Help calculating Fighter damage

[Kupursk]

Hello,

Since I'm still trying to grasp the notion of the numerical values in 5e after so many years playing a different edition of the game, I'd appreciate some help in simulating some expected damage values for mid and high levels. Specifically melee or ranged attacks, not spells.

Let's not consider level 20 since that's rather unrealistic for most games, but take a Fighter of something like level 7-ish and level 15-ish, give or take.

Overall, 5e seems to have increased damage numbers everywhere (monster damage, spell damage, etc) compared to 2e, and also 3e (if we're not counting any "broken" feat combos and such). But I'm not sure if regular attacks have also increased in damage overall.

Take the Champion Fighter as a standard, since that's the most "default" type of warrior there is. Sword and shield.

It seems to me that despite gaining more attacks per round, and increasing critical chance a tad, the damage per attack itself doesn't increase much with time. Which is not unlike previous editions. But I may be (and probably am) missing something.

• At beginner levels he should be doing 1 attack for around 1d8+5 (+3 from Str, +2 from Dueling style).
• Mid-levels he could've raised that Str to 20 already so 2 attacks for 1d8+7.
• And at higher levels 3 attacks for the same 1d8+7.

Is this about right? And if not what else could help increase damage? Feats allowed.

Bonus question: How would other fighting classes compare to that (say, Barbarians, Paladins, etc)?

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PS: The purpose of this is not to say X class is good or bad. As mentioned I'm just trying to get a feel of what's an expected low or high damage per attack in the new edition.

 

[guachi]

HP for monsters, at least low level monsters, is about twice what it was in second edition.

To increase damage:
Fighters have up to four attacks, Action Surge, and all Fighting Styles.
Paladins have two attacks, Smites and some Fighting Styles.
Rangers have two attacks, Hunter's Mark, and some Fighting Styles.
Barbarians have two attacks and Rage.

All of the above have subclasses they have features to increase damage.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

Is this about right? And if not what else could help increase damage? Feats allowed.

That's about right. Short of magical items, there's no good way for a sword-and-board fighter to increase their damage much beyond (1d8+7) per attack.

If you pick up a greatsword, though, then there's a feat which will increase the per-attack damage by +10. I know that it sounds kind of overwhelming for one feat to double your damage like that, but it's balanced by giving you -5 on the attack roll whenever you use it, so you need some sort of accuracy booster to make it really worthwhile. (Battle Master fighters can take a trick that lets them off-set that penalty, or else a Bless spell from a friendly cleric can also go a long way.) Like I said, though, that's only for two-handed weapons.

Bonus question: How would other fighting classes compare to that (say, Barbarians, Paladins, etc)?

Barbarians get a small bonus (about +3) to damage, but they also have a class feature that gives them Advantage on every attack they make. Most barbarians use that Advantage to off-set the -5 penalty from the feat, so they end up making two attacks per round at (1d12+18).

Paladins are also limited to two attacks per round, like barbarians are, but they can burn a spell slot whenever they hit to add burst damage. They're limited in total spell slots for the day, but they can add +3d8 or +4d8 to the hits that they really care about.

 

[TwoSix]

• At beginner levels he should be doing 1 attack for around 1d8+5 (+3 from Str, +2 from Dueling style).
• Mid-levels he could've raised that Str to 20 already so 2 attacks for 1d8+7.
• And at higher levels 3 attacks for the same 1d8+7.

Nope, that looks about right. A sword and shield champion fighter might take a feat like Shield Master, which doesn't increase his damage rolls, but gives a bonus action shove attack to knock someone prone, and attacking a prone person gives advantage, so the accuracy of the attacks (and thus overall damage) improves.

[Note: People will be along presently to say that you can't shove someone prone with Shield Master before taking the attacks, but I ignore those statements.]

To really amp up damage in 5e, there's two main feats: Great Weapon Master and Sharpshooter. Their main benefit is to allow the user to take a -5 penalty to attack rolls to gain a +10 to damage for certain weapon types (heavy weapons for GWM, and ranged weapons for SS).

Almost all high damage builds martial builds in 5e leverage these two feats, and then try to gain as many accuracy bonuses as possible to offset the -5 penalty. The only real outliers are some paladin builds, as converting spell slots into smite is a very efficient form of damage.

Just as a comparison, let's look at your 12th level champion sword and shield fighter with a 12th level archer champion fighter.

Assuming a 20 attack stat for both (easy with a 12th level fighter), and no useful feats other than Sharpshooter. (Shield master would be good here for the sword and board fighter, but then you'd have to try and calculate how often he could successfully shove someone, and then apply advantage to those hits. Somewhat tedious.)

Anyway, 12th level sword guy has 3 attacks, +9 to hit (+5 Str +4 prof) for 1d8+7 damage. Against a fairly baseline 15 AC, that's 75% hit chance * 3 attacks * 11.5 average damage, or 25.9 damage.

