D&D 4E Careful Shot vs Twin Strike....No Contest (4e spoilers)

[Stalker0]

So I ran some math to compare these two powers, and the results are so one sided I thought I had to share.

Let's assume a ranger is wielding two longswords, and is attacking his hunter's quarry. He has the option of choosing twin strike or careful shot. Which one will net him the most damage?

If the ranger has higher than a 10% chance of hitting, twin strike does more damage. Not only that, twin strike has a better chance to hit at least once.

However, that's assuming both weapons are the same. So let's go big, and say the ranger has a +3 longsword in his primary, and a +0 in his offhand. That's a tremendous difference, so it should give us a good gauge.

Now, Twin Strike still does more damage as long as the main hand has a 35% chance of hitting or better (the off hand has a 20% chance or better). Again remember, that's a difference of +3, which in most dnd games should NOT be occurring.


Still not convinced? Let's take out the hunter's quarry and see if perhaps careful shot does better without the quarry.

The answer....not at all. Even with that +3 longsword difference in the main and offhand, as long as the ranger has a 35% chance with that main hand of hitting, twin strike is better.


Twin Strike does more damage. Twin strike is more flexible (you can attack two targets instead of one). Twin strike gives you more chances to crit, and remember you can choose which attack to put your quarry on, so that's more oppurtunity for your quarry to crit.

In fact, twin strike has such a large advantage I can't see any reason to take careful shot. Even if there are some crazy corner cases where careful shot is useful, why would you choose it when twin strike is better 99% of the time?

 

[chaotix42]

I saw this posted by another member of EN World. Sad that such a suboptimal power made it in - apparently a lot of those "Bonus to hit, fewer [W]" powers are pretty mediocre.

Oh well, I guess the ranger essentially has 3 at-wills. : P

 

[zoroaster100]

Now that you've shared your resuls with us, could you please also share your underlying math with us? The results don't actually surprise me too much, but it would be nice to have it laid out, especially for any WOTC employees that read this thread and might be in a position to errata Careful Shot if your math supports the need for such.

 

[Mal Malenkirk]

IMO, Twin strike should have been for melee only.

 

[Mort_Q]

You can wield two longswords?

 

[ryryguy]

It may not change the underlying math that much... but doesn't the off hand weapon have to be light, like a short sword and not a longsword?

(Or is there some ranger feature or feat that allows the larger off hand weapon?)

 

[parasyte]

Now that you've shared your resuls with us, could you please also share your underlying math with us? The results don't actually surprise me too much, but it would be nice to have it laid out, especially for any WOTC employees that read this thread and might be in a position to errata Careful Shot if your math supports the need for such.

Let's take a base d8 weapon. Even if you have a 10% chance of hitting (roll of 19 or 20 hits), Twin strike is better.

- d8 gets replaced with 4.5, as that is the average damage a d8 will do.

Careful:
17-19 hit, 20 crits. 15% chance of d8 damage and 5% chance of 8 damage.
(.15 * 4.5) + (.05 * 8) = 1.075 damage per use.

Twin:
19 hits, 20 crits. 5% chance of doing d8 damage and 5% chance of doing 8 damage.
(.05 * 4.5) + (.05 * 8) = .625 per roll.
.625 per roll * 2 rolls per use = 1.25 per use.

Even with a plain weapon Twin Shot is 16% better.

Now something more typical, with something more your level - say a roll of 14 hits.

Careful:
12-19 hit, 20 crits. 5% crit and 40% hit.
.4 * 4.5 + .05 * 8 = 2.2 per use
Twin:
14-19 hit, 20 crits: 5% crit and 30% hit
.3 * 4.5 + .05 * 8 = 1.75 per roll = 3.5 per use.

Now it's even more pronounced.
The math is pretty easy to do for the rest of the numbers, basically the farther you go from needing a 21 to hit (which is the only point where Careful Shot is better than Twin Strike with a plain d8 weapon) the better a choice Twin Strike is.

I haven't run the equation with high crit or magic weapons. Intuitively the bonuses from them won't fundamentally change the math but it could, so if anyone wants to, feel free.

 

[Vendark]

Consider that the two attacks of Twin Strike effectively count as two different actions where immediate actions are concerned (PHB p.268), and then consider how monster powers interact with hits and misses.

Take the common as dirt goblin as an example. If a ranger melee attacks a goblin with Twin Strike and misses, the goblin can shift away, and the second attack is wasted unless there happens to be another monster adjacent. Against goblins, I'd say Careful Attack is a pretty decent option...and I'm sure there are many, many more monsters where that will also be the case.

 

[Saitou]

You can't wield two longswords, only weapons with the Off-Hand keyword can be wielded effectively in your off-hand. The difference isn't large, but it's there.

 

[Vendark]

You can't wield two longswords, only weapons with the Off-Hand keyword can be wielded effectively in your off-hand. The difference isn't large, but it's there.

Rangers can if they choose the Two Weapon Fighting style.