D&D 5E good breakdown of multiclass vs single class for 5e?

[Flamestrike]

Leave, because life is too short to play with a DM that condescending to me and my fellow players.

Says the player who rocked up to a table with a class designed purely to abuse the 5 minute work day.

It's like losing a player who rocked up with a bag of rats. It would be no great loss.

 

[Dausuul]

Says the player who rocked up to a table with a class designed purely to abuse the 5 minute work day.

It's like losing a player who rocked up with a bag of rats. It would be no great loss.

If I saw a DM treat another player this way, I'd be just as quick to leave.

Bad behavior by a player does not justify equally bad behavior by the DM.

 

[Flamestrike]

If I saw a DM treat another player this way, I'd be just as quick to leave.

Bad behavior by a player does not justify equally bad behavior by the DM.

Its not 'bad behaviour' by a DM to say No to gamist players trying to abuse the system.

All this DM said was 'it doesn't work, this is why. Don't try it again at this table or leave'.

 

[ECMO3]

You dont have a feat yet as youre a Halfling Sorcerer 1, Fighter 1, Monk 3.

Three of the hypothetical players we are looking at (single classed Fighter, Single classed Monk and Single classed Sorcerer) are 5th level in thier class and have a feat. Those characters would all have the second chance feat even though you for some reason are not using the character I was asking about.

I agree the tripleclass character does not have a feat and I did not use it or the 18 dexterity it gives in any of the numbers I presented.

Im just running the three characters (Fighter, Monk and Sorcerer) as BOG standard single classed PCs (a Battlemaster, an OHM and a Draconic blaster) to show how 'complex MC builds, especially ones that do so prior to 5th level) come out poorly compared to single classed PCs.

You are not running the actual character I am playing so it is not relevant to the discussion.

Dude, you have 2 spell slots PER LONG REST, and 3 Ki points per Short rest!

Yes, so in tier 1 that is going to save about 5-30 damage on the spell slots and about the same on each use of ki. That is a huge number.

The Fighter PC presented is +7 to hit with his Bow, and +6 with his Sword, and can add +1d8 to hit thanks to Precise strike. In other words you're hit on 9's with the Bow, or 14's even if you use shield (and you can only do so twice), and any misses by 4 or less (so 4's base d20 roll, or 9's even with shield) are (on average) going to hit should I use precise strike (which I have 5 uses of, per short rest).

The fighter PC "presented" is not using my stats, is not using my race, and actually has nothing to do with the discussion.

But fine. On your turn you use a Ki point and your Bonus action to Dodge, and then move on up to the Fighter and GFB.

You hit on 12's (AC 18) dealing 1d10+1d8+3 (13) damage. 45 percent of 13 damage (lets ignore crits for now) is 6 damage.

It's now my turn.

Against an opponet with a shield, if he hit with Booming Blade and was also using patient defense he likely would not stay in melee and would move away, trading the AOO (at disadvantage and with potential shield spell) for the BB movement damage. He would only use GFB if there was another enemey within 5 feet or some reason he needed to do fire damage.

I'll shoot twice at +7 with the sword (at disadvantage because dodge and you're adjacent to me) if the lowest roll on one dice for either attack comes up 9 or more you're hit, which one of the two attacks should. I presume you'll use shield (knowing full well I have an action surge up my sleeve and 5 sup dice). Lets also presume I dont roll a 14 or more base on either attack due to disadvantage) so also I dont use precise strike.

You are wrong. The chance of rolling greater than a 9 with disadvantage is 36% (slightly better than 1 in 3) so what I highlighted in red above is factually incorrect. Statistically the most likely scenario is BOTH attacks miss, so they should both miss. If you action surge and attack 4 times the most likely outcome is one of them will hit with disadvantage. So with action surge you should hit once and cause shield to be cast.

Now, we are talking about chance and there are lots of possible outcomes but those are what should happen

A predetermined decision to use precision if you miss increases your base chance to 56% on a single attack without shield, but this gets tricky because shield comes AFTER a hit so precision comes before shield and a most of the time shield will cancel the precision if it is used after your roll. Further if you roll high enough to hit without precision, and shield is used you can't go back and add precision. So dealing with precision is statistically difficult unless you use a rules base for it. If you don't use precision you are less likely to hit and less likely to trigger shield. If you do use precision the chance to hit agaisnt shield is almost identical to the base chance to hit without shield but you are more likely to trigger shield. If you are only

* Note in the description I where I say "should" that refers to what is known in statistics as the "expected value" it is the most likely outcome from a random sample of a known population.

Finally, shield is generally a much better defensive spell than silvery barbs for this purpose, but in this white room 1-on-1 battle being propsed silvery barbs would generally be a better option on the second attack if shield is not already used and would give your opponent advantage on his turn.

For my object interaction, I'll switch to the Sword.

