Are Superior Weapons "worth it"?

[The Human Target]

The thing is that "DPR" really doesn't matter as much as people make it out, for one simple reason: There's another human on the other end of the table who can make rational decisions, and usually he isn't going to screw you over if you're taking a beating.

I played WoW for a year; I raided hard for a year. In WoW you need to do a certain amount of DPS for a boss fight because otherwise you will die; the boss has a berserk timer where he will one-shot everyone if you don't kill him before a certain amount of time (anywhere from 5 minutes for a "DPS Race" fight where damage is all that matters, up to about 10+ minutes for a fight where you can slack on damage due to having to maneuver). In a dungeon now, you need to have a certain amount of damage or your healer will go out of mana and won't be able to heal your tank, and you'll die.

That doesn't exist in D&D. If your damage is slacking, the DM should make up for it and not throw monsters that have a truckload of HP at you, or fudge rolls, or make it do stupid/non-optimized things to compensate and even the playing field. D&D monsters don't have to follow a scripted AI and after X minutes it does 10x the damage and wipes (TPKs) everyone.

That's one thing the CharOp guys have never gotten through their head; not in 3.5 and not in 4e. Yes, everyone wants to be the guy who pulls out the uber-attack and pulls out insane damage in a single round, but it's not a big deal when the DM can adjust things on the fly to react to situations and throw you a bone if nobody is optimized for a lot of damage. IMO as long as a Striker can dish out a respectable amount of damage, they're good enough. Nobody is running Recount (for those who don't know, Recount is a WoW addon that tracks your DPS, and is basically an e-peen meter used to ridicule people who do under a certain amount at a certain level with a certain spec and certain gear) and calling you a baddie and a scrub and kicking you out of the group for doing under 40DPR or whatever the "ideal" range is at a given time, because the output doesn't matter nearly as much.

There are plenty of people who play the game as a game, and don't pull punches or build encounters to the specific party strength or fudge rolls.

 

[Dice4Hire]

To me, Sup Weapons are not worth it for a die type or a +1 to hit alone, but another nice ability plus one of the above will do it for me.

 

[Neonchameleon]

There's an interesting chart in the Avenger's guide on the CharOp forums that breaks down the DPR increases of various feats at each tier:

So while Weapon Focus scales in an absolutely linear fashion, getting higher weapon dice will almost always help you out more as you level up and get more and more [W] on your attacks, as well as getting additional attacks per round. It's basically an extension of the same logic of why 2d6 is better than 1d12, law of averages + standard deviation work in your favor.

Remember that the above chart is for Avengers rather than for people who roll once.

Also what I find interesting is that with Axe Expertise, the superior two handed axe is no longer the Executioner's Axe. It's the Urgrosh. Still a d12 weapon (and still effectively Brutal 1) - but you get defensive. You also get the butt-spike for anything that could use two weapons (including Two Weapon Fighting/Defence if you want to tank up - a slayer with a Poll-axe is both fluffy and effective).

 

[wayne62682]

There are plenty of people who play the game as a game, and don't pull punches or build encounters to the specific party strength or fudge rolls.

True, but there's still a human on the other side so it's still a different sort of scenario from an MMO where there's no ifs ands or buts that the boss will enrage and kill everyone unless everybody is doing X damage average, so IMO it's still a fool's errand to be only focused on damage, even for a pure Striker class; you want to be able to dish out enough damage to pull your weight and be able to fulfill your role in the party (otherwise you are just worthless and bring nothing to the group, and can actually hurt the rest of the party), but eking out every tiny bit of damage isn't a necessity like it is in WoW where it will wipe you if you can't do it.

 

[Psikus]

There's an interesting chart in the Avenger's guide on the CharOp forums that breaks down the DPR increases of various feats at each tier:

So while Weapon Focus scales in an absolutely linear fashion, getting higher weapon dice will almost always help you out more as you level up and get more and more [W] on your attacks, as well as getting additional attacks per round. It's basically an extension of the same logic of why 2d6 is better than 1d12, law of averages + standard deviation work in your favor.

It looks like the chart focuses on at-will DPR, which is the standard metric, but also a confusing one to evaluate feats. The use of multi[W] encounter powers should mean that anything providing a hit bonus or a damage bonus per damage die is relatively stronger, compared to static damage like weapon focus, than what the chart suggests.

 

[Neonchameleon]

That doesn't exist in D&D. If your damage is slacking, the DM should make up for it and not throw monsters that have a truckload of HP at you, or fudge rolls, or make it do stupid/non-optimized things to compensate and even the playing field.
...
That's one thing the CharOp guys have never gotten through their head; not in 3.5 and not in 4e.

