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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Hussar" data-source="post: 8615360" data-attributes="member: 22779">Heh, that's true [USER=3400]@billd91[/USER].  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f600.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":D" title="Big grin    :D"  data-smilie="8"data-shortname=":D" />The point I was making here though, is that it really is something every table should do once in a while.   It's so helpful to the DM rather than relying on gut feelings.  Heck, I just went through this for our Artificer.  My gut feeling was that her character was way out damaging other characters - 3 attacks per round, all doing force damage at 5th or 6th level?  Man, what a beast.Then I tracked the damage over 20 rounds.  Pegged her character dead in the middle of the pack.  I was totally wrong.  It just happened she had a bit of a run of luck for a couple of sessions and that stuck in my head. But, once I tracked it over time, I realized that there wasn't a problem at my table.Now, that all being said, the important bit there is "at my table."  Looking at that Critical Role site, I noticed there were several sessions where the sorcerer did zero damage while the fighter types did - so there was combat in that session.  This is something that would likely not happen at my table.  It would be a very rare combat that the sorcerer did zero damage.  It certainly wouldn't be a fairly regular occurrence like it is according to that site.OTOH, there are all sorts of other factors that contribute to who does damage and how much.  I play online and have for a very long time.  All my groups are VTT players, which means that they aren't casuals or newbies.  You don't get on Fantasy Grounds in 2013 or 2014 if you're a new player.  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f600.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":D" title="Big grin    :D"  data-smilie="8"data-shortname=":D" />  Now?  Where VTT play is so much more common?  Sure, maybe.  But then?  No.  No newbies.  All of my players have been playing since at least the 90's.  Which is really going to skew my results.That's why I so highly recommend people do this for themselves before arguing that something is broken or overpowered or whatnot.  Is it actually overpowered at your table?  Is that Sharpshooter Fighter (for example) doing so much damage that it's out of line with everyone else?  If so, then start looking for potential reasons - maybe that player is really good at power gaming, maybe the other players aren't so interested in dealing damage, maybe the other players are buffing the crap out of the fighter, thus greatly increasing his effectiveness.  So on and so forth.White room theorycrafting doesn't work.  There are just too many variables.  At best you might identify a potential problem.  But, until you take the time to actually check if this really is a problem, you cannot begin to work on a solution.  And gut feelings are so rarely right.</blockquote>

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