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Have we misunderstood the shield and sword fighter (or warrior)?
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<blockquote data-quote="ECMO3" data-source="post: 8779400" data-attributes="member: 7030563"><p>Sword and Board with ASIs is going to be better than GWM-PAM in most (any?) WOTC published adventures that go to tier 3. GWM-PAM is great in a white room but magic weapons for this build are rare and you gave up 2 ASIs to get it. Sword and Board will not just equal it in most campaigns, it will flat beat it unless your DM is placing magic items specifically for your character.</p><p></p><p>Even without looking at the magic weapons, I find people overstate the difference</p><p></p><p>At 6th level vs AC 15 a GWM-PAM with a 16 strength is doing 18 DPR on his turn using his bonus action. A sword and board deulist with a 20 strength is doing 16 DPR while having better AC, better saves, higher athletics, a higher carrying capacity and not using his bonus. Start with a 17 strength, go with skill expert (athletics), ASI and then shield master and at level 8 you are way ahead of where a PAM-GWM build will be, getting a large number of your attacks with advantage. </p><p></p><p>That is without considering subclasses. Subclasses that add extra dice on a hit, like Rune Knight, Eldritch Knight or psi warrior are going to do better with dueling and classes that need to use bonus actions (EK, RK, Samaurai, Cavalier) are going to lose PAM attacks to use their bonus actions. Really when you get down to it, the only two subclasses that are really dominant with GWM-PAM are Echo Knight and Battlemaster (using precision).</p><p></p><p>To be honest on most builds I think GWM or PAM are better individually than together. If you take just PAM you have more weapons you can use with it, bringing staffs and spears (which are common) into play, while being able to use dueling. If you take just GWM it gives you a bonus action attack when you kill someone or crit without needing a second feat and you can use higher damage weapons and two more weapons. You also have some space for other bonus actions.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="ECMO3, post: 8779400, member: 7030563"] Sword and Board with ASIs is going to be better than GWM-PAM in most (any?) WOTC published adventures that go to tier 3. GWM-PAM is great in a white room but magic weapons for this build are rare and you gave up 2 ASIs to get it. Sword and Board will not just equal it in most campaigns, it will flat beat it unless your DM is placing magic items specifically for your character. Even without looking at the magic weapons, I find people overstate the difference At 6th level vs AC 15 a GWM-PAM with a 16 strength is doing 18 DPR on his turn using his bonus action. A sword and board deulist with a 20 strength is doing 16 DPR while having better AC, better saves, higher athletics, a higher carrying capacity and not using his bonus. Start with a 17 strength, go with skill expert (athletics), ASI and then shield master and at level 8 you are way ahead of where a PAM-GWM build will be, getting a large number of your attacks with advantage. That is without considering subclasses. Subclasses that add extra dice on a hit, like Rune Knight, Eldritch Knight or psi warrior are going to do better with dueling and classes that need to use bonus actions (EK, RK, Samaurai, Cavalier) are going to lose PAM attacks to use their bonus actions. Really when you get down to it, the only two subclasses that are really dominant with GWM-PAM are Echo Knight and Battlemaster (using precision). To be honest on most builds I think GWM or PAM are better individually than together. If you take just PAM you have more weapons you can use with it, bringing staffs and spears (which are common) into play, while being able to use dueling. If you take just GWM it gives you a bonus action attack when you kill someone or crit without needing a second feat and you can use higher damage weapons and two more weapons. You also have some space for other bonus actions. [/QUOTE]
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