This is a matter of playstyle. There are some DMs for whom fudging rolls is anathema. There are some groups who go in for the challenge - for instance Fourthcore players or anyone entering the Tomb of Horrors. Such a playstyle is absolutely meant to be a challenge and if the DM were to "even the playing field" it would take the challenge and hence the fun out of things. It would be like discovering you'd beaten someone you'd always wanted to in a competition - but only because he'd let you win. It would feel as if you'd simultaneously cheated and been patronised. Sandbox games are likewise going to kill you if you don't run and aren't strong enough. The monsters are what they are - and if despite the DM's warnings you wander into the wrong area and attack the wrong monster you are going to get creamed (or possibly cheesed). The way the DM makes up for it is to have plenty of things you can do even if you are weaker than expected rather than to fudge and fake in your favour.

Just because you advocate a playstyle in which the PCs always win doesn't mean that this is how everyone plays.

Oh, and you are aware that the DPR challenge on the Char-OP forum is a game? It's intentionally done with rules read to the letter and set situations. At one point one of the serious contenders on the DPR challenge was a mounted warlock using a charge attack with Eldritch Strike and a Polearm. Not something anyone in their senses would do in a real game? Probably not. And the person who submitted it knew this. But as an entry to the challenge it was a good one. However you seem to think that this was BadWrongFun?

 

[eamon]

It looks like the chart focuses on at-will DPR, which is the standard metric, but also a confusing one to evaluate feats. The use of multi[W] encounter powers should mean that anything providing a hit bonus or a damage bonus per damage die is relatively stronger, compared to static damage like weapon focus, than what the chart suggests.

Also, that chart is either incorrect, or it assumes the player is using Axe Expertise - otherwise the bonus by using an Execution Axe would be greater in heroic, and much greater in Epic (when at-wills do 2[W]). The Avenger in general is rather unusual in that Axe Expertise doesn't stack well with the Executioner Axe, and that further due to the double-rolling, accuracy is so high that things like Power Attack are much better than otherwise, and Expertise much less good than otherwise.

All in all, interesting, but you can't generalize from the Avenger to other classes.

 

[eamon]

True, but there's still a human on the other side so it's still a different sort of scenario from an MMO where there's no ifs ands or buts that the boss will enrage and kill everyone unless everybody is doing X damage average, so IMO it's still a fool's errand to be only focused on damage, even for a pure Striker class; you want to be able to dish out enough damage to pull your weight and be able to fulfill your role in the party (otherwise you are just worthless and bring nothing to the group, and can actually hurt the rest of the party), but eking out every tiny bit of damage isn't a necessity like it is in WoW where it will wipe you if you can't do it.

In comparison to WoW, there's no doubt that in 4e DPR optimization is less relevant.

If we take WoW out of the picture, then it's quite relevant. DPR (if properly weighted to include encounter/daily DPR) one of the best predictors of absolute combat performance - the other being defenses+damage soaking ability. Incidentally, this holds for all roles.

Not that nothing else matters in combat (not to mention out-of-combat), but if a party's DPR is low, good tactics will generally not be able to compensate, since good tactics tends to act as a multiplier.

And as to DM's compensating - well, that depends on the DM. I play in two games where this isn't entirely true. In one, the DM is entirely story-focused, and combats are ripped whole-sale from modules - the DM might pick a more difficult module if it's too easy, but he's not going to make major changes - and that means that more damage really does make combats go faster. And although the other game is run by a DM that does like to fiddle, he'll still use mostly by-the-book monsters. And so there too damage matters since you'll need to slice through almost the same number of hitpoints regardless of whether the party is optimized or not.

Not to mention that fact that cool combo's - particularly those involving several party members - are part of the attraction of combat. And they just don't work well if people don't do much damage.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

There are plenty of people who play the game as a game, and don't pull punches or build encounters to the specific party strength or fudge rolls.

Even if the dice are not fudged, the DM decides how many monsters are in the encounter, and of course, what adventure you play...

... I don´t fudge in 4e, but my monsters are also trying to make reasonable decisions and even may hang on ther lifes...

... I also don´t scale encounters that much, and I make every humanoid monster in my conversion, that has a name an elite of that stated level... until now my PCs survived, without beeing terribly optimized...

i guess 70% is a great guideline!

 

[Herschel]

There are plenty of people who play the game as a game, and don't pull punches or build encounters to the specific party strength or fudge rolls.

This is not a.... realistic (?) view though. If the DM is an active adversary for the PCs, the game has issues. There generally isn't quite so fine a line between life & death unless the DM is trying to manipulate things to kill the characters. If the party is less optimized then the DM has less impetus to "go for the kill", per se. My point is being blinded by optimization numbers can blind you to what's actually most effective. It's a group game and the group is stronger than the individual.

In other words, the difference between an effective character and an "optimized" character isn't that great, and at times the effective character is simply better for the party.

Take the Warlord, for example. By not using the Greatbow, I may give up a point of damage, but then I have the rattling keyword on my bread & butter at-will. My damage accelerator for the party is just as good and actually the power is better FOR THE PARTY because I'm imposing a -2 to hit and my heals do more healing. So the defender gets missed a little more and has to burn fewer surges. He's able to do his job better and longer because of my help while I still added my damage to the equation.