D&D 5E Paladin Over Powered?

[KarinsDad]

Keep in mind a Paladin can crit maximizing the damage. A fireball can't.

For 8 more points of damage on one foe. Still, nowhere near the ballpark of 100+ points of damage of the wizard.

One of the things we didn't have for playtesting was guidelines on how long the adventuring day was. That may have contributed to the feeling that the Paladin could always dish out some big damage as I tended to keep encounters low but with high difficulty. Between the PH, the Basic rules, and some previews of the other books, I think guidelines exist on the adventuring day which may also reduce this issue.

Personally, I prefer 6 or 8 or even 10 encounters per day. Hence my minor issue with 5E healing. I want 10th level PCs to wade through a dungeon, and not be stopped and go home by encounter 3 or 4.

If a DM does up PC healing, then the Paladin mega-hits won't seem as impressive (especially if he does 44 points of damage to a creature that only has 30 total or remaining).

 

[jgsugden]

When a paladin uses their best limited resources, they should be pretty darn kick butt. All of the classes with depleting resources can do some nice stuff if they deplete their best stuff all at once.

Let's say we have a 20 Strength 9th level paladin with a +2 Greatsword, Great Weapon Fighting and Savage Attacker Feat. He finds himself face to face with a dragon and attacks twice, hitting on both attacks with Divine Smite. He is doing 2d6 + 4d8 + 7 with 1 and 2 rerolled and two damage sets rolled in total for each of the attacks, right? I can see 80 damage there. He is expending two of his most powerful spell slots to do it, and has supporting feats and a great magic weapon, but I can see it.

Now, let's look at a 9th level Sorcerer that throws out a quickened 4th level Ice Storm (2d8 + 4d6 - ~21) and an empowered 5th level Cone of Cold (8d8 twice, use best - ~40). About 60 damage in a large area.

The paladin is focused on one target and does more damage, the sorcerer nails a larger area for about 75% of the damage. Both have blown significant resources. I see no problem... Classes with these types of abilities do very well if they're allowed to take a lot of rests, which means you need to keep them from resting all of the time if you want them to be balanced with the workhorse classes like rogue and fighter that do not deplete resources, but do more when there are no depleting resources being used.

 

[Markn]

For 8 more points of damage on one foe. Still, nowhere near the ballpark of 100+ points of damage of the wizard.



Personally, I prefer 6 or 8 or even 10 encounters per day. Hence my minor issue with 5E healing. I want 10th level PCs to wade through a dungeon, and not be stopped and go home by encounter 3 or 4.

If a DM does up PC healing, then the Paladin mega-hits won't seem as impressive (especially if he does 44 points of damage to a creature that only has 30 total or remaining).

Can you tell me where you are getting the 100+ damage for the wizard? Unless its an attack roll (which can be maximized on a crit), the multitude of dice rolled for high level spells tend to average out apart from the odd roll.

For me, its important that the system can handle few encounters and lots of encounters per day to support multiple play styles. We run vastly different campaigns and our play styles change quite a bit based on what we are focusing on. Sometimes its heavy roleplaying, with 1 or 2 encounters per day. Sometimes its a dungeon crawl with lots of encounters per day. Generally, we shoot for 6-8 encounters as the average.

 

[Markn]

When a paladin uses their best limited resources, they should be pretty darn kick butt. All of the classes with depleting resources can do some nice stuff if they deplete their best stuff all at once.

Let's say we have a 20 Strength 9th level paladin with a +2 Greatsword, Great Weapon Fighting and Savage Attacker Feat. He finds himself face to face with a dragon and attacks twice, hitting on both attacks with Divine Smite. He is doing 2d6 + 4d8 + 7 with 1 and 2 rerolled and two damage sets rolled in total for each of the attacks, right? I can see 80 damage there. He is expending two of his most powerful spell slots to do it, and has supporting feats and a great magic weapon, but I can see it.

Now, let's look at a 9th level Sorcerer that throws out a quickened 4th level Ice Storm (2d8 + 4d6 - ~21) and an empowered 5th level Cone of Cold (8d8 twice, use best - ~40). About 60 damage in a large area.

