D&D 5E Best Non-GWM, Non-SS, Non-PM, Non-CE Damagers

[thethain]

If you're willing to assume 100% applicability, then Battlemaster 3rd, Arcane Trickster 8th, Sentinel, Magic Initiate, ASI, Dueling w. Rapier. Fights alongside an ally. Precision on 1-4.

Stacks GFB and Hex for about 65*/turn. Total 1566 over 24 rounds.

(Level 11, no magic items, PHB and SCAG only.)

*Action Surge twice for about +78 overall.

How are you getting the same hex in all combats if (I assume) you get it from magic initiate so are only good for 1 hour (maybe 2 combats).

I am counting 4d6(21) Sneak, 1d8+7(11.5) rapier, 2d8(9) From GFB, 2d8+3(12)? to another target +1d6(3.5) from hex is 57 a turn. But that is assuming you get hex every single round, which is not possible as you are getting 2 rests, which each take an hour and therefore end Hex from Magic initiate (level 1 lasts 1 hour)

EDIT:OK I am seeing now that sentinel feat is assuming you get to smack someone every single reaction.

 

[guachi]

I only got 1370 damage for the above scenario. Since you have 1 ASI I assumed your hit chance was 5% lower.

Also, I assumed, with a new hit chance of 60% that you'd Precision on the 35% of attacks that missed and weren't a 1. That's (counting 3 Action Surges because you can rest thrice) 27*.35=9.45 uses of Precision. The other uses of Precision you'll use on 10% of your Sentinel attacks and that uses 11.85 of your 12 Superiority Dice.

You action surged if you missed your attack (so you could land sneak attack) and if you didn't miss on your Attack action used your Action Surge on the last round of the second combat before resting.

You got hex for one of the six combats and, therefore, for 4 rounds of combat.

 

[FrogReaver]

If you're willing to assume 100% applicability, then Battlemaster 3rd, Arcane Trickster 8th, Sentinel, Magic Initiate, ASI, Dueling w. Rapier. Fights alongside an ally. Precision on 1-4.

Stacks GFB and Hex for about 65*/turn. Total 1566 over 24 rounds.

(Level 11, no magic items, PHB and SCAG only.)

*Action Surge twice for about +78 overall.

Why would one assume 100% applicapability. I think you like to make numbers appear bigger than they should be.

 

[FrogReaver]

Aarakocra Fey warlock 7/ rogue 2. With booming blade, greater invisibility, stealth expertise, and warcaster.

Turn 1: Turn invisible, hide as a bonus action, and move next to an enemy, possibly straight above them.
Reaction: There's a good chance they will move. Hit them with booming blade.
Turn 2+: Boomblade, hide as a bonus action, and move next to an enemy, possibly a different one.
Reaction: There's a good chance they will move. Hit them with booming blade.

Assuming they move = 2d8+3 + 2d6 intitial attack + 2d8 secondary. * 2 attacks per round (except the first turn).
= 56 * 75% chance to hit (advantage) = 42 DPR

With 2 more levels of rogue and 1 more of warlock for 20 dex. (12 total).

(3d8+5+3d6+3d8) * 2
= 85 * .84 chance to hit = 71.4 DPR.


You lose a few attacks for casting greater invisibility. But you'll probably also get some surprise rounds being invsibilie and sneaky. As well as some crits.

I like the concept. I hate it taking level 9 to even get started with it. Having a friend wizard take greater invisibility and doing the same thing with a straight up rogue swashbuckler could be interesting. At level 7 that may be the scariest buff strategy I've seen.

 

[merwins]

More an attitude that doesn't jump to a "female" (man/woman) objectified stereotype as soon as a whip is mentioned. If you take a look into choice of sex and role in D&D products, it's an unfortunate tradition that powerful women are evil, and women generally are objectified. There are many shining exceptions of course. Our casual choices are normative ones.

Why I'm marking that here is that there is work before us in that regard, noting that gamers worldwide are making credible progress.

I find these observations fascinating and alien.

I have a male character whose quirk is that he will never use a piercing or slashing weapon (or tool) -- won't even use a table knife.

The whip is the only exception, and the reason for it is that the leather that IS the whip is the same leather that binds the head of his maul to its shaft. So he can break his primary weapon to get to his secondary weapon.

I figured somewhere down the line a suitably creative magical weapon will become available to him.

Gender was NEVER a consideration.
Sorry for the OT drift.

 

[FrogReaver]

Almost any major martial build with high STR and shield master. Not only do I get a big uptick from the high likelihood of having Advantage on all my attacks, I also get all the bonus damage my teammates do as a result of having advantage for free on their turn.

