Best of the Best - Strikers.

Which of these is the best striker?

  • Ranger - Archer

    Votes: 46 22.0%
  • Ranger - Two-blade

    Votes: 35 16.7%
  • Ranger - Beastmaster

    Votes: 2 1.0%
  • Rogue - Artful

    Votes: 15 7.2%
  • Rogue - Brutal

    Votes: 17 8.1%
  • Rogue - Ruthless

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Warlock - Dark

    Votes: 4 1.9%
  • Warlock - Fey

    Votes: 3 1.4%
  • Warlock - Star

    Votes: 2 1.0%
  • Warlock - Infernal

    Votes: 1 0.5%
  • Warlock - Vestige

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Avenger - Isolating

    Votes: 4 1.9%
  • Avenger - Pursuing

    Votes: 10 4.8%
  • Avenger - Commanding

    Votes: 2 1.0%
  • Barbarian - Rageblood

    Votes: 18 8.6%
  • Barbarian - Thaneborn

    Votes: 1 0.5%
  • Sorcerer - Cosmic

    Votes: 3 1.4%
  • Sorcerer - Dragon

    Votes: 11 5.3%
  • Sorcerer - Storm

    Votes: 13 6.2%
  • Sorcerer - Wild

    Votes: 19 9.1%
  • Monk - Centered

    Votes: 3 1.4%

Chaos sorcerers are both fun to play and good at damage. There's more flavors of strikers out there than anything else, so you are likely to see people voting for their favorites. I was surprised at how many selected the ranger, but my current main group doesn't have one, so I don't have a chance to see them in play outside RPGA games.
 

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One thing I've found that happens with every ranger I've seen in play, and so far that's about six in as many groups, is that inevitably they just end up spamming Twin Strike.

It has so far become a running joke in every single group. "What does your ranger do this turn?" Everybody answering in unison, "TWIN STRIKE!"

Heh... hmmm how to make spamming fun ... a drinking game
If the player can describe the action differently every time
they use it make a tally every time the talley reaches a
certain lucky number take a drink...

I like the Robinhood/William Tell Ranter Archer and twin strike lends itself well to lots of descriptions..
 

There are too many aspects of Strikers to simply say which is best.

For a general best striker, iid go for the archer ranger with it's high damage, mobility, and independence.


For more survivabiltty I'd say warlock. I've never seen a warlock die if a TPK wasn't nearby.

Avenger if you need a "slay him now" style striker.

As for pure damage, we all know who...
 

Since we got 4e, we've seen almost all the strikers in play:

Game 1
Halfling brutal Rogue, levels 1-3

Our 1st taste of 4e. First level or two, he stayed in back throwing daggers. Did and was dealt little damage. Later, got riskier, jumping in to get CA. Did and was dealt alot of damage(dropped every other fight or so).


Game 2
Halfling brutal Rogue, Daggermaster, levels 1-16

The Rogue was pretty much the same as from the first game. He got better at getting CA without getting attacked as much. Extreme mobility once he got "Gummy-beary juice", the level 6(?) at-will that lets you jump and exceed your movement. Cool character, like a little feral bouncy ninja. He still only rolls a crit every other battle or so - though, he's our wild card since he rolled crits three rounds in a row during one fight and the next didn't roll a single one...

Half-elf warlock, Feytouched(?), levels 1-16

The Warlock was our controller and excelled at avoiding damage, dropping the occasional status effect and dealing moderate damage. Ended up saving our butts from time to time by "lock-tanking" in fights where the rest of us were getting screwed up. Almost invariably, she'd have very little damage and would teleport to the front lines and play D for a bit while the cleric patched the rest of us up.

Her Slashing Wake feat(Int damage to enemies on teleport) makes minion-fights trivial.

Elven Ranger, TWF, Stormwarden, levels 1-16

The Ranger was my character and I don't think I ever found him boring. Being Stormwarden with TWD, he had decent defenses, plus Weave-Through-the-Fray and others to get the heck out of dodge when needed. I liked how when he started, bow and sword were almost equal and I would switch between as needed. Closer to paragon, I began phasing out the bow part and once Stormwarden was hit (yes, with frost-cheese) he's the party's main source of steady, consistent damage.


