D&D 5E What's up with Vicious Mockery?

[GuardianLurker]

One other thing to consider (thought it is an edge case) - vicious mockery's range is "within earshot", and isn't affected by line of sight. It just requires knowledge of the target. The ability to do any damage where otherwise you could do so can be worth quite a bit. Again, it's an edge case, but it does happen.

 

[Shiroiken]

I have a bard in my group. She's had VM since the beginning, and seldom uses anything in combat other than VC or Shatter. At lower levels, it was super good, because it often caused a single monster to miss. At level 5, there seemed to be a slight drop off, but it still wasn't bad at all. Once we started Against the Giants it became super awesome amazeballs, because she would almost always succeed (because giants suck at most saves) and the damage output by the giants was greatly reduced, especially when she targeted ones in the back (who would have cover against an attack, but nothing against a wis save) that were throwing rocks. She likes to pair up with the Barbarian who often uses Reckless Attack to help limit the return fire. She only gets upset when the damage actually kills the target (because someone else could have mopped it up without losing the Disadvantage).

Things to consider:
Bards don't have a lot of other options, unless they use Magical Secrets to pick up an attack cantrip. Unless they're College of Valor (which I've yet to see), their damage output isn't that great anyway.

It uses Psychic Damage, which almost nobody has resistance or immunity to. I've thrown out a lot of different creatures with various resistances/immunity, and she's never had to falter on her primary attack because of it (unlike the Fire Dragon Sorcerers who's greatly weakened in the Hall of the Fire Giant King).

Frostbite is pretty much the same spell available for Wizard/Sorcerer, except it's 1d6 and Cold Damage. I've only seen a few choose to take it, however. My guess is they have better options, and Cold Damage is something that things have resistance to.

 

[ad_hoc]

Frostbite is pretty much the same spell available for Wizard/Sorcerer, except it's 1d6 and Cold Damage. I've only seen a few choose to take it, however. My guess is they have better options, and Cold Damage is something that things have resistance to.

I think the main problem with Frostbite is that it is a Con save.

Monsters in general have high Con and the ones that are the best target for it tend to have the highest Con.

The Hill Giant for example has a +4 Con vs -1 Wis.

 

[Jester David]

Fighter Longsword/Shield Dueling - 21 dmg
Rogue Rapier - 19 dmg
Cleric Sacred Flame - 9 dmg

Total damage: 49

Bard Vicious Mockery - 5 dmg
or
Wizard Firebolt - 11 dmg

= 54 dmg or 60 dmg

Vicious Mockery represents a 10% loss in damage per round in this scenario.

Which makes a the bard a poor character for reliable magical at-will damage. Which, however, is not the only gauge of teh worth of a character. Otherwise, parties would be all fighters.

Bards can choose at-will damage via weapons or vicious mockery. Charisma is still likely their highest stat, so they're hitting with a secondary or tertiary stat with weapons. That means a +3 or so to attack and damage of 1d8+1. So average damage of 5.5.
But they'll miss 10% more often, bringing down their average damage: when you factor in accuracy their bow or rapier damage isn't much higher than vicious mockery.
So you can do simmilar damage, but one option imparts disadvantage on an attack. Which would you choose?

 

[Caliban]

One other thing to consider (thought it is an edge case) - vicious mockery's range is "within earshot", and isn't affected by line of sight. It just requires knowledge of the target. The ability to do any damage where otherwise you could do so can be worth quite a bit. Again, it's an edge case, but it does happen.

This is incorrect. Vicious Mockery has a range of 60', and you have to be able to see the target, plus the target has to be able to hear (but not understand) you.

 

[Plaguescarred]

It's exemple like this that proves some people often put too much emphasis on damage to think something is not good due to it's low damage despite it's effect when it's actually is the contrary!

 

[Helldritch]

That single spell saved the life of party members so many times that it is impossible to count them all. That spell is simply great. Damage and disadvantage imposition is simply to good to ignore. If you consider only the damage, that spell is not that great. It is only when you take the disadvantage into account that the spell shines. Most heavy hitters have only one attack. This spell saves a lot of dmg.

 

[TallIan]

The bard in the game I run casts VM pretty much every round of combat. The rest of the party are all big damage dealers, so the loss of DPR is not a problem.

The reduction of enemy DPR is what does make the spell good, by reducing the damage your party takes it eases the pressure on other party resources, like healing, or other character's action economy.

Your bard is not going to a be primary damage dealer in any party. So comparing potential damage of a spell vs spells designed for primary damage dealing is an apples and oranges thing.

Tall

 

[GuardianLurker]

This is incorrect. Vicious Mockery has a range of 60', and you have to be able to see the target, plus the target has to be able to hear (but not understand) you.

Huh. I stand corrected. It's been a bit, and I obviously misremembered . Thanks for the correction.

 

[Tony Vargas]

It's been the most popular Bard cantrip in games I've run - and I've had a surprising number of bards, some parties even with two of 'em at a time. You get to insult things to death. It's hard to compete with that on the cantrip end of things. As has been pointed out, it's pretty good on the mechanical side, too.