 attacks (and 10 hexes).
Of Course in Reality with many options available it wouldn't likely come off that way, you may want another source for your concentration, or you may cast another spell... You might Quicken a Level-5 Scorching Ray instead, or Darkness ... Or you might Dash and cast Expeditious Retreat to escape your DM's wrath...
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A magic weapon quickly fixes the resistance issue.
We are comparing a level 8 (7 if i drop it to 2 cleric and let someone else use hold person/monster) PC vs. a level 13 PC
Assuming no crits and I hit; just path to the grave, action surge, 2 attacks, 2 manuver dice and GWM I'm still doing 1d12 + 1d8 + 14 X2 plus another attack which evens out to about 85 damage in one round.
I could just create a 17 open hand monk and 2 divination wizard and just force a creature to fail its quivering palm save and one shot anything that's out of legendary resistances.
Really! That changes things...with an 11 Kensei Monk/4 Paladin/6 Sorcerer and the MI (warlock) feat, you could potentially Divine Smite twice at max 5d8 and twice at 4d8 for great damage. With longsword, using Sharpen the Blade for 3 ki points (and hex of course), that would be 2d10 + 21d8 + 4d6 + 6 + (4 x DEX), average 145.5 with more for the next turn. You could do all sorts of things with that already, but replace 2 levels of paladin with fighter and you'll net a ton more from Action Surge! Action Surge would allow that fusion of WotFE nova with the paladin smite damage...I'll have to calculate that later! This build would be MAD though, maxed in DEX and CHA and 13+ in WIS and STR. A smiting monk is a terrifying thought...
*Note*: edited to omit Devotion paladin subclass. I checked the Channel Divinity feature and it improves the attack roll, not the damage dealt.
In most cases, yeah. It is possible for a monster to have resistance to piercing, slashing or bludgeoning damage with no caveats for magical attacks. Like a Treant.
I get that, but requiring 2 failed saves in a row and that no one else attack the monster between your turns still makes it pretty impractical.
You can't Hold Person a Treant silly.
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There is no saves on the second post other than menacing attack which still deals damage and this all happens in one turn assuming I use action surge.
I like the Hold Person/Monster builds in theory. But I always try to treat the theory with a bit of practicality. So we're looking at a Cleric Grave/Fighter Battle Master. Channel divinity to double your damage is Practical and effective. You use your maneuvers to increase damage dice and get some secondary benefits. It's definately solid.
There's a couple of problems with the presentation though, if you want to compare to other builds. If one build does 3 attacks and calculates the average damage if all hit and notes that it also has advantage in most scenarios. Its good. You've got the numeric result and side benefits, but if the average damage calculation has assumptions outside of the assumed hits or assumed failed saves *against the damage* It complicates things. Its difficult to really compare with other results.
So don't assume humanoids, and don't assume the enemy starts the round paralyzed. Then lay out the damage and add plus if its a humanoid I can cast Hold Person on the first round and get guaranteed criticals after.
Otherwise the result is "Well, lots of characters can cast Hold Person. Shall they all assume their target is paralyzed?" Rather than letting them be incomparable just drop that one assumed spell and see where it goes:
8d6+4d8+16=62 when you use action surge. On top of that if you Paralyze an Enemy with Hold Person you gain advantage and guaranteed crits, add in GWM for 16d6+8d8+56=148 at Level-7! That'll give a 20 ki FoUA a run for its money. Or the better comparison 7 ki for 8d10=44.
I'm going to propose the FoUA as our unit of measure. The Grave Robber hits for up to 1.4 FoUAs at level-7 but possibly up to 3.36 in the right conditions
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Sorry for the double [triple] post. I'm out in the boonies today.
Also DDB removed the 'Desktop View' button so I can't delete my posts on mobile.
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Pure FoUA can scale directly proportionally with level, so it's silly. One FoUA is 5.5 (1d10) times the level of the character +1.
A level-1 Cleric can Inflict Wounds for [edit: 1.5] FoUA at his level.
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I worded my posts akwardly.
The purpose of my build is to create something can be reasonably powerful throughout an DnD campaign book.
It adds some utility to the fighter and adds a cool finisher that can come packed with cheesy one liners and laughs as I inevitably miss my attacks.
Lol! FoUA = 5.5 x character level. I like it!
Flurry of Smites is in too many classes:
Sorcerer 9, Congratulations, you can cast 5th-level spells, which is different from casting spells at 5th level.
Sorc 9/Paladin 6, you got Extra Attack and Smite; you also took the Dueling Style, but you stuck around for one more level to pick up another spellcaster level (12) and you got that sweet Aura of Protection everyone's talking about.
Sorc 9/Pally 6/Fighter 2, you can Act twice! But only once.
Sorc 9/Pally 6/Fight 2/Monk 2 you are no longer allowed to use any of your equipment, remember back when you were a Sorcerer? Well here's your stick. Flurry of Blows twice between rests.
One left. Warlock? Maybe. Barbarian? That's dumb. Rogue? Meh... Druid!
Sorc 9/Pally 6/Fight 2/Monk 2/Druid 1 now you can cast Healing Word and Shillelagh!
Now Attack! Surge! Smite! Flurry!
You make 6 attacks and use 3 4th-level slots, 2 5th-level slots and your 6th to roll over them with max damage Divine Smites. You pre-buffed with Divine Favor and did...
34d8+8d4+42=215 or 1.86 FoUA
Now with this set up you don't need all those Paladin levels. Or is it the Sorc levels? Well you can drop a single level from one of Druid, Paladin, or Sorcerer to take Warlock just for Hex and that regenerating level-1 spell slot. Go ahead, sell your soul. Your thinking "Hex is a d6 and Divine Favor is a d4." Or Hex lasts 24 hours! Well lets split hairs, or lets not.
With Shillelagh a staff is a 1 hand d8 Monk Weapon, so is a Yklwa for that matter, but that thing's dumb. You can get the +2 Dueling Style and keep the d8. Really I just don't want to spend every single high level spell slot on one round. With one additional spellcaster level you you get an extra 5 and 4 and a 7 to boot. Shillelaghs are better than Yklwas because sometimes they are a Staff of Power or something.
Also note: You can cast Hold Person at Sorc 3 to guarantee criticals for you and your allies.
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Also that calculation isn't right. An FoUA should be 5.5×(level+1) a Inflict Wounds would be 1.5 FoUA which makes me feel more confident in the unit.
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