D&D 5E Barb vs Fighter vs Monk..vs Paladin!

[Hjorimir]

The monk's real gifts are (as mentioned above) movement (monks with the Mobile feat are groovy as hell) and their incredible defensive abilities (i.e. deflect missiles, slow fall, evasion, stillness of mind, purity of body, and diamond soul). Bring this evaluation to 7th level and toss in a fireball and a couple of bow attacks and I think the monk will start to shine. Interesting stuff though, great thread!

 

[Celtavian]

Monk is definitely not going to be a damage king. I would think the monk would be taken by a player wanting to play a certain style of character. They look like they can be fun and effective. Definitely not going to be the choice for those that want to do high damage.

 

[Paraxis]

Monk isn't that bad damage wise. Assuming 16 dex at 5th level a pure monk has 2 attacks for d8+4 & bonus action for a d6+4. I understand that isn't amazing but they can easily focus fire or spread the pain around dropping mooks. Also stunning strike is wonderful against bosses, any type of action mitigation is worth consideration.

 

[Tormyr]

Monk isn't that bad damage wise. Assuming 16 dex at 5th level a pure monk has 2 attacks for d8+4 & bonus action for a d6+4. I understand that isn't amazing but they can easily focus fire or spread the pain around dropping mooks. Also stunning strike is wonderful against bosses, any type of action mitigation is worth consideration.

At 16 Dex shouldn't the damage bonus be +3? Or did you mean 18 Dex?

But I totally agree on monk damage. Stunning Strike, Flurry of Blows, Catch a missile and throw it back. There is a lot of pain brought by the monk. Our level 10 monk regularly hits 2-3 times a round for a rough average of 23 damage per round, almost every round. Stunning strike is scary powerful for him. Legendary resistance is there to keep a legendary monster from getting stun-locked.

But every class listed here is scary powerful.

I ran 3 CR8 gladiator barbarians last week against the 6 person level 10 party. They had brutal critical and retaliation. You could see the spreading "uh-oh" on their faces when one of the barbarians attacked with its three attacks. All three hit. The barbarian used Reckless for advantage, and the first two attacks had nat 20s. 3d8+7, 3d8+7, and 1d8+7 (52 average) damage later, the fighter was almost down.

Our two weapon fighter is a whirling dervish of destruction with her swords and magic.

Our Ancients Paladin has a 8 Charisma, but most of his spells go to healing, buffs and smites, so the Charisma modifier rarely comes into play. When a Paladin rolls a nat 20 and decides to smite, watch out as all the damage dice are doubled, and the Paladin can expend higher level spell slots to amp up the damage.

 

[Sacrosanct]

My 5th level shadow monk has been damage king when I drop the Hex spell from my magic initiate feat. Raining d6s yo!

With flurry of blows, it can be up to 8d6+16. And if I crit? heh heh.

 

[Zelc]

Can you run this with a Ranger?

 

[kerbarian]

It just feels so wrong to ever give up the knockdown benefit of Open Hand - declare your Attack action, use bonus action on Flurry right away for 1 Ki, knock opponent down, get advantage on the rest of your attacks, which doubles their chance to crit and may give you defensive benefits.

Flurry of Blows is one of the few bonus actions with specified timing. Unlike Martial Arts, Flurry lets you take a bonus action "After you take the Attack action", not "when you use the Attack action". I believe that means you can't take the Flurry attacks first -- I was disappointed, because an Open Hand monk who always starts out by knocking his target down sounded like a great idea.

 

[Paraxis]

Flurry of Blows is one of the few bonus actions with specified timing. Unlike Martial Arts, Flurry lets you take a bonus action "After you take the Attack action", not "when you use the Attack action". I believe that means you can't take the Flurry attacks first -- I was disappointed, because an Open Hand monk who always starts out by knocking his target down sounded like a great idea.

That is something I have overlooked and is annoying about flurry of blows. Well at least you can still sunning strike your opponent on your first attack and if they fail the save not only do your other attacks have advantage they get can't take any actions on their next turn.

 

[Blue]

Thanks for putting this up, it's very interesting. With the exception of the monk (whom as other say might not be a frontline fighter), it's interesting how close these come to each other. Fighters are more consistant than Barbarians, Barbarians going full out are better than fighters going full out, etc.

Paladin Lay-on-hands for 30 HP seems to add roughly 1.5 to 2 rounds of survivability (depending on shield of faith or not) at the cost of one round of action and additional chances to lose Concentration. Since barbarian resist from Rage were factored in to RIS, would it be appropriate to use that as well?

Are you keeping the DITR flat for the entire time, or accounting for foe deaths? You briefly touch this in Oath of Vengeance paladin, but I don't see variable DITR numbers. With the "best defense is a good offense", this may spiral up the numbers as those doing more damage could start taking less damage sooner. I would think that it could also make a noticeable difference for the defensive hit of the Barbarian Reckless Strike ability if it starts getting used with 2 or even 1 opponent left instead of three attackers.

(I hope this comes across as "I love what you did, hopefully this is constructive to make it even better!". Don't have an emoji for that.)

 

[Cortrillion]

What about...

Human Paladin, Carlius, Oath of Devotion, Heavy Armor mastery, GWM, using a maul, 2hander style. Chain mail.
Str: 20 Dex: 10, con: 16 (15+1), wiz: 15, int: 12, cha: 18. Ac: 16, Level: 5, hp: 49.

Human fighter, Uther, battlemaster, Shield mastery, Heavy armor mastery, using battle axe, dueling style, chain mail, shield.
Str: 20, dex: 16, con: 18, wiz: 15, int: 12, cha: 10. Ac: 18, level: 5 hp: 54.

The round before closing to fight the Warrior draws his shield and sword and the paladin draws his hammer and uses Sacred Weapon.
This is from "The real World" as the two characters are Uther Hardholder, a scared veteran of the north and Carlius Dragonbane, a devout champion of Pelor. Stats are simplified, but both have really high rolls.

I don't have the formulas you are all using ready, so if one of you could run the numbers I would be grateful. It looks to me like the paladin is a massive favorite here. From the gaming sessions, I would say that the paladin dose around 3 times as much damage as the warrior, but this could be luck.

It looks to me like the game is horridly unfinished. Lacking major balancing and customization options. I will not go into details here, as that would be a discussion of a different thread. But from the look of it, the paladin can do everything the fighter can do, just as well or better and has a lot of extra options to boot (in the form of spells) The fighter gains more attacks and feats, but at level 11 he has 1 more attack and one more feat (stat+2), at that point the paladin gains +1d8 dmg on all swings, +4 to all saves, immunity to fright and disease. That is without counting spells, Smites alone add +15d8(67,5) damage, where as the combat maneuvers at best add +5d10 (+27.5) if not using ripost (harder to calculate). Also remember that the paladin has +4 to hit for 10 rounds after using sacred weapon, an amazing boost. The warrior having Second wind adds hp of 1d10+11 (16.5) as a bonus action, costing action surge or extra attacks. The paladin LoH adds +55 hp costing an action.

Anyway, if someone would run the numbers it would be amazing =)