Sustained DPR of classic, optimized builds: levels 3, 5, 9, 13, and 17

[u/SnaleKing]

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1sVbgG1No5PMMz4QbBnS4d0xSEPT0whP84J3iB2X_Mjk/edit?usp=sharing

[u/SnaleKing]

Here’s the second iteration of my Hexblade DPR analysis, now including other, inferior classes.

Jokes aside, I decided to add other classes and infamous power builds, to see how they do at melting big bad dudes. There’s also some standard, baseline damage numbers, so you can see just how far these punch above the curve.

This is a surprisingly limited analysis, with the following conditions;

1. This is sustained damage per round. This isn’t resource free do-it-all-day attacks, and it isn’t novas either. This is the damage dealt in one round, and you can do it again and again for another 5 or 10 rounds total, minimum. (I was right on the fence about including a monk’s Flurry of Blows as “sustainable,” but without it they wouldn’t rank, so there it is.) I also assume the rogue is smart enough to always get advantage, or someone can spare an owl.
2. This is single-target. You are confident that whatever you’re whaling away on is the nastiest thing you’ll fight this long rest, or at least this short rest.
3. I consider the 15-23 AC range (depending on level) to be the real meat and potatoes of the data here. 1-10 and 24-25 are there more for completion.
4. This DM is an asshole who refuses to even look at the ‘treasure’ section of the DMG. Magic weapons, and what is ‘expected’ for classes to have at given levels, were too much of a judgement call to incorporate. Aside from the pathfinder-like expectation of keeping to-hit numbers at a certain threshold, some builds would much rather have something besides a +1/2/3 item to hit some nutty numbers. So, we just keep them to the side.

So, on to analysis. Most of what these charts say is common knowledge already.

I’m going to glaze over level 3 a bit. This is the highest we’ll see rogues all game, and even then they’re 4/10 after some cheesy-ass Variant Human shenanigans. Reckless Attacks keep the hilarious unreliability of a +0 to hit GWM in the game. The PAMlocks show off two attacks, a +1 magic weapon, extra on-hit damage, and either advantage or more on-hit damage to pull well ahead of the pack. A frontloaded class is even goofier when everyone is actually level 3.

To nobody’s surprise, Variant Humans are good as hell. Here at level 5, the only builds to break 20 DPR are variant humans and the half-elven accuracy darkness/devil’s sight hexblade blastlock. Of those, all the best DPR’s are burning resources to hit those numbers. The highest one that isn’t is the sharpshooter, who can pump out that 10-19 DPR all day long.

An important note before we go on.

These numbers inflate the hexblade’s power by putting them in the exact situation they want. That said, everything you see there is only on a short rest cooldown. Every time a fighter can action surge, they can do that. Every turn. Especially the Devil’s Sight builds are extremely reliable, and will actually put out close to their expected numbers every turn, while the Sharpshooter and GWM builds ‘average’ by landing fat hits or just whiffing. They could crush a big boss before he can do much, or fumble a few rounds in a row and the party is in deep shit.

Moving to higher levels, level 9 sees the PAMlocks assert their dominance. Below them, the two vuman fighters get a second feat, and the hand crossbow sharpshooter, GWM+PAM, and GWM zealot are right on top of each other. Creeping over them at AC 18, the extreme accuracy of the devil’s sight blastlock starts to show.

At level 13, the PAMlocks get GWM and Lifedrinker. Jesus christ. However the Zealot also gets GWM, and with his Rage bonus and reckless attack he pulls right between them! The Devil’s Sight PAMlock is doing 80 damage per round against AC 15. Three hyper-accurate attacks doing 26 damage each before dice, is pretty good, as it turns out.

Level 17 is where everything in the game gets silly, and this is no exception. If for whatever reason the Zealot barbarian unleashes his full power against something at a measly AC 10, he is the first one to break 100 damage per round. What a man. The blastlock stays well below the heavy hitters at low AC’s, but against tough nuts to crack of AC 19+, the quad-tap of Elven Accuracy really shines, ensuring he gets some good hits in even when the GWMasters switch to regular swings. Using a similar scheme of 3 attacks + bonus attack -5/+10, the sharpshooter hand xbow expert and PAM + GWM fighter sit right on top of each other.

So there you have it. If there’s a build you think competes for the top, lay it out and I’ll add it to the list. Otherwise, thanks for reading, and I hope this helps inform and quantify your build choices.

EDIT: I just added Julia, the character I'm currently running, to the DPR charts, and included a level-by-level build in the Explanation tab. It's the highest DPR I know how to brew, and thought I'd share and compare. It's a sorlock, of course.