12th level archer guy has 3 attacks, +6 to hit (+5 Dex +4 prof -5 Sharpshooter +2 archery fighting style) for 1d8+15 damage. Again 15 AC, that's 60% hit chance * 3 attacks * 19.5 average damage or 35.1 average damage.

 

[Kupursk]

HP for monsters, at least low level monsters, is about twice what it was in second edition.

To increase damage:
Fighters have up to four attacks, Action Surge, and all Fighting Styles.
Paladins have two attacks, Smites and some Fighting Styles.
Rangers have two attacks, Hunter's Mark, and some Fighting Styles.
Barbarians have two attacks and Rage.

All of the above have subclasses they have features to increase damage.
Rangers

Thank you for the run down of it all.

I didn't count the 4th Fighter attack on the initial post since you only get it at level 20. Otherwise, my initial assumptions of damage per attack were right, then?

I thought it a bit strange that 3 attacks for 1d8+7 was the expected. A 2e fighter could reach that with a decent % on Strength and +2 from specialization. And considering how (as you said) monsters have about double the HP from 2e to 5e I thought I might be missing something else that increased this damage.

Granted, the 5e fighters have Action Surge, slightly better critical chance, and +0.5 attacks per round at high levels, compared to the 2e fighter.

But the 2e fighter would only very rarely miss an attack after a certain level, whereas I suppose in 5e you'll probably miss more if a creature has AC on the higher range. So all in all the average damage of a 2e or 5e doesn't seem too different, whereas the HP of monsters have almost doubled (or triple or quadrupled at higher levels!)

Maybe I'm still missing something?

 

[Kupursk]

If you pick up a greatsword, though, then there's a feat which will increase the per-attack damage by +10. I know that it sounds kind of overwhelming for one feat to double your damage like that, but it's balanced by giving you -5 on the attack roll whenever you use it

Most barbarians use that Advantage to off-set the -5 penalty from the feat, so they end up making two attacks per round at (1d12+18).

Paladins are also limited to two attacks per round, like barbarians are, but they can burn a spell slot whenever they hit to add burst damage. They're limited in total spell slots for the day, but they can add +3d8 or +4d8 to the hits that they really care about.

Yeah I'm aware of this Barbarian combo of advantage + great weapon. And the Smite damage seems more or less in line with the Smite from 3e (which was +Class Level to damage.)

I didn't want to count the Great Weapon feat, though, as short of having some "perma" advantage like that it doesn't seem reliable with the -5 to hit. So I went for the Sword and Shield fighter.

Champion Fighter also seemed like the best baseline class to compare.

12th level archer guy has 3 attacks, +6 to hit (+5 Dex +4 prof -5 Sharpshooter +2 archery fighting style) for 1d8+15 damage. Again 15 AC, that's 60% hit chance * 3 attacks * 19.5 average damage or 35.1 average damage.

So I guess archers are the big damage dealers now, then? That's quite the change, considering melee used to be much stronger in general, back in 2e and 3e (again, core rules considered, not counting possible broken feat combos.)

 

[TwoSix]

I thought it a bit strange that 3 attacks for 1d8+7 was the expected. A 2e fighter could reach that with a decent % on Strength and +2 from specialization. And considering how (as you said) monsters have about double the HP from 2e to 5e I thought I might be missing something else that increased this damage.

It's been a while since I've 2E'd, but wasn't +5 on melee damage really high? Like 18/91-99 high?

Plus, weren't high level fighters with Weapon Specialization pretty much cuisinarts, especially with percentile strength?

 

[TwoSix]

So I guess archers are the big damage dealers now, then? That's quite the change, considering melee used to be much stronger in general, back in 2e and 3e (again, core rules considered, not counting possible broken feat combos.)

2H melee owned 3e damage because of the power attack feat, mainly. Which means 5e isn't really that different, as the two types of combat that can utilize a similar mechanic (heavy weapon melee and archery) are the two best damage dealers.

Archers are overall the better option because being far away is usually better because, well, monsters. Melee has benefits, though, in that it's usually easier to gain advantage in melee, and there are a good number of spells and class features that specify melee over range.

But yea, for pure damage it's hard to top a fighter with Sharpshooter and Crossbow Expert, especially a battle master fighter who uses his special dice to help his attacks hit.

 

[Mistwell]

Fighters get more feats or ability score improvements than any other class. If you use feats, that gives you a route to gain an attack on a bonus action (like polearm master or crossbow expert) or a reaction (like Sentinel or Mage Slayer) or both.

 

[S'mon]

Mid level 2 attacks for d8+7; Action Surge for 4 attacks.
High level he likely has a magic weapon, a flaming sword is nice since it gives you +2d6 fire on every attack.

There's also stuff like Weaponmaster superiority dice to add in.