A good chance for advantage on your attacks is good. Proning an enemy can actually hurt some parties as it makes ranged characters incapable of focus firing on the same enemy as the melee allies. In short shield master is very effective in the right party but in a typical party it had slot of negative synergy working against it.

 

[mellored]

I like the concept. I hate it taking level 9 to even get started with it. Having a friend wizard take greater invisibility and doing the same thing with a straight up rogue swashbuckler could be interesting. At level 7 that may be the scariest buff strategy I've seen.

Better, a friendly sorcerer to twin-buff. Then 2 rogues with booming blade and full xd6 sneak attack running havoc.

 

[Greg Benage]

I know you said you don't care about "at-will," but just as a baseline and foregoing the UA stuff, a 5th-level AT with booming blade and an owl is doing 22.5 DPR (27 DPR if Cunning Action nets booming blade rider damage half the time). He's using zero resources (except owls, potentially), so he can pretty much do this all day. The DPR will scale up about +3 every other level, with booming blade bumps at 11th and 17th. Take variant human with Magic Initiate for booming blade and find familiar, and he's basically up and running at 2nd level when he gets Cunning Action. He also gets some spells and skills and stuff, but that's not really the point of the exercise.

For comparison, a Reckless Attacking 5th-level barbarian with GWF (duh - he doesn't get GWFing...adjust down a nudge) and GWM is doing about 33 for the three fights he's raging and about 30 for the three fights when he's not, assuming he continues to use Reckless Attack without damage mitigation. He drops down to just under 19 DPR for those three fights if he doesn't. His damage doesn't scale as well as the ATs (unless/until he adds PAM!). ETA adjusted numbers without GWF: 30.8 raging/reckless, 28.2 reckless, 17.5 not reckless).

 

[FrogReaver]

I know you said you don't care about "at-will," but just as a baseline and foregoing the UA stuff, a 5th-level AT with booming blade and an owl is doing 22.5 DPR (27 DPR if Cunning Action nets booming blade rider damage half the time). He's using zero resources (except owls, potentially), so he can pretty much do this all day. The DPR will scale up about +3 every other level, with booming blade bumps at 11th and 17th. Take variant human with Magic Initiate for booming blade and find familiar, and he's basically up and running at 2nd level when he gets Cunning Action. He also gets some spells and skills and stuff, but that's not really the point of the exercise.

For comparison, a Reckless Attacking 5th-level barbarian with GWF (duh - he doesn't get GWFing...adjust down a nudge) and GWM is doing about 33 for the three fights he's raging and about 30 for the three fights when he's not, assuming he continues to use Reckless Attack without damage mitigation. He drops down to just under 19 DPR for those three fights if he doesn't. His damage doesn't scale as well as the ATs (unless/until he adds PAM!). ETA adjusted numbers without GWF: 30.8 raging/reckless, 28.2 reckless, 17.5 not reckless).

Isn't the rogue better off dual wield style than trying to use booming blade at level 5? A d6 and a huge boost in accuracy to sneak attack seems much better than a d8 and a lower chance to land sneak attack? Maybe I'm missing some interaction he gets with the owl?

 

[Greg Benage]

Isn't the rogue better off dual wield style than trying to use booming blade at level 5? A d6 and a huge boost in accuracy to sneak attack seems much better than a d8 and a lower chance to land sneak attack? Maybe I'm missing some interaction he gets with the owl?

The owl grants advantage, so you're making two attack rolls to land sneak attack either way. The dual-wielder (say swashbuckler) can hit twice with a d6 weapon, while the AT can hit once with a 2d8 weapon (1d8 from the weapon, 1d8 from the melee cantrip on a hit). But:

* Advantage is better than two attack rolls for sneak attack crits (i.e. you never have that situation where you hit with the first attack and use sneak, then crit with the bonus-action attack).
* Crits are better with 2d8+3d6.
* The extra 2d8 rider damage from booming blade half the time isn't matched by the dual-wielder.

It's a marginal difference at 5th level (ETA: not that marginal -- I'm getting about 20 DPR for the TWFer, assuming variant human with Dual Wielder), but the AT scales better because of the melee cantrip. The AT is dependent on the owl, however. If the owl dies, the AT should switch over to TWFing to keep up, but then he can't bonus-action Disengage -- he has to spend a feat on Mobile to match the swashbuckler until he can re-summon the familiar.

So...swashbuckler more reliable, AT higher ceiling? Again, leaving out spells.