D&D 5E GWF vs. TWF Fighting styles
- Thread starter Sezarious
- Start date
Xeviat
Dungeon Mistress, she/her
When it's 1 attack vs 2, the consistency is definitely there. 2 vs 3, you're going to feel it less. It's all but gone at 3 vs 4.
If feats are in the equation, pole arm master does the same thing, and with reach and a higher mainhand damage.
As for "just do what you think is cool": would anyone take this feat:
Super Cool
You're super cool.
Benefit: You're cool.
I'm being hyperbolic, but all options should be comparable. The ability to split damage is a plus for twfing, but that falls away with Extra Attack.
Yes, yes. Didn't I say "And at level 15 gwf (3d12+15) does consistently more damage than twf (4d6+20)"?
So what's the layman's term for standard deviation?
Yeah, extra attack weakens it and picking a feat kills it. As soon as you pick DW someone else will pick PM or GWM and gain the same split damage on bonus action.
Well, at least for fighter. Hunter has some features to compensate. Too lazy to look at Kryx worksheet.
What?
When you roll a 1 or a 2 you can reroll and must keep the second value. That means it's replaced, and therefore couldn't possibly influence the formula. Now, you can still roll a 1 or a 2 on the second roll, but that's already included in the die's average.
1d4 becomes (2.5 + 2.5 + 3 + 4)/4 = 3
1d6 becomes (3.5 + 3.5 + 3 + 4 + 5 + 6)/6 = 4 1/6
1d8 becomes (4.5 + 4.5 + 3 + 4 + 5 + 6 + 7 + 8)/8 = 5.25
1d10 becomes (5.5 + 5.5 + 3 + 4 + 5 + 6 + 7 + 8 + 9 + 10)/10 = 6.3
Improving your Dex gives you +1 AC and +1 damage (about the equivalent of replacing a light weapon with a bigger one-handed weapon, although it is slightly weaker in that it doesn't get to add that damage again on crits), and you also get +1 to hit and +1 to everything else Dex improves.You are mistaken.
Dual Wielder provides +1 AC, removes the mandatory "light" quality to use TWF and allows you to sheathe/unsheathe both weapons at the same time. Second and third are quite compelling, especially the second one, if you wanna perform properly as a dual wielder.
IF you stack dex with a feat, you'd better do so when you have an odd value and need to even it
The only thing you don't get is the ability to draw your weapons at the same time, which probably doesn't come up all that often. If you're at all prepared for combat, you've probably already got at least one drawn. If you're surprised in a situation where you didn't already have a weapon out, you miss one off-hand attack in the first round, which is a disadvantage to the style but not devastating.
Some things are easier to quantify than others, but if you just ignore those things when doing comparisons they should fall behind the easily quantifiable, because it has other benefits you're not, well, accounting for.GWM provides you the formerly known as Cleave feature, which is purely situational. When you theorycraft, you'd better stick to consistent mechanics
juggerulez
First Post
let's assume yours are correct for the sake of the argument, in what way they should disprove my theory? I'm missing the point.
Hunter's Mark is situational since it's not a cantrip.
+2 dex is overall better, mechanics wise, yes! But this is not the point at hand.
I'm speaking about Feats because we were speaking about a level 1-3 character and the only way to introduce a feat in that context is by rolling as human. As a human you get +1 on two stats and a feat OR +2 in all stats, and since there are no feats that provide you with more than +1 on a stat, you can't go over 17 even if you try, implying you're using the standard statistics builder (the formally known as '15 15 15 8 8 8 set' :v ).
I know GWM is better, I told you so... roughly 68% times better if you want the odds. What I told also was that it gets disqualified because it handles a to hit ratio I wasn't going to contemplate in my explanation, but it was still mentioned because it's awesomely better.
GFW provides BAs? Yes! Should you contemplate it in your statistics? no! because it's a situational event, not something you will bring to the table all the times.
no it's not. It was just for the sake of the argument
A paladin could go for magic initiate (druid) to get shillelagh to better her dps output, but that's not the end of it: I personally would go for guidance and goodberry (goodberry abuse? yes please) but thorn whip is a sweet control cantrip too!
Level dip, though, it's definitely a big no-no
I couldn't agree more but many don't even consider the implications of what *we* consider a "competitive option"... they simply go with their guts, something I've long forgotten how to do.
Cleave is *not* easy to quantify. you can't contemplate that it has a constant upkeep by simply watching the criteria it has: you must fall someone to 0hp or less and have someone else in reach to discharge a melee weapon strike as a BA.
you can't make any assessment that involves the use of cleave as a reliable source of dpr, it's simply too inconsistent
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Kryx
Explorer
I don't know what theory you are speaking of. That TWF is somehow more "versatile"? It simply isn't. It has 1 more attack than GWM, sure, but not in comparison to Polearm.
Or.. instead... we could model things that have a chance to happen to the best of our ability to do so.
Again, my model is unconcerned with min-maxing and I do not assume Vumans. Nor do I allow them. 1-3 assumes no feats.
GWM is 168% of TWF? Not by my numbers. At 20 when TWF is the worst it's 143%. At other levels it ranged from 120-135%
Well lets just go ahead and ignore all of D&D because nearly everything has a chance to happen. Lets ignore the chance to prone an enemy, because, why not? Lets ignore sneak attack, because rogues suck. Lets ignore the complication of Offhand + Hunter's Mark competing for Bonus action.