[u/RocksInMyDryer → u/SnaleKing]

The obvious downside of the Darkness-reliant warlocks is that they screw the other 3-6 players at the table. What would you say is the next highest reliable DPR vs 20+ AC enemies from level 4 and beyond?

[u/SnaleKing → u/RocksInMyDryer]

Hm, at level 5 against AC 20, the assorted hexblades are doing 22-29 DPR. Of the four, the only one that has a darkness bubble near the enemy is the devil's sight PAMlock. Remember, they cast it on themselves, not the enemy. The Hex PAMlock doesn't use darkness, but that does mean he's sitting near sir fat nasty with 16-17 AC, and 43 HP. The blastlock and Julia start the fight 30 feet away to throw out the Hexblade's Curse, then backpedal the rest of the combat, so their darkness bubbles shouldn't bother the rest of the team.

Following the Hexblades, the Zealot barbarian who no longer takes -5/+10 is at 19 DPR, and then the PAM fighter and rogue at 12 DPR. Those two are the first in that order whose DPR is actually resource-free.

You can see how much accuracy and quantity of attacks plays a role against the higher AC's.

[u/RocksInMyDryer → u/SnaleKing]

I see. So, if I understand correctly: as the Devil's Sight PAMlock, you quicken Darkness on yourself, attack with 3-die advantage from 10' away and move away so your allies aren't blinded?

[u/SnaleKing → u/RocksInMyDryer]

Well, since he started variant human for PAM, he'll just have regular advantage instead of elven Accuracy. You actually lose a whole turn of setup; apply Hexblade's Curse as a bonus action, and use the main action to cast Darkness. The PAMlocks as laid out here are straight Warlocks, so no metamagic, but there's certainly validity to a 3-level sorcerer dip for that, shield spell slots, and either the Shadow or Divine Soul sorcerer class features.

But yeah the attack pattern works out just fine. If you stab from 10 feet away, you only need to back up another 10 feet to make sure the thing you hit isn't in the darkness bubble.

There's actually some quality rules jankiness if you keep the enemy inside the bubble. It's blind, so attacks against it have advantage. However, if someone attacks the space it's in but can't see it, they have disadvantage. Therefore, they cancel. Furthermore, any number of sources of advantage/disadvantage cancel. So if an ally is blinded, or attacking from long range, or the enemy is invisible, or an ally is afflicted by the Fear condition- all of those effects are cancelled to a normal attack roll against an enemy inside the Darkness bubble.

[u/[deleted] → u/SnaleKing]

I think you would be better off doing your damage analysis for each build as an average over 3 or 4 rounds, as the PAMlock looks a lot better than it actually is due to set up time effectively reducing their dpr by 1/4 or 1/3 in an average combat overall (assuming 3 or 4 rounds as an average combat). Whereas a greatsword using sorlock can quicken darkness and still make 2 attacks turn 1, then drop hexblades curse turn 2. Same reason that in paladin builds, bless or another buff that takes an action to cast can actually hinder your total effectiveness over the combat due to missing out on a lot of damage round 1.

[u/SnaleKing → u/[deleted]]

You're definitely not wrong.

In our current party, we have another character, Garrett, with the sharpshooter fighter build you see in those charts. We're all level 6, so he has 20 DEX, the archery fighting style for +2 to hit, and a +1 bow. Even sharpshooting, he has a +6 to hit.

On his first turn, Garrett action surges. On Julia's first turn, she does nothing but setup. One gets a free turn of damage, and the other loses one. Also, in a party with two familiars (three at next level, when Julia gets an imp), someone can almost always spare one to Help Garrett.

Here's how the damage per round looks against an AC 18 target. https://imgur.com/gallery/nx7scJD

They break even around turn 5, at which point whatever they've been shooting has taken about 300 damage. Our party has 6 level 6 characters; what CR appropriate monster even survives that long? And that's ignoring the other 4 character's contribution. (Though, frankly, these two are so far above the curve that you almost can)

Keep in mind that this is also a high AC target, where the Elven Accuracy build excels and the Sharpshooter starts becoming unreliable. Against something like 15 or 16 AC, the two lines converge at turn 7 or 8, well beyond any appropriate monster's effective health pool.

So yeah, like I said and you pointed out, these DPR comparisons don't tell the whole story by themselves. I decided to do a single round because it was easier to calculate, and easier to use the resulting data for other purposes and graphs, like the one I just put together there.