Game 3
Half-orc Barbarian, Rageblood, levels 3-6

The amount of damage he puts out is staggering. Mordenkrad + Half-orc + Howling Strike + Obsidian Steed + Horned Helm + Boots of Adept Charging = A +1-to-hit, 4d6 + 10-12 damage attack almost every round at 5th level.

Stir in some Bestial Armor and his Rageblood free charge and, in the last fight, he did a Howling Strike(+Orc Extra Damage) Crit + Free Barb MBA on crit + Bestial armor to do three huge attacks and take an elite goblin from somewhat bloodied to dead in a round.

His 7 THP on killing something make him decently tanky, despite his slightly-low AC: he has 20 at level 6, about the same as the pacifist cleric's and WAY below the Swordmage's 26.

Drow Wild Sorcerer, levels 3-6

Good damage, decent status effects (especially with a Feyswarm Staff). He rolls evens several times in a row with remarkable frequency, allowing his Chaos Bolt (he calls it "The Magical Bouncing Ball of Doom") to frequently hit between 2 and 6(!) enemies in a round. Like the warlock, he's somewhere between controller and striker.


Game 4
Gnome Dragonmagic Sorcerer, levels 3-9

Dragonmagic Sorcerers are sweet. In one big fight when he dropped 2 dallies, then hit with his at-will burst, any enemy that hit him would take 5 lightning + 5 cold + 3 fire and by pushed 1 square if it hit him. If he activated his Dragonflame Mantle, add another 1d6 fire to that... Since our Scales of War group is only 3 of us, he's stepped up and solo'd the second half a couple tough fights while my Avenger and the Cleric lay bleeding out. His damage isn't as high as the Wild-Mage, but man do enemies have a tough time hurting him.

Elven Pursuit Avenger, levels 3-5
Half-elf Pursuit Avenger, levels 5-9

The first was my first attempt at an Avenger, using a fullblade. He was kinda fun, with big shifts and teleports, fair-to-good defenses, and moderate damage. After the first adventure, I decided to switch out to the infamous "Daggavenger" to see how they played at heroic (Half-elf Twin-Strike Daggermaster at Paragon uber-cheese). As a result, power's dex-based riders are far less exciting, his defenses are much lower, but his damage (Bloodclaw Executioner's Axe until Paragon) is far higher.

Interestingly, I found that Power Attack made for a significant drop in damage, since about once per combat, the -2 made the difference between hitting and missing(and missing out on 1d12+10 to 2d12+16 damage).


Final summary:
TWF ranger is good at single-target smack-downs, with enough evasion/decent defenses to survive to deal it. The Stormwarden(with rolled stats and Scimitar Dance) mean, at 16, a minimum of 21 damage a round against the Twin-Strike target, average somewhere in the mid-high 30s. Also managed to pull out the generic Armor Splinter + Blade Cascade to dish out around 200 damage to a solo in one round at level 15, and I didn't even get all my attacks in.

The rogue's daze/blind/stun powers and sneak attack make for a smattering of helpful control and occasional bursts of huge damage.

The fey warlock makes for great control when built that way and Paragon Feylocks trivialize minions.

Barbarians can do sick amounts of damage and usually have enough HP/THP in our experience to survive to dish it out.

The Wild Sorcerer is great at ranged DPS with a smattering of control thrown in, while the Dragon Sorcerer is extremely survivable and can dish out nearly as much.
 

I wanted to have the surprise vote: Wizard!

In our group we had 2 rogues, and avenger, a cleric, a fighter, and a wizard.

We keep our DPR milestones on a blackboard and see who can get the most damage in one round. The rogues are at like 317 and 363, the avenger is at 461, and the wizard is over 800...