The paladin is focused on one target and does more damage, the sorcerer nails a larger area for about 75% of the damage. Both have blown significant resources. I see no problem... Classes with these types of abilities do very well if they're allowed to take a lot of rests, which means you need to keep them from resting all of the time if you want them to be balanced with the workhorse classes like rogue and fighter that do not deplete resources, but do more when there are no depleting resources being used.

Agreed. During our playtest, I think the Paladin had too many rests and could keep sacrificing his top spell slots. Additionally, the stats rolled by the Paladin were probably on the higher side (as in well above the average roll) which also increased the numbers a bit.

 

[KarinsDad]

Can you tell me where you are getting the 100+ damage for the wizard? Unless its an attack roll (which can be maximized on a crit), the multitude of dice rolled for high level spells tend to average out apart from the odd roll.

Wizards can target their spells a bit better in 5E. We were assuming the Paladin hit with both attacks for the 44 damage with his highest level spell. If we assume that the wizard targets 3 foes and they all fail their saves, that's 105 damage. If it is 4 foes, that's 140 damage. If 3 foes and they all save, it's 51 damage, etc.

The point is that the Paladin might do 44+ in a round using up a spell, just like a wizard might do 100+. The wizard might only do 34 (cause he could only target two foes and they both saved), but still, the wizard will typically average more damage with his highest level spell than the paladin will with his.

 

[Markn]

Wizards can target their spells a bit better in 5E. We were assuming the Paladin hit with both attacks for the 44 damage with his highest level spell. If we assume that the wizard targets 3 foes and they all fail their saves, that's 105 damage. If it is 4 foes, that's 140 damage. If 3 foes and they all save, it's 51 damage, etc.

The point is that the Paladin might do 44+ in a round using up a spell, just like a wizard might do 100+. The wizard might only do 34 (cause he could only target two foes and they both saved), but still, the wizard will typically average more damage with his highest level spell than the paladin will with his.

Fair enough. Thanks for the clarification.

Edit: It's strange. As a group we are comfortable enough with the wizard and the amount of damage he spreads out over his foes. But for some reason when there is a LOT of damage (LOT being subjective ) on one foe, that seems to raise a red flag.

 

[Mouseferatu]

For 8 more points of damage on one foe. Still, nowhere near the ballpark of 100+ points of damage of the wizard.

While I agree with you that, overall, the paladin is not overpowered, this particular assertion is mistaken. A crit doubles all damage dice, bonus damage included. So on a higher-level smite, we're looking at quite a bit of extra damage on a crit.

 

[KarinsDad]

While I agree with you that, overall, the paladin is not overpowered, this particular assertion is mistaken. A crit doubles all damage dice, bonus damage included. So on a higher-level smite, we're looking at quite a bit of extra damage on a crit.

Yup. Forgot about that. So, we are talking 83 points of damage on a crit. Awesome.

 

[Halivar]

While I agree with you that, overall, the paladin is not overpowered, this particular assertion is mistaken. A crit doubles all damage dice, bonus damage included. So on a higher-level smite, we're looking at quite a bit of extra damage on a crit.

I don't believe this is correct.

"When you score a critical hit, you get to roll extra dice for the attack's damage against the target. Roll all of the attack's damage dice twice and add them together. Then add any relevant modifiers as normal."

You don't double anything except the number of dice rolled. Modifiers remain the same. A 2d6+4 greatsword crit is 4d6+4.

EDIT: Smite damage is damage dice. I stand corrected. Wow.

 

[Joe Liker]

The math makes sense and maybe its not as bad I fear. But once you add other classes to the mix that grant Advantage on attacks, extra damage from other spells, and if its an undead or a fiend, it seems to get pretty high oh so quick! It still leaves me uneasy and something that I think will get over powered pretty quick...

If other party members are helping boost the paladin's damage output, then you cannot attribute all the damage to the paladin. The team should rejoice together in their amazing shared victory!