D&D 5E Smite Nerf: Paladin Buff?

[Argyle King]

Right, that's not under dispute. That's why every time Wrathful Smite has been mentioned in this thread, it has been qualified with statements such as, "So for most intents and purposes, once Wrathful Smite sticks, it doesn't come off." You still have to get it to stick initially. When we discussed Strahd upthread, the point was made that Wrathful Smite isn't a good choice against Strahd due to legendary resistance; but Divine Smite might potentially be good.



I guess I'm just less impressed than you are with the damage of Divine Smite. (There is almost no utility or usefulness to it apart from the damage, except in the extreme corner case where you are fighting zombies, vampires, or similar creatures with weaknesses specifically to radiant damage.)

I'm willing to concede that Wrathful Smite could potentially turn the tide of a fight. You're right. I looked at the spell again. I had thought that it was broken by attacks in a manner similar to Turning Undead. Seeing that it isn't, I can see a lot of uses for it.

The damage aspect of Divine Smite isn't what I am impressed by. What I like is that it can be used any time an attack is used. It's possible to smite with every attack if I really wanted to ensure that something died on my turn. It also appears that, in theory (admittedly, I haven't played 5E paladins much), I could even use it during opportunity attacks. In either case, I don't need to declare I'm using it until I see the result of the attack.

Typically, I'm someone who values status effects over damage. I tend to play spellcasters who focus on effects. (Believe it or not, back in 3.5 days, I had a DM ban me from playing a Bard because he felt what I was doing was too overpowered.) It might very well be that my opinion is skewed because most of the paladin play I've seen was in a Strahd campaign.

 

[Gladius Legis]

A 3rd level spell deals around 28 damage on a failed save. At that level, a paladin with a second level spell slot can deal 38.16 if both greatsword hits hit. The wizards is 75% the paladin's damage against a single target. Both have two spell slots of this level, 3rd or 2nd. Looking at the DMG spell builder, an area attack dealing 75% of a single target is appropriate.

With a 65% chance to hit or chance the target fails their save, the numbers change a bit. Assuming they smite on their first hit in the round and aren't crit fishing, it comes out to an expected 29.62 damage. The fireball does 23.1 with half damage on a successful save. That's 78% of the paladin.

So, the Paladin still deals more single target damage than a wizard using equivalent resources.

The problem here is you're assuming the Paladin has its most damaging weapon (greatsword) with a feat that many consider overpowered (GWM). That's not a fair comparison.

Let's stick that Paladin (I'm gathering Lv. 5, STR 16?) with a longsword, instead, and that Paladin took the Defense Fighting Style, so no damage bonus.

Assuming both attacks hit + one 2nd-level slot for Divine Smite = 2d8 + 6 + 3d8 = 28.5. That's only half a point more than a Fireball does to a single target on a failed save, except the Wizard's Fireball is dealing that much damage regardless of equipment, class feature or feat choices.

Factor in the 65% hit chance, with one 2nd-level Divine Smite, and it's .65*(2d8+6) + (1-(1-.65)^2)*3d8 = 21.6, or below the Wizard's 23.1 figure for Fireball on a single target. And again, that Wizard is doing that damage regardless of equipment, class feature or feat choice.

Yeah ... if anything, I've actually proven the Paladin's Smiting is underpowered, at least numbers-wise, for its resource expenditure ...

 

[Xeviat]

Wow there's quite a phenomenon here. No matter what you type it's beginning to sound the same, "Xeviat thinks Wizards should be equal to or stronger than paladins any time it comes to damage"

That's not what I said in the slightest. In fact, the paladin numbers were still higher here against a single target.


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[Xeviat]

The problem here is you're assuming the Paladin has its most damaging weapon (greatsword) with a feat that many consider overpowered (GWM). That's not a fair comparison.

Let's stick that Paladin (I'm gathering Lv. 5, STR 16?) with a longsword, instead, and that Paladin took the Defense Fighting Style, so no damage bonus.

Assuming both attacks hit + one 2nd-level slot for Divine Smite = 2d8 + 6 + 3d8 = 28.5. That's only half a point more than a Fireball does to a single target on a failed save, except the Wizard's Fireball is dealing that much damage regardless of equipment, class feature or feat choices.