Or.. instead... we could model things that have a chance to happen to the best of our ability to do so.
Cleave is *not* easy to quantify. you can't contemplate that it has a constant upkeep by simply watching the criteria it has: you must fall someone to 0hp or less and have someone else in reach to discharge a melee weapon strike as a BA.
you can't make any assessment that involves the use of cleave as a reliable source of dpr, it's simply too inconsistent
I didn't say it's easy to quantify. I said ignoring it because it's more difficult to quantify means your analysis will undervalue it.
Besides, it also triggers on a crit and that's easy enough to quantify. It happens on 5% of attacks.
The target does not need to be within reach, but you do need to be able to get to it. That's always true with TWF, though.
Kryx
Explorer
It's not difficult. First you calculate the total chance to crit (typically 5, 9.75, 14.26, 18.55, etc). You then add in the chance to kill a creature.Cleave is *not* easy to quantify. you can't contemplate that it has a constant upkeep by simply watching the criteria it has: you must fall someone to 0hp or less and have someone else in reach to discharge a melee weapon strike as a BA.
you can't make any assessment that involves the use of cleave as a reliable source of dpr, it's simply too inconsistent
To calculate the chance to kill a creature you compare your total DPR (besides the cleave part) to the average HP for that CR.
For example the average HP of a CR 10 creature is 213 (AVERAGE(206, 220)). A GWM fighter at 10 does 19.5 dpr. 19.5/213 = 11%. You can't add them directly as they cross over slightly. The formula I use is "=1-((1-crit chance)*(1-kill chance))". That is 20% in this case.
And that is assuming you are the only one dealing damage. If you assume all allies are doing damage it could go either way as you could be kill stealing or they could.
juggerulez
First Post
I don't understand why you feel compelled to disprove a point I've made excluding the hit ratio (which involves the crit ratio as well) by forcing the hit ratio argument against it...
Did I even once speak about to hit? never. The only time i did, it was to exclude GWM from the list specifically because it was going to call for a "to hit ratio" consideration inside an argument that was purposefully excluding it.
I was strictly speaking about damage ratio, not hit ratio, because otherwise you had to mitigate ALL the results by introducing hit bonus, proficiency bonus and the 5% crit ratio and I would rather have not, because to prove my point I didn't have to!
I was also agreeing with you "to a certain extent" . If you forgot to read the whole argument, I was, in facts, agreeing with you when you said that TWF was reliable at lower levels IF you were NOT introducing feats. As soon as you'd introduce feats, by - for instance - rolling human, even at levels 1-3 TWF would feel inadequate.
SO if you don't like feats at levels 1-3 simply disregard everything i've said after "let's introduce a feat" and that's it... why keep arguing?
If you want to create a baseline, you must disregard everything that has no recurrence. The functional tree is really simple: "can I see this behaviour happening the 100% of times"? YES/NO
YES: it can be included to compile a baseline
NO: it can not be included to compile a baseline
cleave? will happen all the times? no! NOT in the baseline!
reroll 1 and 2? it will happen all the times? yes! in the baseline!
Hunter's mark? will be cast 12 encounters out of 12? of course not, silly, you can cast it at best 4 times per day! NOT in the baseline!
Action surge? NOT in the baseline.
and so forth.
"yes but it will happen 1 out of 20 times" it's cool, but it is NOT to be included in a baseline.
It would be like attempting to find a lowest common denominator by including certain exceptions... would that make sense? nope.
After you've created a damage ratio, then you can create a mitigated damage ratio by introducing the hit and crit ratios as well, if you fancy doing that. But that's another story.
Did I even once speak about to hit? never. The only time i did, it was to exclude GWM from the list specifically because it was going to call for a "to hit ratio" consideration inside an argument that was purposefully excluding it.
I was strictly speaking about damage ratio, not hit ratio, because otherwise you had to mitigate ALL the results by introducing hit bonus, proficiency bonus and the 5% crit ratio and I would rather have not, because to prove my point I didn't have to!
I was also agreeing with you "to a certain extent" . If you forgot to read the whole argument, I was, in facts, agreeing with you when you said that TWF was reliable at lower levels IF you were NOT introducing feats. As soon as you'd introduce feats, by - for instance - rolling human, even at levels 1-3 TWF would feel inadequate.
SO if you don't like feats at levels 1-3 simply disregard everything i've said after "let's introduce a feat" and that's it... why keep arguing?
If you want to create a baseline, you must disregard everything that has no recurrence. The functional tree is really simple: "can I see this behaviour happening the 100% of times"? YES/NO
YES: it can be included to compile a baseline
NO: it can not be included to compile a baseline
cleave? will happen all the times? no! NOT in the baseline!
reroll 1 and 2? it will happen all the times? yes! in the baseline!
Hunter's mark? will be cast 12 encounters out of 12? of course not, silly, you can cast it at best 4 times per day! NOT in the baseline!
Action surge? NOT in the baseline.
and so forth.
"yes but it will happen 1 out of 20 times" it's cool, but it is NOT to be included in a baseline.
It would be like attempting to find a lowest common denominator by including certain exceptions... would that make sense? nope.
After you've created a damage ratio, then you can create a mitigated damage ratio by introducing the hit and crit ratios as well, if you fancy doing that. But that's another story.
