D&D 5E Monk vs Warlock: Checking the Baseline

[ad_hoc]

It is very useful for checking the recently made argument that monks are way behind on dealing damage over extended periods of time. Warlock is also a good comparison since both they and monk have a clearly limited resource per short rest and obvious ways to convert the resource into damage.

While both classes obviously have strong themes and should be evaluated based on those, this thread is clearly for the discussion of the damage aspect in the context of other discussions.

And I think that entire discussion is useless.

It's a fools' errand. Nothing to be gained by it.

 

[Gammadoodler]

So the recent Monk thread had me wondering about Treantmonk's baseline. First of all, I wanted to check it from a scientific standpoint (peer review is important!). But I also wanted to see for myself how the monk looked when I thought about my own campaigns.

The Numbers are below. Here are the assumptions I used.

1) Monk starts with 16 dex. The warlock starts with Cha 16. Monk is using a quarterstaff.
2) The warlock takes agonizing blast (Cha to damage) at 2nd level.
3) Both the monk and warlock increase their attack stat at level 4. At 8th we will assume the monk bumps wisdom, and the warlock bumps Cha. People commonly say that Monks are MAD have to split their stat bumps to be effective, so we will do that here to see how it fares.
EDIT: Note in my original numbers warlocks had an 18 cha to start. Feedback was this was a poor assumption for a baseline, so the numbers were adjusted to have 16 cha as the starting point.
4) At level 5 I give both classes a magic item (while technically optional, I have never played a table that didn't give characters a basic weapon magic item by 5th level). Warlocks get a +1 rod of the pact keeper (+1 to attacks only). Monk gets a +1 quarterstaff (which does not affect unarmed strikes).
5) I assumed a 65% hit rate when no additional attack bonuses were applied and the stat was 16. This means that applying more attack stat and attack bonuses from magic items increased the to-hit rate beyond 65%.
6) The % Improvement column is for the Monk, so positive numbers is how much more DPR the monk is doing.
7) I look at levels 1-10, because WOTC research shows these are the actual levels that people play at (which also is similar to the levels my table plays at). Therefore, I don't consider any data passed 10th level to be of relevance to the discussion.
8) First table is at base, second table is full power (hex and flurry). Third table is hex but no flurry.

Summary
1) At base (no hex, no flurry), the monk shows superior DPR at all levels, a good amount in fact.
2) With full power (hex and flurry), the monk's DPR is remains superior at all levels.
3) At levels 2-4 (which are common levels for many tables), the monk is almost 50% over the warlock in DPR.
4) At low levels (1-4), a warlock basically has to use hex to keep up with a monk. A monk can ignore flurry and stay close to the baseline. Once at 5th, the monk needs flurry to keep up with hex.
5) The only real debate point then is how often the Monk can flurry vs the Warlock can hex. This comes down to rounds/combat, frequency of short rest, how often concentration is disrupted or warlocks wants to use other concentration spells, etc.
6) Honestly, these numbers seem good enough that I don't think the Monk has trouble "making the baseline". He seems quite capable of putting out equal or superior damage to a warlock.

Spoiler

Level	Warlock	Monk	%Improvement
1​	3.85​	8.8​	128.57%​
2​	5.8​	8.8​	51.72%​
3​	5.8​	8.8​	51.72%​
4​	6.925​	10.85​	56.68%​
5​	14.8​	20.125​	35.98%​
6​	14.8​	20.125​	35.98%​
7​	14.8​	20.125​	35.98%​
8​	17.35​	20.125​	15.99%​
9​	17.35​	20.125​	15.99%​
10​	17.35​	20.125​	15.99%​
Level	Hex	Flurry	%Improvement
1​	6.3​	8.8​	39.68%​
2​	8.25​	12.5​	51.52%​
3​	8.25​	12.5​	51.52%​
4​	9.55​	15.525​	62.57%​
5​	20.4​	25.55​	25.25%​
6​	20.4​	25.55​	25.25%​
7​	20.4​	25.55​	25.25%​
8​	23.3​	25.55​	9.66%​
9​	23.3​	25.55​	9.66%​
10​	23.3​	25.55​	9.66%​
Level	Hex	Monk	%Improvement
1​	6.3​	8.8​	39.68%​
2​	8.25​	8.8​	6.67%​
3​	8.25​	8.8​	6.67%​
4​	9.55​	10.85​	13.61%​
5​	20.4​	20.125​	-1.35%​
6​	20.4​	20.125​	-1.35%​
7​	20.4​	20.125​	-1.35%​
8​	23.3​	20.125​	-13.63%​
9​	23.3​	20.125​	-13.63%​
10​	23.3​	20.125​	-13.63%​

In fairness, I don't believe there was any contention that low level monk damage was bad, so much as that it is not the best, and comparatively worse if you pull in feats and magic items.

Also, in this exercise, we've elected to set the cutoff at level 10, which is a pretty key break point since a number of +damage abilities come online between class abilities and cantrip scaling at level 11. So this is where I'd expect to see the damage balance tip away from the monk.

