Should the Greatsword be d12?

[Anthony Jackson]

Another issue that is being missed here is overkill. The extra damage from high crit is only useful if the crit didn't already kill the monster. The extra damage from hitting when you would have missed is nearly always important, because it's very unlikely that your miss would have killed the critter.

 

[eloquentaction]

Worth spelling out your assumptions, eloquentaction
Magic numbers are average damage with these penalities...
-0.1: Military
-0.2: Superior
-0.2: Load minor
-0.4: Two handed

...and these bonuses...
+0.5: Off-hand
+0.5: Ranged (any non-zero)
+1.0: Reach

High crit is factored in a bonus 5% of of the maximum damage, which is incorrect. That would imply that when you crit with a high crit, you maximize that high crit die/dice, which of course is not true.

Since I also disagree that military melee should be penalized because ANY class that wants to use a melee weapon is going to at least have military melee (OK, so Clerics don't, but then you might as well just get the bastard sword).

After adjustment, the Halberd and Longspear come out on top, which shows that unless you REALLY think reach is the bomb, the formula is flawed.

Yep, those were my assumptions.

As with any magic number assessment, you have to factor in all of the parameters.

I tried to 'flatten' the sample data based on the first instance of that item in the list. In this case, the first item that uses REACH is the Glaive.

With a factor of 1 for Reach, Glaive bumped up to what I though was about the right area for it. So I left that factor alone and continued on.

If you think Reach is overpowered, reduce the factor for it to... 0.75 perhaps.

As with many things, everything is subjective. But I think the sheet I threw together did a pretty good job, all things considered.

I even noted that '* Reach is given a fairly high bump in value.' in my notes.

** NOTE: After moving Reach down to 0.65, Glaive falls right in line with a Falchion with Halberd and Longspear still being above a Greatsword.

(New sheet attached).

BTW - You were correct on the High Crit calc. I was using Max damage, not average damage. It's corrected on the new sheet.

 

[keterys]

The spreadsheet (unnaturally) favors low proficiency over high because it ignores bonus damage entirely. Especially if you're a striker that damage can be sizable, but it's not hard to throw in a big damage bonus and see that the +3 weapons scale better the more bonus damage you have on the spreadsheet (toss in like a +20 and just drag it down to see the greatsword as better than the greataxe for instance)

Though, again, the maul and greataxe should do slightly more damage. The sword is better at landing effects. Which are potentially very important. Heck, you only need to land, what, one more Cleave (the low end of the totem pole for actual usefulness) to close the damage gap.

 

[eloquentaction]

The spreadsheet (unnaturally) favors low proficiency over high because it ignores bonus damage entirely. Especially if you're a striker that damage can be sizable, but it's not hard to throw in a big damage bonus and see that the +3 weapons scale better the more bonus damage you have on the spreadsheet (toss in like a +20 and just drag it down to see the greatsword as better than the greataxe for instance)

Though, again, the maul and greataxe should do slightly more damage. The sword is better at landing effects. Which are potentially very important. Heck, you only need to land, what, one more Cleave (the low end of the totem pole for actual usefulness) to close the damage gap.

In the sheet I gave a 0.1 penalty for requiring a Military feat and a 0.2 penalty for requiring a feat per weapon.

While it's true the numbers are 'skewed', that's what a magic number IS. A skewed number based on weightings you've given it.

And you're correct. None of my calculations look at powers, just the raw weapon comparisons. If you start figuring in 2[W], 3[W] and so forth, then one number begins to outweigh them all: The average damage.

You could make an argument that proficiency or High Crit mean a lot as well, but mathematically they are very small compared to Average Damage.

With that in mind, I've gone in and refactored the weightings to make average damage more important.

