Is Ranged really better than Melee?

[clearstream]

So your argument is that if monsters take option 2 where they just take the OA’s and focus fire that such a decision puts the PC’s in a worse position than if they had just focus fired the enemies.

I agree in part with your general heuristic but try to think more about how the battle is going to flow. I’ll elaborate more later.

Indeed, think about how the battle flows. Archers very likely have one to two turns before they are engaged (for analysis, I assume one). In that turn, they are dealing damage with no reply from melee. Their focus-fire removes opponents from the fight faster than melee can, and of course each creature removed from the fight contributes no further damage.

It's only if melee is supposed to teleport (while ranged cannot) or starting distances are very short and kiting impeded, that melee has an edge. I think there is a good case to say that often happens in dungeons. However, much of the action in published adventures takes place outside or in more spacious venues.

 

[FrogReaver]

On a "one round in splendid isolation" comparison, DW edges out archery ranger in tier 1. After that, archery ranger out-damages them. That's based on a points-buy character with foe ACs per the DMG.

On a "one five-round encounter" comparison, DW continues to edge out archery ranger at tier 1. After that, archery ranger substantially out-damages them. That is with Hunter's Mark assumed up for 3 of those 5 rounds, and melee assumed to be repositioning for 1 of those 5 rounds.

Sword-and-board is equaled by ranger in tier 1, but thereafter ranger out-damages them. By either comparison.

I think DW and 1HS could look better if accuracy is ignored, and feat selections are all sub-optimal. The former has to be taken into consideration for any plausible assessment, in my view. Regards the latter? Players make sub-optimal choices all the time, but I think posters should call out whenever they're assuming a sub-optimal choice.

So I guess I'm saying, if accuracy isn't considered, the analysis isn't plausible.

The damage when attacking of all the characters i mentioned are so close to the same in tier 2 there is no effective difference. The only difference is what benefits range provides vs what melee provides. Uptime is a big ranged benefit. No doubt. Spreading damage around by having more bodies for enemies to hit is a big melee advantage. The whole discussion is about whether such melee benefits outweigh the ranged benefits.

 

[clearstream]

The damage when attacking of all the characters i mentioned are so close to the same in tier 2 there is no effective difference. The only difference is what benefits range provides vs what melee provides. Uptime is a big ranged benefit. No doubt. Spreading damage around by having more bodies for enemies to hit is a big melee advantage. The whole discussion is about whether such melee benefits outweigh the ranged benefits.

It might be I'm not quite following your point. Is it right that you are ignoring Sharpshooter in this discussion? And perhaps therefore also Great Weapon Master? But Dual Wielder is a feat...

On a "one round in isolation" basis, the damage looks close because up-time plays no part. On a "five round encounter" basis, the damage is not so close, because more up-time translates into a damage multiplier.

Then, in discussing spreading damage. I think the ranged side has greater fiat over where damage is applied than the melee side. Faced with a ranged side, a melee side can't choose to spread damage among themselves. I don't understand how the melee characters are making their opponents spread their attacks among them? Why aren't they being focused down?

Are you arguing that the OAs ranged might take to avoid being dog-piled or attacking at disadvantage make up the damage? Each melee gets one reaction a round, and likely has about 4 rounds (5 round encounter, less 1 round repositioning) to take it in. In tier 2, they could catch up with ranged if they got OAs every other round. I acknowledge that, but point out that in fact, OAs tend to spread damage around. By accepting OAs and focus-firing, ranged foes delete opponents sequentially from the fight, removing all the attacks those foes were going to get. Catch-23.

 

[FrogReaver]

It might be I'm not quite following your point. Is it right that you are ignoring Sharpshooter in this discussion? And perhaps therefore also Great Weapon Master? But Dual Wielder is a feat...

On a "one round in isolation" basis, the damage looks close because up-time plays no part. On a "five round encounter" basis, the damage is not so close, because more up-time translates into a damage multiplier.

