D&D 5E Most powerful class in 5e

[KarinsDad]

I added it twice on purpose. Improved Smite on PHB 85 is explicit that you add the extra d8 to both your regular attack and your smites.

Yeah, I think you are misinterpreting this.

"Whenever you hit a creature with a melee weapon, the creature takes an extra 1d8 radiant damage. If you also use your Divine Smite with an attack, you add this damage to the extra damage of your Divine Smite."

It doesn't state that you add this damage a second time. That isn't even a literal interpretation (but I could see someone interpreting it that way). It says (and probably means) that the extra D8 is added to the extra damage of the Divine Smite. Period. All of that radiant damage is one pool of damage. In other words, since the name of this is Improved Divine Smite, the 1D8 extra damage from IDS stacks with DS, it does not get replaced by it. A first level spell slot adds 3D8 (adding it once), not 2D8 (not adding it) and not 4D8 (adding it twice).

I think the intent was to avoid confusion on whether the 1D8 applied for an actual DS attack or got replaced by it, and they ended up making it less clear.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

How do you figure? The rogue can Hide and Dash as a bonus action maintaining secrecy and distance.

Warlock/bardlock can Dash as a bonus action (Expeditious Retreat) and can hide as a regular action if necessary, although he doesn't really need to since Eldritch Blast doesn't rely on being hidden, unlike Sneak Attack. And if you're spending your bonus action each round to Hide, you're not spending it to Dash, which means the enemy is closing the distance.

If things get sticky the bardlock has additional options like Hypnotic Pattern or flooding the area with conjured animals.

For flavour reasons though my favorite "lone advance scout" PC is the Shadow Monk, because she is Batman.

Are you talking a bard using Stealth and Eldritch Blast? He can't generally move as fast as the rogue or hide as a bonus action...unless he casts haste or something similar. You could set up a bardlock to do it. I do like Cunning Action for scouting just in case. I imagine a bard might be able to D-Door or misty step if he got in trouble. The rogue can generally do better at lower level.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Try asking Crawford if that is correct. He specifically called out scorching ray as an example that the bonus damage does not add to each roll.

http://www.sageadvice.eu/2015/06/28/scorching-ray-dd-errata/

Huh. That's interesting. So that means that Scorching Ray explicitly ignores PHB 196 even if you cast it on multiple creatures (separate damage rolls for each one instead of one), yet there's no indication of that in the text or any way to know which spells behave like Scorching Ray and which behave like Magic Missile. Scratching my head over this one.

Edit: oh, I see! It's the "strike simultaneously" in MM's text that is significant. So that means that Eldritch Blast is by default a sequence of blasts, which means that you can blast the same enemy backwards 40' if all blasts hit, because it's a sequence not simultaneous. Interesting.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Yeah, I think you are misinterpreting this.

"Whenever you hit a creature with a melee weapon, the creature takes an extra 1d8 radiant damage. If you also use your Divine Smite with an attack, you add this damage to the extra damage of your Divine Smite."

It doesn't state that you add this damage a second time. That isn't even a literal interpretation (but I could see someone interpreting it that way). It says (and probably means) that the extra D8 is added to the extra damage of the Divine Smite. Period. All of that radiant damage is one pool of damage. In other words, since the name of this is Improved Divine Smite, the 1D8 extra damage from IDS stacks with DS, it does not get replaced by it. A first level spell slot adds 3D8 (adding it once), not 2D8 (not adding it) and not 4D8 (adding it twice).

I think the intent was to avoid confusion on whether the 1D8 applied for an actual DS attack or got replaced by it, and they ended up making it less clear.

Yeah, having read and considered this interpretation, I think you're probably right. It's weaker than I thought, below the threshold of "powers worth spending two levels acquiring."

They should have just written "this is in addition to the damage from any damage from the Divine Smite feature."

 

[Celtavian]

Warlock/bardlock can Dash as a bonus action (Expeditious Retreat) and can hide as a regular action if necessary, although he doesn't really need to since Eldritch Blast doesn't rely on being hidden, unlike Sneak Attack. And if you're spending your bonus action each round to Hide, you're not spending it to Dash, which means the enemy is closing the distance.

If things get sticky the bardlock has additional options like Hypnotic Pattern or flooding the area with conjured animals.

For flavour reasons though my favorite "lone advance scout" PC is the Shadow Monk, because she is Batman.

Expeditious Retreat is a concentration spell. If you're setting up Hide effectively, the enemy won't even know where you are. A rogue doesn't need the resources a caster does to the same thing. Give him Sharpshooter and let him take out things from long range. You could take a few levels of Warlock as well for Devilsight to truly ensure you have a great advantage in the dark. You can use either Assassin for the really big hits or Arcane Trickster for the nifty spell help. If you play a rogue real high, Elusive is pretty awesome. Means your blur and Dodging always works, no way around it.

Rogue is one of those classes that performs well in my play in my experience. I'm sure experiences differ. Rogue is a very fluid class with a lot of nifty abilities that are truly useful.