The AC in your example included a shield, so you don't really have an option other than using a sword or throwing a weapon (and only getting 1 attack). You could use an action to doff the shield.

 

[ECMO3]

Seeing as we can both see you're dead on turn 3 or worst case for me turn 4

Mathematically, as I posted earlier it is turn 5 (turn 4 with action surge) and I get a save not to go to 0.

 

[Flamestrike]

The fighter PC "presented" is not using my stats, is not using my race, and actually has nothing to do with the discussion.

They have everything to do with the discussion because they're BOG standard 5th level single classed PCs with nothing special or broken or fancy about them.

Against an opponet with a shield, if he hit with Booming Blade and was also using patient defense he likely would not stay in melee and would move away, trading the AOO (at disadvantage and with potential shield spell) for the BB movement damage. He would only use GFB if there was another enemey within 5 feet or some reason he needed to do fire damage.

You already moved 30' to get to melee range this turn, so you're not moving far. I also have a Bow, and am actually better with it than my sword, so it's a moot point.

You are wrong. The chance of rolling greater than a 9 with disadvantage is 36% (slightly better than 1 in 3) so what I highlighted in red above is factually incorrect. Statistically the most likely scenario is BOTH attacks miss, so they should both miss. If you action surge and attack 4 times the most likely outcome is one of them will hit with disadvantage. So with action surge you should hit once and cause shield to be cast.

Err... I didnt action surge till turn 3 or 4 when your shield spells were burnt out.

And a 1 in 3, followed by another 1 in 3 means statistically speaking, 1 attack should actually hit. A 36 percent chance, followed up by another 36 percent chance generates a much higher probability of a successful attack landing than does your singular 45 percent hit chance (with a slight possibility that both hit).

A predetermined decision to use precision if you miss increases your base chance to 56% on a single attack without shield, but this gets tricky because shield comes AFTER a hit so precision comes before shield and a most of the time shield will cancel the precision if it is used after your roll. Further if you roll high enough to hit without precision, and shield is used you can't go back and add precision. So dealing with precision is statistically difficult unless you use a rules base for it. If you don't use precision you are less likely to hit and less likely to trigger shield. If you do use precision the chance to hit agaisnt shield is almost identical to the base chance to hit without shield but you are more likely to trigger shield. If you are only

I play the odds. My average d8 roll is 4.5, so I never use precise strike unless I am no more than 4 away from your AC.

Accordingly Precise attack is only used in one of two circumstances:

1) When I miss your base AC of 16 by 4 or less. So (with the Bow at +7) it's used on base D20 rolls of 5-8. And every attack roll has a a 64 percent chance of generating a roll of at least 5 (presuming disadvantage).

You would presumably cancel that out with shield, but that's OK. You have 2 x shields, and I have 4 x superiority dice.

2) If shield has already been used, or if my attack roll dice come up in the 10-13 range (for a final attack roll of 17-20) - which happens at least 30 percent of the time with disadvantage - I also use a sup dice, because I either am (or am likely to be) aiming to hit AC 21.

I factored bad rolling by me in the first 2 turns, so I only hit once on turn one (that you negated with shield) and on turn 2 I had to use a precise strike just to land a hit at all (that you also negated with shield).

So on turn 1 I only managed a single attack roll of 9 (from two attempts, which I had a roughly 2/3 chance of getting factoring in two attacks) and on turn 2 I managed a single attack roll in the 10-13 range from two attempts (which I had a 50 percent chance of getting, factoring in two attacks), that you managed to successfully negate with shield anyway (so I also rolled poorly on the d8, getting a 1-3 on the D8, and still not high enough to hit your shielded AC).

Regardless of my poor rolling, you're totally undamaged at the end of my turn 2, and out of spell slots, and with 1 ki point remaining.

The AC in your example included a shield, so you don't really have an option other than using a sword or throwing a weapon (and only getting 1 attack). You could use an action to doff the shield.

No it didnt. Plate, AC 18. I use a Greatsword and Bow.

 

[Flamestrike]

@ECMO3

PVP is silly anyway, and clearly I win (my Monk likely had problems due to your good Con saves vs Stunning fist).

How about you Math it out (or look at those PCs) in the context of the following common encounters for a 5th level party, spread out over a single adventuring day (presume short rests after encounters 2 and 4):

1) Hobgoblin boss and 5 Hobgoblins.
2) 2 x Ettins
3) 4 x Gargoyles
4) 1 x Ghast and 4 x Ghouls
5) 2 x Black dragon wyrmlings
6) 1 x Young black dragon (increase CR by 1, HP by 20 percent, add 2 x LA from adult white, and 2 x LR)

 

[Flamestrike]

Look at the above encounters and consider the impact of Fireball, or Hypnotic pattern, or Revivify, or Extra Attack or 12 bardic inspiration die instead of 4, or 15 Ki points (and stunning fist) etc.