Then, in discussing spreading damage. I think the ranged side has greater fiat over where damage is applied than the melee side. Faced with a ranged side, a melee side can't choose to spread damage among themselves. I don't understand how the melee characters are making their opponents spread their attacks among them? Why aren't they being focused down?

Are you arguing that the OAs ranged might take to avoid being dog-piled or attacking at disadvantage make up the damage? Each melee gets one reaction a round, and likely has about 4 rounds (5 round encounter, less 1 round repositioning) to take it in. In tier 2, they could catch up with ranged if they got OAs every other round. I acknowledge that, but point out that in fact, OAs tend to spread damage around. By accepting OAs and focus-firing, ranged foes delete opponents sequentially from the fight, removing all the attacks those foes were going to get. Catch-23.

Is your assumption that no enemies are melee?

 

[clearstream]

Is your assumption that no enemies are melee?

So far, I think assumptions in that regard have been vague (apologies if I have missed a post where someone spelt out the "normal" scenarios.) What do you think the average party size is? Are the options mixed (two and two?), all ranged, all melee? Or does it seem necessary to consider the other two kinds of mixed (three and one, one and three)?

My experience at the table has been three to six characters, mixed. So that is what is most informing my intuitions. That is supplemented with quite a lot of spreadsheet analysis of the various supported fighting styles. Casters are hardest to model. One can estimate their maximum damage, and assume that in many cases Greater Invisibility and Haste are their best buffs. Still... what number of casters must one allow for to have a plausible scenario?

If I had to pick one normal, it would be four characters being one or two melee, one or two ranged, and one full caster. Then for monsters, I think one sees more homogeneity, so perhaps four monsters being either four melee or four ranged. Perhaps one of our core questions is if the party would fare better were they say three ranged, and one caster? Versus three melee, and one caster?

What's your take on good normal and exploratory scenarios?

 

[FrogReaver]

In RPG-skirmish style combat, where effectiveness is simplified to "fully-functional until dead", a fundamentally powerful strategy* is removing participants one-at-a-time from the combat. Focus-fire enables this. OAs do not.

I feel like this is being overlooked by your thesis. The putative Catch-22 is countered by a more powerful Catch-23.



*...and a good argument for critical hit systems that incrementally cripple participants.

So here is the elaboration I promised. You have already agreed that looking at a fully ranged party is pointless. So for right now we are looking at a party with at least 2 melee PC's and at least 2 ranged PC's.

The tactic I'm proposing is that the ranged PC's still focus fire on the target of one of the melee PC's. Assuming team PC spreads their melee characters out as previously described then at least one enemy will take at least 1 OA if they attempt the focus fire strategy.

If the enemies do take the OA to focus fire on one of the melee PC's then there is now nothing preventing the PC's from focus firing back as all the enemies are clumped around 1 melee PC and OA's no longer deter the targeting of that PC. That's where actions like the dodge action start looking very impressive. When all the enemies are attacking a single PC then having that PC dodge (or some defensive spell cast on him start looking really impressive).


So looking at the 2 melee 2 ranged PC's after round 1, the focus fired enemy will have taken 3 attacks (2 ranged 1 melee) and another enemy will have taken 2 attacks (1 melee and 1 OA). 1 PC takes 4 attacks.

After turn 1 and everything has converged and started to focus on the 1 PC then the rest of the fight will be actions to keep that PC alive and actions to focus fire down the rest of the enemies. If enemies only need 4 attacks to kill then turn 2 I can kill 2 enemies with 3 attacks which gives the focused PC the option of taking the dodge action, or of some other party member of defensively supporting him.

At the end of 2 rounds 2 enemies have died and the party has taken 8 attacks. 4 presumably without any additional defenses and 4 presumably with dodge up (or the other melee PC possibly was targeted instead).

Your focus fire only strategy would potentially have 7 attacks targeting 1 PC after 1 round and none of those attacks would be facing the dodge action.

Even in possibly the best case scenario for "PC focus fire of enemies (when 1 round worth of attacks is guaranteed to kill an enemy)" my basic tactics for spreading out or mitigating damage are looking superior to the simple always focus fire mantra.