Overall, the wizard is the best striker in the game. :p
That's a lot of damage, what level are ya?
All my experience so far suggests the Ranger is just awesome in damage. He deals out a lot, and he takes a lot. :p

But he can't really take it. There needs to be a very good Defender and Leader in the party to survive for long. But maybe the people playing him are playing him "wrong" - they need to keep moving. If I ever play a Ranger, I will see what I can do about that.

Maybe there is a good argument for actually playing a Dwarven Ranger. Con Bonus, Minor Action Second Wind...
bow-ranger takes almost no damage quite often..
I don't like questions like these because they are so vague.

A Striker's job is to deal damage. If a Striker is not dealing competitive damage, you could say it's not doing the job of a Striker.

So the "Best Striker" is the one that does the most DPR. Not necessarily nova, mind you, but sustained DPR.

Keeping that in mind, the best Striker is the two-blade Ranger--particularly Storm Wardens and Pit Fighters--because it does the most damage, even more than its archer cousin. Of course, that's pretty much all that Rangers are capable of doing--damage. They are the purest Striker, and they excel at it.

If by "best" you actually meant "favorite," then Pursuit Avenger, without a doubt. What an awesomely fun class to play. But as it is, this poll is pretty meaningless because everybody voting on it isn't answering the same question.
Well, a dual-weilding ranger indeed has the highest possible dps - unfortunately, as i told my raiders for years in several MMO's a dead (or dying) striker does 0 dps - Which is why the archer is the better striker, going by your definition. He will be stunned/dazed/dead/dying a lot less than the melee one.
 

In a strange twist, all 4 are from the PHB1 (goodbye power creep) and three of the four are martial options (who could have imagined that back in the days of third edition).

I find this really cool!

In 3E, nothing ever surpassed the cleric, druid, and wizard in power, with sorcerer close behind.

Any poll of favorite classes to play or which you've played or which you played the most always skewed very heavily towards the core classes.

And if a poll were done for the "roles" of 3E, the only reason a martial/noncaster character couldn't possibly win in more than 2 roles is because the leader/healing thing as a martial aspect is new to 4E.
 

Say what you want. All I know is the dual weapon ranger I played with couldn't hit squat. My brutal scoundrel drow rogue on the other hand dealt more damage than all of the other party members combined. Booyah.
 

Say what you want. All I know is the dual weapon ranger I played with couldn't hit squat. My brutal scoundrel drow rogue on the other hand dealt more damage than all of the other party members combined. Booyah.

First post on EnWorld is a 1-year threadsurecction? Welcome to EnWorld.

I think your dual-weapon ranger was rolling poorly or built his ranger non-optimally. At high paragon my dual-scimitar ranger was doing as much or more damage per fight as our rogue and warlock combined.*
*Caveat: assuming the rogue didn't go on a critting spree and get more than 1 crit in a fight - his average
 

I've been playing an Artful Dodger rogue for the past 6 levels, and I have a hard time getting combat advantage. Got maybe 3 sneak attacks during last session's combat. :(

Perhaps you aren't taking enough risks as an artful dodger then. With mine, it's running into the fray and attacking from the middle of all the bad guys, and zipping back out. Almost never missing and hardly ever getting hit thanks to increased AC against opportunity attacks or powers that let him shift 5 squares, etc. In true glass cannon fashion, he's hits often but unless he's moving he get hit... hard.
 

Getting combat advantage as a rogue is ultimately up to the player, of course, but the make-up of the party, structure of the encounters, and teamwork from the other players can make a huge difference. Defenders can be cooperative flanking buddies or not, as can melee-oriented leaders and other melee-oriented strikers. Leaders can also arbitrarily hand you CA if they take the right powers. Controllers can daze/stun/blind/knock-prone/etc enemies, giving you CA.

Aside from that variability, though, the Rogue hits like no other class. Even the Essentials Rogues and Slayer quite live up to the 4e Rogue's combination of a +3 proficiency weapon, weapon talent, and /weapon attack powers vs non-AC defenses/.
 

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