Halivar
First Post
I developed a program to do this. It's written in Delphi, so if you want it, let me know.
Ok, folks, with a random distribution of dice rolls, covering 5000 rounds per calculation, using my lvl 17 fighter with a greatsword and improved crit., and STR bonus of +7, 4 attacks a round:
First off, let's do vs. AC 20, no fancy stuff:
+27 2d6+18 vs. AC:20 Crit. 17-20 x2:
Hits per Round: 3.545
Damage per Round: 129.1246
With 3.0 Power Attack:
+20 2d6+25 vs. AC:20 Crit. 17-20 x2:
Hits per Round: 2.6428
Damage per Round: 134.8626
More damage... no surprise there. What about 3.5 power attack?
+20 2d6+32 vs. AC:20 Crit. 17-20 x2:
Hits per Round: 2.665
Damage per Round: 167.0366
Pretty awesome. +30 damage a round is very nice. One prob... at CR 17 you'll be hard pressed to find AC less than...
AC 25. Plain vanilla attack:
+27 2d6+18 vs. AC:25 Crit. 17-20 x2:
Hits per Round: 2.9454
Damage per Round: 113.6628
With 3.0 Power Attack:
+20 2d6+25 vs. AC:25 Crit. 17-20 x2:
Hits per Round: 1.7046
Damage per Round: 95.9444
A little less. In general, I think we all knew that Power-Attack falls apart against higher AC opponents.
Now 3.5 Power Attack:
+20 2d6+32 vs. AC:25 Crit. 17-20 x2:
Hits per Round: 1.6874
Damage per Round: 115.842
Hrmm... this feat yields 2 more damage per round. Is that worth a FEAT?
Here's where is all falls apart. I frequently run across AC 30 NPC's. First, vanilla swing:
+27 2d6+18 vs. AC:30 Crit. 17-20 x2:
Hits per Round: 2.0696
Damage per Round: 89.275
3.0 Power Attack:
+20 2d6+25 vs. AC:30 Crit. 17-20 x2:
Hits per Round: 0.9
Damage per Round: 57.0042
At this point, PA is completely worthless.
Can 3.5 fix the worthlessness of this feat? Will the extra damage bonus offset the fact that I don't hit enough? Let's see:
+20 2d6+32 vs. AC:30 Crit. 17-20 x2:
Hits per Round: 0.909
Damage per Round: 70.3216
No. Using +7 Power-Attack (3.5) against AC 30, I lose 30 points of damage a round.
In short, PA is a worthless feat, at least for my character. 3.5 PA continues to be worthless, and is not over-powered.
Can anyone tell me how I could be misinterpretting the data?
If you have any data-sets you like me to run through, let me know.
Ok, folks, with a random distribution of dice rolls, covering 5000 rounds per calculation, using my lvl 17 fighter with a greatsword and improved crit., and STR bonus of +7, 4 attacks a round:
First off, let's do vs. AC 20, no fancy stuff:
+27 2d6+18 vs. AC:20 Crit. 17-20 x2:
Hits per Round: 3.545
Damage per Round: 129.1246
With 3.0 Power Attack:
+20 2d6+25 vs. AC:20 Crit. 17-20 x2:
Hits per Round: 2.6428
Damage per Round: 134.8626
More damage... no surprise there. What about 3.5 power attack?
+20 2d6+32 vs. AC:20 Crit. 17-20 x2:
Hits per Round: 2.665
Damage per Round: 167.0366
Pretty awesome. +30 damage a round is very nice. One prob... at CR 17 you'll be hard pressed to find AC less than...
AC 25. Plain vanilla attack:
+27 2d6+18 vs. AC:25 Crit. 17-20 x2:
Hits per Round: 2.9454
Damage per Round: 113.6628
With 3.0 Power Attack:
+20 2d6+25 vs. AC:25 Crit. 17-20 x2:
Hits per Round: 1.7046
Damage per Round: 95.9444
A little less. In general, I think we all knew that Power-Attack falls apart against higher AC opponents.
Now 3.5 Power Attack:
+20 2d6+32 vs. AC:25 Crit. 17-20 x2:
Hits per Round: 1.6874
Damage per Round: 115.842
Hrmm... this feat yields 2 more damage per round. Is that worth a FEAT?
Here's where is all falls apart. I frequently run across AC 30 NPC's. First, vanilla swing:
+27 2d6+18 vs. AC:30 Crit. 17-20 x2:
Hits per Round: 2.0696
Damage per Round: 89.275
3.0 Power Attack:
+20 2d6+25 vs. AC:30 Crit. 17-20 x2:
Hits per Round: 0.9
Damage per Round: 57.0042
At this point, PA is completely worthless.
Can 3.5 fix the worthlessness of this feat? Will the extra damage bonus offset the fact that I don't hit enough? Let's see:
+20 2d6+32 vs. AC:30 Crit. 17-20 x2:
Hits per Round: 0.909
Damage per Round: 70.3216
No. Using +7 Power-Attack (3.5) against AC 30, I lose 30 points of damage a round.
In short, PA is a worthless feat, at least for my character. 3.5 PA continues to be worthless, and is not over-powered.
Can anyone tell me how I could be misinterpretting the data?
If you have any data-sets you like me to run through, let me know.