Munchkinizing the Game

[thegreatbuddha]

Just out of curiosity, what is the absolute MOST damage you can eek out of a 20th level character in one round, assuming standard funds and as much prep-time as needed, so long as ALL damage is dealt in a single round. My max is ~2000 in a 20ft radius sphere, with no saving throw.

 

[DM with a vengence]

Brought to you by Way too Much Time Ltd. Ion cooperation with DM with a vengence Productions.

The Maximum Points of Damage in a Single Round Smack.

The Character
Druid 16

The Stats.
Wis 26+

The Feats.
Quicken Spell.
Enlarge Spell
Improved Initiative (It can’t hurt)
Spell Focus: Evocation (See Above)

The Items.
Greater Rod of Maximization.
Necklace of Prayer Beads (Karma)
Ioun Stone of Spell Storing (3x Extended Haste (CL 12))

The Spells.
8th) 2x Sunburst, Quickened Flamestrike

The Enemies.
Many Vampires in bat form.

Preparation.
Activate your Prayer Beads and your Ioun Stone. This can be done as much as 48 rounds before combat, so you should have plenty of time.

The Combat.
Win Initiative. This is important. If you don’t win the zillions of Vampires will fly down and kill you, so get that initiative.
Cast Sunburst and Maximize it with the Rod.
Cast Sunburst and Maximize it with the Rod.
Cast Quickened Flamestrike an Maximize it with the Rod.

Sunburst has an area of a sphere with radius 10’/level. Thanks to the Bead of Karma, that’s 200 ft, total volume of Sunburst. 200^3(pi)*4/3=33510321.64 ft^3. A Vampire in bat form has a volume of 1 ft^3, so we can get around 33,510,321 in one sphere. Each one of those takes 20d6, or 120 points of damage. The Flamstrike has a volume of 12566.37061 ft^3, so we get 12,566 Vampires each taking 15d6, or 90 points of damage.

33510321*120=402,1238,520
12566*90=1,130,940

2*402,1238,520+1,130,940=8,043,607,980
Over 8 Billion Points of Damage.

But that’s at 16th level, let’s do it again at 20th
Same as before, but with a second Quickened Flamestrike
240^3(pi)*4/3=57905835.79*144=8338440240
12566*90=1,130,940

8338440240*2+1130940*2=16,679,142,360

Over 16.6 Billion Points of damage
Now if we could put a bunch of gaseoused formed vampires in there, then damage would conceivably go to infinity.

(Note: No actual vampires were hurt in the creation of this Smackdown)

 

[EricNoah]

LOL -- sixteen BILLION hit points.

I'm gonna slide this over to the Rules forum where many more of these "sultans of smack" threads can be found.

 

[Stalker0]

You could get a rod of quickening as well then just use it on a third sunburst. Or you could just empower the flamestrike twice, and go that route

 

[Shallown]

pretty sure you need three rods to do thta. Says somewhere you can only use rods/wands/staffs etc once per round

Pretty sure anyway

 

[GuardianLurker]

I don't know. This seems a little unfair.

After all, I could replace the vampire bats with normal mosquitos. I can probably get billions of those in the volume of the area of effect, which would magnify the total damage by a factor of 10000 or more.

Let's be fair, what's the maximum smackdown damage someone can do to a *single* opponent? (Bonus points for non-spellcasters)

The biggest non-spellcaster smack I can remember is the Paladin Smiting Charge, but I'm sure somebody's come up with better.

 

[DM with a vengence]

In defense of my smackdown, or since this isn't really a defense, but more some comments.

A) No Rod of Quickening, which is very sad.

B) Sunburst only does 1d6/caster level damage against the undead and oozes, so unless they were zombie mosquitos, it wouldn't work.

 

[Caliber]

Barbarian 10/Frenzied Berserker 10
Half-Orc

Important Stats
Strength 20
+4 (Level-Ups - Unnamed)
+4 (Barbarian Rage - Unnamed)
+5 (Tome of Strength - Inherent)
+6 (Belt of Might - Enhancement)
+10 (Frenzy - Unnamed)
Total: 49 for a +19 bonus

Now this guy is swinging a scythe so that +19 bonus gets multiplied by 1.5 for a +28 bonus.

This Scythe is a +5 Scythe of Fiery Burst, Icy Burst, and Shocking.

Power Attacking away his entire BAB and using the Supreme Power Attack ability of the Frenzied Berserker this guy whips out

2d4 (base Scythe)
+28 (Strength Bonus)
+5 (Enhancement Bonus)
+40 (Supreme Power Attack)
+1d6 (Fiery Burst)
+1d6 (Icy Burst)
+1d6 (Shocking)
for an average of 88.5 per attack. Not bad, but we can do better.

Lets watch this guy crit.

Seeing as Scythes are x4 weapons, on a crit his damage looks like this ...

8d4 (base Scythe, x4)
+112 (Strength Bonus)
+20 (Enhancement Bonus)
+160 (Supreme Power Attack)
+1d6 +3d10 (Fiery Burst)
+1d6 +3d10 (Icy Burst)
+1d6 (Shocking)
for a grand total of ....

355 average with a max of 402 and a min of 309. Pretty damn good if you ask me.

Note that this guy is pretty simple and slip shod. I threw him together in a few minutes. Note that 9 of his Barbarian levels are pretty much useless, since all we are using them for is BAB. Any +1 per level progression class could step in and do the same.

A Paladin's Smite Evil or a Ranger's Favored Enemy could both be useful in this situation, knocking the number up by 1 or 2 (or for the crit, 4 or 8.)

So how did I do?

 

[JRRNeiklot]

Remember, you can only cast one quickened spell per round.

 

[Geoff Watson]

Get thirty thousand mithril +1 spell storing flaming shocking X bane holy lawful shuriken [substitute appropriate alignment and bane effects, as appropriate for the target].

Load each of them with a Flame Arrow spell cast at 20th level.

Get a Ring of spell storing with the following spells: Prayer, Divine Favour (at 15th level caster or higher)

Have the Point Blank Shot feat with the target in range.

Cast the spells from the ring.
Cast Haste
Cast Telekinesis and launch ten thousand of the shuriken at the target.
Cast Telekinesis and launch ten thousand of the shuriken at the target with the extra action from haste.
Cast Quickened Telekinesis and launch ten thousand of the shuriken at the target.

Maximum damage, assuming all of them hit is: 5,340,000hp.

That doesn't include criticals, or anything from non-core books.

Your munchkin ways are nothing compared to the power of Telekinesis

Geoff.