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Message: <blockquote data-quote="FormerlyHemlock" data-source="post: 6662884" data-attributes="member: 6787650">Look, KD, before I address your post, here's who I am and here's what I'm about:My name is Max. I'm a middle-aged software engineer in Seattle. I've recently picked up 5E within the past year after being away from D&D since the TSR era in the 90s. I've just recently started DM'ing, also within the past nine months or so. My big thing while DM'ing is enabling and respecting player choice. My big thing as a player is versatility and planning ahead. When it comes to Internet forums, I value two things: usefulness and accuracy. In this discussion, I'm focused on trying to point things out that people might not necessarily think of themselves (e.g. new players may not know how to use Planar Binding, and it may not occur to them that breaking the concentration and action economies with it or Animate Dead is a powerful thing), and in preventing people from believing things that are false. I don't want anyone thinking that GWM or Sharpshooter is uniquely good, then nerfing those feats and thinking they're going to have a perfectly-balanced game after that, and being surprised when it doesn't happen. I want them to at least know what they're getting into.That's who I am. I'm not trying to pick a fight with you, and frankly I don't really care how you run your game. You're not my audience and I'll stop talking as soon as I run out of things to say, even if you're not persuaded yet. Presumably you'll do the same.That being said:RE: #1, "Your 11th level Sorlock cannot have both the spell sniper feat and a Charisma of 20. So it is either range, or a bonus to hit." This is simply incorrect. A sorlock can have 20 Cha and Spell Sniper by level 11 as easily as you can have Sharpshooter by level 1, as you yourself note. "Option 0 can start at level 1. Alternatively, it starts at level 4 for many PCs." Rolling is the standard method, and if you roll a 16 you can be a half-elf and start with Cha 18 and boost Cha to 20 at Sorc 4 and pick up Spell Sniper at Sorc 8 (or the other way around). Alternatively, even if you're using the standard array, you can put a 15 in Cha and then be a Variant human for 16 Cha and Spell Sniper at level 1. Then boost Cha at Sorc 4 and Sorc 8. Likewise, you can't twin Eldritch Blast in the first place, nor do you need to--Quicken Spell is all that the numbers I cited rely upon. Yes, a Hunter could Volley to shoot "3, 4, 5, even more" foes within a 10' radius, but what are you trying to prove by citing that? The sorlock could toss a Fireball for more damage over a 20' radius and still Eldritch Blast somebody that round. (Sharpshootered Volley has better range though, I'll give it that. Rangers are pretty cool.) Yes, a battlemaster could boost his damage significantly by using up his dice on Precision Strike and Action Surging--he'd eclipse the sorcerer in damage that turn, maybe. And yes, he can help his party. (So can the sorc, with spells like Web.) So what? The fact that the battlemaster can rival or exceed the sorlock's damage occasionally is indisputably a good thing. Nerf Sharpshooter and GWM and that ceases to be true: you'll have the Sorlock outclassing the battlemaster's damage all day, every day, and still having a nearly-full load of spells. (N.b. I don't actually think Sorlocks should Quicken Spell every round. Cheap, consistent damage is more my style. I'd probably just toss up a Web in a chokepoint for 3 SP to help the whole party and then blast all the enemies that get caught in it. But there are players who do like to nova, and they're the ones who would be Sorlocks if you nerfed Sharpshooter.)Player tip #1: When enemies are playing the "popup game" with cover, popping up, shooting at you, and then ducking back under cover, Spell Sniper Sorlocks are way better at fighting them than Sharpshooters are. The reason is because by RAW you can ready a single weapon attack or you can ready a spell--but you can't Action Surge or use Extra Attack features on a readied attack. Ergo, the Sorlock will be getting 3d10+15 from three attacks (or 3d10+3d6+15 if hexed), but the Sharpshooter will be getting only 1d8+15 with his single attack. Sharpshooter and Spell Sniper can both negate half or three-quarters cover, but neither one can negate full cover, which is what the bad guys will have at the end of each of their turns if the popup game is being played truly effectively. If the DM is being merciful they may have only 3/4 cover, and then Sharpshooter is a great help, as is Spell Sniper. Player tip #2: Sorlocks should take their first level in Sorcerer, not Warlock, because proficiency on Constitution saves helps you keep Concentration. And Concentration can help you not blow important spells, such as keeping Polymorph up when you've turned the fighter into a Giant Ape, and not losing Animate Objects.Player tip #3: A 9th level Sorcerer/Warlock 2 is not limited to only two castings of Animate Object. He's got one 5th level spell slot, and three 3rd and three 4th level slots. A 3rd and a 4th level slot equals seven sorcery points, and seven sorcery points buys a 5th level slot. In principle he could cast the spell up to six times in a day and have three 1st level slots left over (plus warlock slots) plus 2 sorcery points; in practice it's probably better to cast other spells, because Animate Objects is only useful in some situations. As KD correctly notes, it's not great when the enemy is far away because it takes so long for the objects to fly over there--I've had fights where the objects spend half the time flying to enemies or chasing after retreating enemies. That's great as a distraction if your goal is just to keep certain enemies off your back, but it isn't great for actually killing things. In many cases you'll want to cast something else, so you should probably never hit that "six Animate Objects per day" theoretical threshold.Player tip #4: has nothing to do with Sharpshooter, but--all sorcerers should learn Expeditious Retreat and Counterspell at some point before 9th level. They're both lifesavers.@KD: RE Simulacrum, I didn't mean that an 11th level sorc had access to Simulacrum. Those last couple of paragraphs were no longer talking about the specific example of the 11th level Sorlock and were back to talking about the general game:If you're asking, "At what point does Simulacrum double his damage output?", the answer is "Whenever the Wizard learns it and casts it on him, likely at 14th level; or whenever the Sorlock himself learns Wish and uses it to duplicate Simulacrum, likely at Sorc 17." N.b. in my game Simulacrum is only as effective as AD&D Simulacrum + Reincarnation + Limited Wish; that is, you get 40 to 65% of the abilities of the original, not 100%. In return, I let Simulacra regain spell slots normally. But that wouldn't matter for the Sorlock simulacrum anyway because even under RAW, he regains sorcery points normally, which can be converted into spell slots as needed.In short, Simulacrum is another of those things which is superior to the Sharpshooter/GWM feats in magnitude of effect.</blockquote>

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