The new sheet is attached, and here are the new raw numbers:


Weapon Name Magic #
Club 3.67
Dagger 3.83
Javelin 4.17
Mace (1H) 4.73
Mace (2H) 5.34
Sickle 4.17
Spear (1H) 4.73
Spear (2H) 5.34
Greatclub 4.81
Morningstar 5.39
Quarterstaff 4.33
Scythe 4.81
Hand crossbow 4.17
Sling 4.17
Crossbow 4.63
Battleaxe (1H) 5.69
Battleaxe (2H) 6.31
Flail (1H) 5.69
Flail (2H) 6.31
Handaxe 4.57
Longsword (1H) 5.03
Longsword (2H) 5.73
Scimitar 4.86
Short sword 4.38
Throwing hammer 4.57
Warhammer (1H) 5.69
Warhammer (2H) 6.31
War pick (1H) 4.86
War Pick (2H) 5.52
Falchion 5.40
Glaive 5.36
Greataxe 6.68
Greatsword 5.78
Halberd 5.94
Heavy Flail 6.84
Longspear 5.94
Maul 6.84
Longbow 5.79
Shortbow 4.73
Bastard Sword (1H) 6.08
Bastard Sword (2H) 6.78
Katar 4.45
Rapier 4.93
Spiked Chain 5.70
Shuriken 3.13

-- Hirahito

 

[keterys]

That still doesn't seem to factor bonus damage... at all. I mean, to use two relevant examples from one of my 11th level games:

The paladin deals 1d10 + 6 (Str) + 4 (Wis) + 3 (Enh) + 2 (Focus) with his at-will holy strike.
The rogue deals 1d8 + 5 (Dex) + 5 (Cha) + 3 (Enh) + 2 (Focus) + ~13.5 (3d8 Sneak Attack) with at-will sly flourish.

Those are pretty darn good examples of why you can't ignore bonus damage, even if slightly atypical.

And if the paladin is, say, trying to do a righteous smite or the rogue a knockout, the value of the +1 attack starts to really add up.

 

[Stalker0]

Does the spreadsheet account for the fact that the bastard sword and longsword are not 2-handed weapons...and therefore don't get the extra benefit from power attack and reaping strike?

 

[eloquentaction]

That still doesn't seem to factor bonus damage... at all. I mean, to use two relevant examples from one of my 11th level games:

The paladin deals 1d10 + 6 (Str) + 4 (Wis) + 3 (Enh) + 2 (Focus) with his at-will holy strike.
The rogue deals 1d8 + 5 (Dex) + 5 (Cha) + 3 (Enh) + 2 (Focus) + ~13.5 (3d8 Sneak Attack) with at-will sly flourish.

Those are pretty darn good examples of why you can't ignore bonus damage, even if slightly atypical.

And if the paladin is, say, trying to do a righteous smite or the rogue a knockout, the value of the +1 attack starts to really add up.

Keterys -

The original argument is about weapons. Not powers.

Thus, damage given from a power is not relevant to the discussion about the weapon.

Thus, my sheet only factors in items that are about the weapon and gives a comparison number.

That's all it was designed to do.

But I do agree with you; comparing all of the powers and their relative value over each other is a very interesting topic thread on its own. I'd like to see which class actually has a numerical advantage. Making that sheet would be pretty difficult, however. ;-)

-- Hirahito

 

[keterys]

Keterys -

The original argument is about weapons. Not powers.

I'm not talking about powers. I am saying that your spreadsheet is inherently and fundamentally flawed because it does not even _try_ to take into account bonus damage. Proficiency bonus is more and more important the more bonus damage and bonus effect you do.

So, you can't compare weapons and say that the greataxe is better than the greatsword if you assume 0 bonus damage. No one does 0 bonus damage. No one.

In fact, there are some characters I would cheerfully take a W = _0_ weapon if the attack bonus was high enough. Nice off hand weapon for a rogue, nothing else.

 

[eloquentaction]

I'm not talking about powers. I am saying that your spreadsheet is inherently and fundamentally flawed because it does not even _try_ to take into account bonus damage. Proficiency bonus is more and more important the more bonus damage and bonus effect you do.

So, you can't compare weapons and say that the greataxe is better than the greatsword if you assume 0 bonus damage. No one does 0 bonus damage. No one.

In fact, there are some characters I would cheerfully take a W = _0_ weapon if the attack bonus was high enough. Nice off hand weapon for a rogue, nothing else.

I hear what you're saying.

Give me some options.

How do you think it could be fixed?

 

[keterys]

I'm not entirely sure... could just have the ability to put in your own bonus damage (at which point it's reasonable for letting a character choose the best weapon specifically for them), could pick a range of values for bonus damage (say not optimized, optimized, middle of the line) and factor them all in, could have a way to compare weapons and 'Seek'... I mean, it's all a bit of work unfortunately.

I suspect the first option is the easy route and ensures its relevance to someone.