D&D 5E Which characters are the DPR (damage per round) leaders at your table(s)?

[THEMNGMNT]

This is my personal, anecdotal experience:

I ran a 1-20 campaign with a vengeance paladin, beastmaster ranger, arcane trickster rogue, lore bard, and shadow sorcerer. The paladin was easily the DPR king. That player would burn smites like they were going out of style. I tend to run deadly fights with enemies coming in waves. Once the paladin was over 10th level it was difficult to exhaust all his spell slots. The sorcerer also had excellent DPR. The lore bard peaked in Tier 2 and Tier 3. The players of the ranger and rogue had suboptimal builds despite my best efforts to help them.

I am currently running a campaign with an evoker wizard, cavalier fighter, and swashbuckler rogue at 8th level. They're about evenly matched. The fighter is much more effective than I was expecting -- the heroic badass you want a fighter to be. The wizard was the weakest in Tier 1 but now wrecks face. The rogue's player has little interest in direct damage and is more of a lateral thinker who tries off the wall tactics to flip the situation on its head. Good times.

Also running a campaign with an evoker wizard, vengeance paladin, and genie warlock at 8th level. I've house ruled that the paladin only gets one smite per turn. That seems to be having the desired effect. The paladin is formidable but doesn't overshadow the rest of the party. The wizard's player is more fluent in the rules than the warlock's player, and that results in his character having higher DPR.

 

[ECMO3]

Spirit Guardians takes being in it for three rounds to bypass a fireball. Considering most combats only last 3-4 rounds, foes can move to exit the AoE, and they can break concentration on the casters, Fireball will often do better in practical terms.

And that's not even considering the opportunity cost of it being a Concentration spell. The fireball caster may have already up a Concentration spell and be gaining other benefits, while the Spirit Guardians caster can not.

The problem with fireball is it is situational and typically hard to place for maximum effect unless you are an evocation wizard. The area is huge and unless you win initiative your party members will usually get mixed up with the enemy before your turn comes around. I think the ease of use pretty much evens out the point made about SG.

As I've got more experience I find I prefer lightning bolt to fireball as a 3rd level blasting spell. While Fireball can get a lot more enemies under ideal circumstances, that rarely exists in play and really makes fireball very situational. Also when fighting a lone BBEG with a high CR (1 dragon/purple worm/vampire etc) Lightning Bolt is going to do just as much damage but be a lot easier to use employ.

 

[JiffyPopTart]

Sir, I have brought up points several times and you have refused to engage with any of them. You are also moving the goalposts from Spirit Guardians vs. Fireball to whole classes. At this point I see no point in continuing this discussion.

Sure thing. I'll just refer you back to your post #101 which started our side discussion and you can read for yourself whether or not I was talking about classes in general or specifically about the merits of SG vs Fireball in the post of mine you replied to.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

unless you win initiative your party members will usually get mixed up with the enemy before your turn comes around.

I'm surprised that there are not more "pump up initiative" wizard builds around.

 

[Blue]

The problem with fireball is it is situational and typically hard to place for maximum effect unless you are an evocation wizard. The area is huge and unless you win initiative your party members will usually get mixed up with the enemy before your turn comes around. I think the ease of use pretty much evens out the point made about SG.

As I've got more experience I find I prefer lightning bolt to fireball as a 3rd level blasting spell. While Fireball can get a lot more enemies under ideal circumstances, that rarely exists in play and really makes fireball very situational. Also when fighting a lone BBEG with a high CR (1 dragon/purple worm/vampire etc) Lightning Bolt is going to do just as much damage but be a lot easier to use employ.

Sure. I am using Fireball simply because that was the example that couldn't keep up with damage of Spirit Guardians. Fireball has limitations on targeting because it can get allies. Spirit Guardians has limitations on targeting because it has no range and has a smaller area of effect.

Personally I'm with you on Lightning Bolt - in practical terms it's useful more times. If I'm playing a wizard who wants AoE damage, I learn fireball first because with very limited slots per day to cast it I can usually find enough times that it (or other 3rd level spell) is useful at which point it's more targets. But I make sure by higher levels I have Lightning Bolt for more frequent tactical usage when I have more 3rd+ level slots to use, as well as an alternate damage type.

 

[jgsugden]

...In actual play, the greatest single target damage dealer was an Eldritch Knight / Gloom Stalker Great Weapon master / Paladin. In the first round of a big combat he would attack 10 (or 11) times, with each attack at +13 for 2d6 (reroll 1or 2) + 9 (Strength) + 3 weapon + 10 (great weapon master) ... and he'd smite on top of it. He got the drop on an Ancient Dragon and 'soloed it' before it acted (Surprise round and first round before dragon goes, dragon prone for advantage, 30 damager per hit and the PC was going to get about 17 to 19 attacks before it went...

....Christ in heaven. And they thought 2E multiclassing was bad! I thought Samurai was painful burst but it's a joke next to that.

That is three classes: Fighter, Ranger, Paladin. The PC was an Underdark based PC who fell into the service of a God late in their career. I thought of it as a bit of a Vax rip off the way that they added the Paladin and suddenly 'finding the Gods'.

If you want to talk multiclassing, let me introduce you to Myska Urge, my Glasya Tiefling Archer. She began as a bodyguard to a low level beurocrat sent to the Underdark - but her charge was murdered and she was banished for her failure. She joined an adventuring group and introduced them to her views on religion - that labeling Asmodeus as evil and condemning him for his place in society overlooked that he served an essential function and was doing whatever he had to in order to serve that function - Fighting the Blood War. She joined his clergy, and then within the clergy became an assassin in their service (which became a major plot point for the campaign).

Gloom Stalker Ranger 5, Cleric of Order 1, Divine Soul Sorcerer 5, Fighter Battlemaster 4, Rogue Assassin 3, Divine Soul for 2 more levels. 5 Classes.

In some ways an abomination of multiclassing, that was a pretty organic development. She was also extremely efficient.

 

[Stalker0]

That is three classes: Fighter, Ranger, Paladin.

I'm unclear on how you get to like 10 attacks. My numbers are 3 attacks (fighter base) + 1 (gloomstalker 1st round) = 4, x2 (action surge) = 8. How do you get to 11?

 

[Cap'n Kobold]

I'm unclear on how you get to like 10 attacks. My numbers are 3 attacks (fighter base) + 1 (gloomstalker 1st round) = 4, x2 (action surge) = 8. How do you get to 11?

Haste spell and a bonus action attack (GWM crit, PM buttstroke etc) would take it to 10 I think.