Consider if in the above scenario it only took 3 attacks to down an enemy. Also consider if it took 5 attack to down an enemy. Both of those cases highly favor my focus fire and attempt to spread damage tactic much more than the always focus fire tactic.

My tactic will cause the team to take more attacks but the individuals on the team are better able to survive as the damage either gets mitigated easier or spread around easier.

That's a simple 2 ranged vs 2 melee group comparison against 4 enemy combatants.

 

[FrogReaver]

Indeed, think about how the battle flows. Archers very likely have one to two turns before they are engaged (for analysis, I assume one). In that turn, they are dealing damage with no reply from melee. Their focus-fire removes opponents from the fight faster than melee can, and of course each creature removed from the fight contributes no further damage.

It's only if melee is supposed to teleport (while ranged cannot) or starting distances are very short and kiting impeded, that melee has an edge. I think there is a good case to say that often happens in dungeons. However, much of the action in published adventures takes place outside or in more spacious venues.

Again, it's group vs group combat. If you have 1 melee ally that engages enemies then all the enemies can easily dogpile that ally especially given no other in range options for enemies to attack. Since we agree you will have at least 1 melee ally going toward enemies then ranged allies kiting won't keep their melee ally alive but will only hasten his death.

 

[FrogReaver]

It might be I'm not quite following your point. Is it right that you are ignoring Sharpshooter in this discussion? And perhaps therefore also Great Weapon Master? But Dual Wielder is a feat...

You don't need the dual wielder feat to effectively dual wield

 

[clearstream]

So here is the elaboration I promised. You have already agreed that looking at a fully ranged party is pointless. So for right now we are looking at a party with at least 2 melee PC's and at least 2 ranged PC's.

Hmm, I don't recall agreeing that. Perhaps I gave the wrong impression. I think looking at fully ranged is essential, notwithstanding that it doesn't reflect what I've normally had at my table.

The tactic I'm proposing is that the ranged PC's still focus fire on the target of one of the melee PC's. Assuming team PC spreads their melee characters out as previously described then at least one enemy will take at least 1 OA if they attempt the focus fire strategy.

If the enemies do take the OA to focus fire on one of the melee PC's then there is now nothing preventing the PC's from focus firing back as all the enemies are clumped around 1 melee PC and OA's no longer deter the targeting of that PC. That's where actions like the dodge action start looking very impressive. When all the enemies are attacking a single PC then having that PC dodge (or some defensive spell cast on him start looking really impressive).

I still don't see how they got clumped this way? I'm creating characters in Fantasy Grounds and will run various mixes against random Hard encounters generated by Kobold Fight Club.

After turn 1 and everything has converged

Why no kiting, i.e. un-converging? The ranged PCs in my weekly campaign un-converge like crazy!

That's a simple 2 ranged vs 2 melee group comparison against 4 enemy combatants.

Maybe I misunderstand what you have outlined here. It feels like a narrative of what you picture happening, rather than coming from actual and diverse plays-through, to check intuitions. Is that right? Were characters created and this played? I'm doing that as time permits.

 

[FrogReaver]

Hmm, I don't recall agreeing that. I think looking at fully ranged is essential, notwithstanding that it doesn't reflect what I've normally had at my table.


I still don't see how they got clumped this way? I'm creating characters in Fantasy Grounds and will run various mixes.


Why no kiting, i.e. un-converging?


Maybe I misunderstand what you have outlined here. It feels like a narrative of what you picture happening, rather than coming from actual and diverse plays-through, to check intuitions. Is that right? Were characters created and this played? I'm doing that as time permits.

Unless you have a combat simulator that actually works for group vs group with programmable tactics and all then I don't think you can actually resolve this question by playing through a few human simulations. There's to much randomness in the dice rolls themselves to reveal anything interesting outside many many playthroughs and since the hit and damage rolls can be either high or low, etc then there's a lot room for slightly changing tactics midgame to adjust to the current situation, which can greatly skew such simulations if you end up doing any particular tactic at a time I'm not advocating for it.