 

[Seramus]

Humorously, I think a monk spending ki on flurry of blows is flushing their potential down the toilet, unless they are fishing for a fourth attempt on a stun.

 

[jgsugden]

Humorously, I think a monk spending ki on flurry of blows is flushing their potential down the toilet, unless they are fishing for a fourth attempt on a stun.

You have to decide to spend the Ki before you make the unarmed strike, so that is often not a great gambit.

Open handed monk, with their ability to knock prone, push and negate reactions, have plenty of reason to flurry against an enemy rather than save the Ki for a stun. Why stun when you can knock off a cliff, into a pit, into the rea of a damage spell, etc... For exmple, if the enemy attacks right before the monk, a flurry allows you to knock the enemy prone and give all your allies advantage on melee attacks - just as if it was stunned - which can often allow you to bring the enemy down without the stun ever being relevant. In those situations, the potential extra damage from the extra flurry and two shots to prone the enemy is a better bet than one stun attempt.

 

[Mistwell]

And I think that entire discussion is useless.

It's a fools' errand. Nothing to be gained by it.

I think it sucks that someone forced you to read and respond to a thread you think is useless like this. You should give whoever did that to you a kung fu punch followed by an eldritch blast!

 

[Al2O3]

Ok, so the Monk, depending upon what #s & assumptions you plug into your equation, wins the DPR race against the Warlock.
Can't most classes can do that?

While I didn't follow the "Monks suck" thread closely, it did seem to claim that monks were way behind warlocks in terms of DPR. This thread seems to be all about checking that (apparent) claim.

 

[DND_Reborn]

@Stalker0

My calculations actually show Warlocks have a slight edge over Monks, but there are so many factors involved (short rests, number of rounds in a battle, how frequent the battles are, use of ki for non-flurry of blows, use of slots for other than hex or if concentration is broken, etc.).

IMO the difference is so slight that by bumping up the monk's martial arts damage die one stage they are nearly identical.

So, while I don't think monks are ahead in DPR as your calculations show, they certainly aren't far behind warlocks as others think. shrug

 

[TwoSix]

I don't think Tier 1-2 damage between Warlocks and Monks is really the problem. (And I agree that the calculations show Monks keep up just fine.) The "problem" with Monks compared to Warlocks is that they don't have a comparable bump in power to the 3rd and 4th beam of Eldritch Blast at levels 11 and 17.

The other problem with Monk relative to other Martial classes is that they don't have an obvious path to leverage the two power feats for damage, GWM and SS, and that their features have no synergies to make those kind of attacks better.

 

[jgsugden]

There are countless threads out there that check the DPR of the different options at different levels under different assumptions. In the end, there are a few heavy hitters that deal more damage and a lot of lighter hitters that deal less, but have more tricks up their sleeves to make up for it. The balance of all the classes - even the much maligned ranger - is fine.

 

[NotAYakk]

Warlocks at level 2 get 2 hour-long Hex's. They refresh these Hex's on a short rest, which takes an hour.

For a Warlock not to have Hex up, it requires they lose concentration, feel they have better uses for concentration/spell slots, or have a multiple-hour period with no rests and lots of combat.

By level 5, the Warlock's hex lasts 8 hours. They can wake up an hour early, cast Hex on a frog, kill the frog, then take an hour rest to get the slot back.

Hex at that point only costs concentration. If you have a 6+ hour day with no short rests they start having to spend actual slots on it.

Again, Hex is baseline.

---

I like using a fixed AC as my baseline. Both 16 and 18 AC are reasonable to me.

65% means hitting on an 8, which or an AC of 13-15 over that range, which is really low to me. That will value accuracy really low.

Level 8 monk with 18 dex and a +1 staff:
+4 (prof)+4(dex) = +8 to hit fists for 1d6+4 (x1)
+9 with staff for 1d8+5 (x2)

On 18 AC, 55% hit chance with fists and 60 % with staff.

2Staff+1Fist is then 16.15 damage. Each Ki is +4.3 damage, and has 8 Ki for 34.4 damage over a short rest.

Level 8 Warlock with 20 cha and +1 rod and hex
+10 to hit for 1d10+1d6+5 x2 (28)
65% hit chance (18.2) 5% crit (0.45) is 18.65 damage per round.

And has 2 4th level spell slots per short rest, which I think most people will accept is worth more than 34.4 damage.

So the Monk is 13.5% under the Warlock by level 8.

And while you chose to ignore it, at level 11 just round the corner the Warlock is getting +50% damage output, while the Monk's level 11 subclass features are nowhere near that strong.

---

TL;DR Hex isn't an "all out" option for a 2nd level warlock, let alone a 5th level warlock.

Your AC assumption was low, which means that the improved accuracy of the warlock wasn't all that valuable. At level 1, you assumed foes have 13 AC, which is almost the floor of ACs you'll run into. Even your level 10 model is assumed to be only fighting AC 15 enemies.

Starting at level 5 and increasing at level 8, the Warlock gets an increasing edge against higher AC foes compared to your Monk model.