Factor in the 65% hit chance, with one 2nd-level Divine Smite, and it's .65*(2d8+6) + (1-(1-.65)^2)*3d8 = 21.6, or below the Wizard's 23.1 figure for Fireball on a single target. And again, that Wizard is doing that damage regardless of equipment, class feature or feat choice.

Yeah ... if anything, I've actually proven the Paladin's Smiting is underpowered, at least numbers-wise, for its resource expenditure ...

I wasn't using GWM.


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[Greenstone.Walker]

The real appeal of Wrathful Smite is that it imposes fear that, basically, doesn't wear off. The victim can try to throw off the fear, but that requires making a Wisdom check (NOT saving throw), which like all ability checks is made at disadvantage while frightened...

The roll is only at disadvantage while the Paladin is in sight.

So, the frightened creatures disengages or dashes (or both, depending on features) away, gets out of sight of the Paladin, makes its check, then goes somewhere else to warn people about the scary Paladin.

Or it casts darkness.

 

[FrogReaver]

That's not what I said in the slightest. In fact, the paladin numbers were still higher here against a single target.


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A better comparison is not to look at average DPR on a round but to look at the chances something will happen when the paladin uses divine smite.
For example a Paladin similar to yours will have a 45.5% chance to land a single attack. A 42.25% chance to land both attacks. He will have a 12.25% chance of missing entirely.

A wizard similar to yours will have a 65% chance to deal full damage and a 35% chance to deal half damage.

Writing this out:

A paladin with 65% to hit will have:
42.25% chance of doing 38.16 damage
45.5% chance of doing 25.83 damage
12.25% chance of doing 0 damage

A wizard with 65% save Dc will have:
65% chance of doing 28 damage
35% chance of doing 14 damage

So you are right, even with your rule variation: As long as the Paladin doesn't whiff he's basically doing very close to the Wizard's damage if not significantly more. That 0 damage 12.25% of the time really pulls his weighted average down.

Just for test purposes. A paladin following PHB smite rules can do:
42.25% chance of doing 60.66 damage
45.5% chance of doing 39.33 damage
12.25% chance of doing 0 damage

A GWF battlemaster with action surge can do:
17.85% chance of doing 67.32 damage
38.44% chance of doing 50.49 damage
31.05% chance of doing 33.66 damage
11.14% chance of doing 16.83 damage
1.5% chance of doing 0 damage

After looking at these numbers I'll concede the point about the paladin vs wizard in your variant. I'm curious though, the fighter is very similar to the Paladin and will do significantly more than your paladin variant and will have even fewer resources left after doing so. Is the fighter's NOVA not problematic for some reason?

 

[Gladius Legis]

I wasn't using GWM.

So you weren't, once I broke your number down. Still, my point remains that resource-for-resource, only a very narrow set of choices (weapon, Fighting Style) for the Paladin was allowing it to do considerably more single-target damage than a Wizard's Fireball that always does that much damage regardless of certain choices.

 

[Ovarwa]

Paladin single-target damage *should* be higher than a wizard's.

Wizards get the best spell list in the game. No one gets spells faster. D&D5 wizards have more flexibility than ever with their daily spell choices. They usually have much better things to do with their action than mere single-target damage.

Comparing a paladin's damage against a full-caster only makes sense in the context of trying to demonstrate that paladins are underpowered. (Which they are not.) Comparisons against rogues, rangers, fighters, monks and barbarians makes more sense. Ok, not rangers, since they are a Known Problem. The different martial classes won't all do the same damage, but might bring a variety of tricks to the table to offset those differences.

Really, if paladins need to be nerfed because they sometimes get to do a lot of damage, then barbarians are next on the chopping block because rage is just plain wrong, and then we need to ban assassins or never let them get surprise because that's the first step in winning the war against terrorism, and then maybe limit Fighters to only the Champion subclass because Fighters already get too many attacks and ASIs. So we're left with monks and rangers as the epitome of fair martial class design. But just in case, let's make every ranger a core beastmaster, because they are the most flavorful and least abusive.

Yay?

Anyway,

Ken