 

[Celtavian]

I am the DM, and I allow lots of stuff, whatever is in RAW for the most part[1], although no one has ever gotten a paladin to 11th level yet. If your reading of Divine Smite is correct no one will ever bother doing so either[2], because the ability is marginal even under my reading--an extra 2d8 only when you spend a spell slot (otherwise 1d8) is still not enough to make smiting a good idea, usually. I'll think it over, but if you have a Crawford quote I'd like to see it.

[1] A memorable moment: 8th(?) level shadow monk/druid PC and his 1st level buddies snuck into the lair or what turned out to be a CR 12 Chain Worm. One of the 1st level guys got too close and got eaten. While the chain worm was busy eating him (several rounds of contented munching) I expected the 8th level guy to sneak past and run away. Instead the player spent several minutes poring over the books, then came to me with a plan involving his cursed Bag of Devouring: "If I can stuff one of the chain worm's legs in my Bag of Devouring, will it eat the chain worm?" I re-examined the text for Bag of Devouring and saw no reason why not, but told him he doesn't get to control its limbs unless it is stunned. So he used a Stunning Strike on it, which luckily succeeded, and then kept stunning it for several rounds until the Bag of Devouring woke up (50% chance per round) and sucked in the chain worm, right before it would have killed the monk (it had made its final save vs. stunning strike and was still at nearly full health; would have stunned him right back and eaten him). Score: 8400 XP! and some miscellaneous loot like rusty armor, from the lair.

[2] Better to invest the last two levels in warlock and become a pallysorlock, although from a RP standpoint that's unlikely to happen--but he might invest in sorc 11 instead of paladin 11 and get Wall of Stone/Mass Suggestion plus 8th level slots.

An extra 1d8 per attack is quite in line with the balance of the edition. It costs the paladin nothing. There are other nifty attractions for a higher level paladin.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

An extra 1d8 per attack is quite in line with the balance of the edition. It costs the paladin nothing. There are other nifty attractions for a higher level paladin.

It's negligible, not worth the opportunity cost. If you're fighting eight frost giants, that extra 9 points of damage per round may at most kill a giant fast enough to prevent a couple of attacks, saving 40 HP of healing. That's not transformative. Agonizing Blast would be transformative, but since my paladin would refuse to sell his soul for power, Mass Suggestion would also be transformative: "Surrender and be spared!" Wild Sorc 11/Paladin 9 is more attractive than the other way around: more spells and Heighten Spell.

 

[Ashkelon]

It's negligible, not worth the opportunity cost. If you're fighting eight frost giants, that extra 9 points of damage per round may at most kill a giant fast enough to prevent a couple of attacks, saving 40 HP of healing. That's not transformative. Agonizing Blast would be transformative, but since my paladin would refuse to sell his soul for power, Mass Suggestion would also be transformative: "Surrender and be spared!" Wild Sorc 11/Paladin 9 is more attractive than the other way around: more spells and Heighten Spell.

Actually, the smart way to do it is Paladin (Oathbreaker) 12, Sorcerer 8.

Elemental Weapon gives you elemental damage to your weapon attacks, which then gets increased your charisma modifier from dragon magic. The oathbreaker already gets to add Charisma to damage as well. Greatweapon fighting allows you to reroll 1s and 2s for damage dice. So without using a smite spell, your at will damage with elemental weapon up is 2d6 + 1d8 + 1d4 +2x Cha mod + Str mod. Taking rerolls into account, that is 8.33+5.25+3+150+5 = 31.58 per hit on average, and you still have plenty of slots for smiting. You also get 2 extra feats this way.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Actually, the smart way to do it is Paladin (Oathbreaker) 12, Sorcerer 8.

Elemental Weapon gives you elemental damage to your weapon attacks, which then gets increased your charisma modifier from dragon magic. The oathbreaker already gets to add Charisma to damage as well. Greatweapon fighting allows you to reroll 1s and 2s for damage dice. So without using a smite spell, your at will damage with elemental weapon up is 2d6 + 1d8 + 1d4 +2x Cha mod + Str mod. Taking rerolls into account, that is 8.33+5.25+3+150+5 = 31.58 per hit on average, and you still have plenty of slots for smiting. You also get 2 extra feats this way.

You just sold your soul for 10 points of damage per round.

You only get one extra feat that way BTW, and in return you lose Animate Objects and Hold Monster.

If my paladin were the sort to care about DPR more than saving lives, he'd spend those two levels on Feylock or Fiendlock for temp HP and 54 DPR with Hex (crossbow expert to negate disadvantage). He'd wind up with almost the same at-will DPR as the Oathbreaker, but can Quicken as needed to double it to 108 as needed, plus would have either Devil's Sight or Repelling Blast. He saves two feats relative to the Oathbreaker by leaving Str at 16, which pays for Crossbow Expert, and unlike the Oathbreaker he retains Animate Objects.

As a player I'm very tempted. As a PC he finds the idea laughable, not even tempting, so Wild Sorc 11 it is instead, eventually, which has its upsides. Hiring eight frost giant mercenaries for a month via Mass Suggestion would be nice... too bad he doesn't speak Giant.

 

[KarinsDad]

They should have just written "this is in addition to the damage from any damage from the Divine Smite feature."

Bingo.

It's not always easy for writers and editors to catch these types of English usage issues.