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<blockquote data-quote="jgsugden" data-source="post: 7187482" data-attributes="member: 2629"><p>I think a lot of that analysis is found in another Wizard Guide here: </p><p></p><p><a href="http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?469130-GUIDE-Arrive-on-Time-A-General-Guide-to-Wizardry&p=6707815#post6707815" target="_blank">http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?469130-GUIDE-Arrive-on-Time-A-General-Guide-to-Wizardry&p=6707815#post6707815</a></p><p></p><p>Note that the average damager they show assumes a certain percentage of made saves. </p><p></p><p>One thing these guides do not delve into enough, IMHO, is the control uses of damage spells, specifically of area damage spells. When I cast an area damage spell, I'm usually doing it to clear fodder to open lanes for the fighters to get to the bad guys. Those fodder enemies are often more of an obstacle than a threat (although in 5E even a goblin can't be ignored as it can still hit reasonable AC characters at higher levels), so you're really removing a wall when you use fireballs to clear fodder undead, goblins, gnolls, drow warriors, lesser elementals, manes, etc... Don't get me wrong - I don't mind catching the big bad in the spell, but I am generally trying to clear his allies.</p><p></p><p>If you agree with the notion that these area spells are primarily useful to clear out the minions, then the question is how well do they do it? To do it, they need to do enough damage to take them from max HP to 0. To determine this, we need to figure out how many HPs these minions tend to have. Can you typically eliminate them even if they make the save? Only if they fail the save? Or can you typically not get them all with one spell?</p><p></p><p>At first blush, you might think that enemies are so spread out in HPs that it doesn't matter - some minions will be above and below whatever threshold you want to look at. However, there are actually some pretty common thresholds where monster HPs fall. CR 1 Monsters tend to have ~25 or fewer HPs while CR 2 creatures tend to have more than ~35 HPs. That leaves a 10 HP gap in the middle... and that gap is where a lot of damage spells fall. 8d6 from a fireball? 28 average damage. If you want to get that fireball up to 38.5 HP damage you need to use a 6th level spell, and that is only going to take out CR 2 monsters about half the time if they fail a save. </p><p></p><p>The thresholds I look at for average damage for minion sweeping are 28 hps (where fireball at 3rd is the gold standard), and 42 hps (where Vitriolic Sphere cast at 5th level, with a delay of a round for that second set of damage, is my standard - although chain lightning at 6th level is noteworthy). However, certain PCs, like a 10th level evoker, get to add damage to their spells which can alter this analysis quite a bit by making it easier to hit these thresholds. People mock the minimal extra damage that come with these features, but they can make a big difference in whether a spell is a good sweeper or just a waste of time that doesn't actually finish an enemy off faster.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="jgsugden, post: 7187482, member: 2629"] I think a lot of that analysis is found in another Wizard Guide here: [url]http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?469130-GUIDE-Arrive-on-Time-A-General-Guide-to-Wizardry&p=6707815#post6707815[/url] Note that the average damager they show assumes a certain percentage of made saves. One thing these guides do not delve into enough, IMHO, is the control uses of damage spells, specifically of area damage spells. When I cast an area damage spell, I'm usually doing it to clear fodder to open lanes for the fighters to get to the bad guys. Those fodder enemies are often more of an obstacle than a threat (although in 5E even a goblin can't be ignored as it can still hit reasonable AC characters at higher levels), so you're really removing a wall when you use fireballs to clear fodder undead, goblins, gnolls, drow warriors, lesser elementals, manes, etc... Don't get me wrong - I don't mind catching the big bad in the spell, but I am generally trying to clear his allies. If you agree with the notion that these area spells are primarily useful to clear out the minions, then the question is how well do they do it? To do it, they need to do enough damage to take them from max HP to 0. To determine this, we need to figure out how many HPs these minions tend to have. Can you typically eliminate them even if they make the save? Only if they fail the save? Or can you typically not get them all with one spell? At first blush, you might think that enemies are so spread out in HPs that it doesn't matter - some minions will be above and below whatever threshold you want to look at. However, there are actually some pretty common thresholds where monster HPs fall. CR 1 Monsters tend to have ~25 or fewer HPs while CR 2 creatures tend to have more than ~35 HPs. That leaves a 10 HP gap in the middle... and that gap is where a lot of damage spells fall. 8d6 from a fireball? 28 average damage. If you want to get that fireball up to 38.5 HP damage you need to use a 6th level spell, and that is only going to take out CR 2 monsters about half the time if they fail a save. The thresholds I look at for average damage for minion sweeping are 28 hps (where fireball at 3rd is the gold standard), and 42 hps (where Vitriolic Sphere cast at 5th level, with a delay of a round for that second set of damage, is my standard - although chain lightning at 6th level is noteworthy). However, certain PCs, like a 10th level evoker, get to add damage to their spells which can alter this analysis quite a bit by making it easier to hit these thresholds. People mock the minimal extra damage that come with these features, but they can make a big difference in whether a spell is a good sweeper or just a waste of time that doesn't actually finish an enemy off faster. [/QUOTE]
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