 

[ECMO3]

They have everything to do with the discussion because they're BOG standard 5th level single classed PCs with nothing special or broken or fancy about them.

But I asked about multiclassing MY character or waiting until 5th level. Not some random character you think is standard.

Err... I didnt action surge till turn 3 or 4 when your shield spells were burnt out.

Ok then you are a little ahead of what I originally posted. You do not use AS in turns 1-3 (while shield and patient defense are in play). What I put in turn 4 and turn 5 both happen in turn 4. You take him to 0 in turn 4 and he gets a save to stay at 1.

And a 1 in 3, followed by another 1 in 3 means statistically speaking, 1 attack should actually hit. A 36 percent chance, followed up by another 36 percent chance generates a much higher probability of a successful attack landing than does your singular 45 percent hit chance (with a slight possibility that both hit).

If you have a 36% chance of hitting your explicit chances are:

two hits: 13%
zero hits: 42%
first hit second miss: 23%
first miss second hit: 23%

I play the odds. My average d8 roll is 4.5, so I never use precise strike unless I am no more than 4 away from your AC.

Accordingly Precise attack is only used in one of two circumstances:

1) When I miss your base AC of 16 by 4 or less. So (with the Bow at +7) it's used on base D20 rolls of 5-8. And every attack roll has a a 64 percent chance of generating a roll of at least 5 (presuming disadvantage).

You would presumably cancel that out with shield, but that's OK. You have 2 x shields, and I have 4 x superiority dice.

2) If shield has already been used, or if my attack roll dice come up in the 10-13 range (for a final attack roll of 17-20) -

Well that is a rule base, although you should not know what an adversaries AC is and if we are going to assume, my unarmored character should be assumed to have about a 12 AC at least for the first time you roll.

That minor point aside, this is rather complicated to account for statistically. Regardless you will do LESS damage in the first 2 turns then I calculated because you will be using precision LESS. You may make up for it later on, but you won't take me to 0 any earlier than turn 4.

which happens at least 30 percent of the time with disadvantage - I also use a sup dice, because I either am (or am likely to be) aiming to hit AC 21.

Your math is way off. The chance of rolling between a 10-13 on a roll with disadvantage is exactly 16%. Chance of rolling 11-13 on one dice is 20%, chance of rolling 13+ on the other is 40%. With 2 combinations the overall chance of this happening is 16%

I don't know what a sup dice is, but if it is a set of dice that rolls between 10-13 with disadvantage then I guess I understand where you are coming from.

So on turn 1 I only managed a single attack roll of 9 (from two attempts, which I had a roughly 2/3 chance of getting factoring in two attacks) and on turn 2 I managed a single attack roll in the 10-13 range from two attempts (which I had a 50 percent chance of getting, factoring in two attacks), that you managed to successfully negate with shield anyway (so I also rolled poorly on the d8, getting a 1-3 on the D8, and still not high enough to hit your shielded AC).

now you are making stuff up. Use actual math if you want to support your position.

 

[ECMO3]

@ECMO3

PVP is silly anyway, and clearly I win (my Monk likely had problems due to your good Con saves vs Stunning fist).

Instead of focusing on random combats, why don't you address the things I said I care about? I specifically bolded them in the original post on page 3 and you still ignored them. I will post them again here.

Charisma save vs damage to keep from going to 0 hp
proficiency in Con and Charisma
Darkvision 120 feet (please do not suggest a different race)
Shield
BB, GFB cantrips
5 cantrips
6 spells
second wind 1d10+5
Action Surge
40hp (please don't come back with another character with a higher constitution)
Martial Arts
1d8 Martial Arts damage
Stunning Strike

These are the things that matter to this character build. Do you understand that?

Those were the things I said were important to this build. I can't get all of them in a multiclass by level 5, I can't get all of them in a single class by level 5. I can get some of them in either a multiclass or a single class and I want to maximize that.

Please build me the character (using my abilities and my race) that gets me as many of these things as possible by level 5. I don't think all of these are equal in importance, but they are all roughly equal. Provide me the template that gets the most of these by level 5 on a halfling with my stats. If you think some of them are just silly then explain why they are silly and should not be on the list.

Partial results matter, so while say 4 spells is not 6 and not meeting the desire by 6th level, it is something and if losing 2 out of 6 spells gets me something else on this list great! Giving up all 6 spells for something else though is not "great" that is an even trade.

I think the character I presented 1sorcerer/1fighter/3 shadow Monk gets me the most of the things that matter. But perhaps I am wrong.

Although some subclasses won't work thematically, I am going to ignore that for the moment. You can use any class or subclass features you want to get as many of these as possible. The only thing that are not changable are:
1. halfing
2. S8/D17/C12/I8/W16/CH13 at start
3. first ASI is second chance with dex boost to 18