D&D 5E The New Class Tiers

[Zardnaar]

That is a point to remember though when talking about "tiers". Like the bard example, how much does adding a bard to the group improve the group as a whole? Between bardic inspiration and other goodies, it does make a considerable difference. The trick is, how do you calculate just how much difference is it making? That's going to be a judgment call.

Hang on.



But, there's the problem. No matter what, you can only convert 4 misses/short rest, 5 at level 7. You will miss more than 4 times/short rest meaning that you will not convert all your misses. And, since you are only converting 2/3 of your misses at best, in the 26 attack example we used before, you will still only hit 20 times - 17 for regular hits + 3 for precision attack. 3 extra hits cannot possibly equal the 30-40 d8 bonus damage that the ranger has done.



No. It doesn't. You don't have to use the bonus action every round. You only use it when you've first marked something. At worst you've lost about 7 points of damage on a single attack (note that you will hit more often because you aren't using SS on that attack), which will be made for by subsequent mark damage. Are you assuming that you have to change marks every single round?


Yes, but, you only do that once out of 3 combats. Every other combat you are averaging about 30 (ish) per round. Note that the ranger, either brand, has done an extra 10 points from colossus slayer and hunters mark or had at least one, possibly 2 more attacks (thus 6 attacks to your 6 attacks).

See, I've played both the archer ranger and the archer fighter. The archer ranger just outdamages the fighter so badly. Of course, you're insisting on so many presumptions that I can see why you'd think this. You are presuming the following:

1. A battlemaster fighter who ONLY spends superiority dice on Precision Strike.
2. A ranger that never fights his favored enemy
3. A group that uses feats (note, without feats, the ranger is head and shoulders above the fighter)
4. A 2 rest adventuring day.

To me, that's too many presumptions to come to your conclusion. Sure, if all the above is true, the fair enough, the fighter is edging out the ranger. Not by a whole lot, but, sure, a bit. And, not the revised ranger either because he's hitting a heck of a lot better than 66% when you gain advantage on your first round attacks most of the time. Change your presumptions and your argument doesn't work very well.

This generally the Ranger IMHO outshines the fighter. And can do other stuff. The rules kind of assume 6-8 encounters 2 short rests, I lean more towards 6ish encounters and 1-2 short rests. Either way I would still pick the Ranger over fighter (well hunter ranger of BM fighter). Combat wise its mostly a wash, the BM may be marginally better but overall its still worse IMHO (one trick pony). Obviously Sharshooter looks a lot better if you roll an 18 for your dex and get a racial or whatever to get it to 20 which gives you 20 dex+ feat at elvel 4.

Throw in the other stuff Rngers can do and its a no contest IMHO at least until level 11 and Rangers don;t scale as nice as say Paladins (who are a bit meh low level true).

The other assumption I would go with is feats, its mostly a wash. Sure warrior types get the -5/+10 type feats but spellcasters get things like warcaster and resilient: con which makes concentration checks very trivial. I don't think you'll be using the -5/+10 part of the feats that much level 1-5 (its a lot better level 8 or so).

 

[FrogReaver]

That is a point to remember though when talking about "tiers". Like the bard example, how much does adding a bard to the group improve the group as a whole? Between bardic inspiration and other goodies, it does make a considerable difference. The trick is, how do you calculate just how much difference is it making? That's going to be a judgment call.

Hang on.



But, there's the problem. No matter what, you can only convert 4 misses/short rest, 5 at level 7. You will miss more than 4 times/short rest meaning that you will not convert all your misses. And, since you are only converting 2/3 of your misses at best, in the 26 attack example we used before, you will still only hit 20 times - 17 for regular hits + 3 for precision attack. 3 extra hits cannot possibly equal the 30-40 d8 bonus damage that the ranger has done.



No. It doesn't. You don't have to use the bonus action every round. You only use it when you've first marked something. At worst you've lost about 7 points of damage on a single attack (note that you will hit more often because you aren't using SS on that attack), which will be made for by subsequent mark damage. Are you assuming that you have to change marks every single round?


Yes, but, you only do that once out of 3 combats. Every other combat you are averaging about 30 (ish) per round. Note that the ranger, either brand, has done an extra 10 points from colossus slayer and hunters mark or had at least one, possibly 2 more attacks (thus 6 attacks to your 6 attacks).

See, I've played both the archer ranger and the archer fighter. The archer ranger just outdamages the fighter so badly. Of course, you're insisting on so many presumptions that I can see why you'd think this. You are presuming the following:

1. A battlemaster fighter who ONLY spends superiority dice on Precision Strike.
2. A ranger that never fights his favored enemy
3. A group that uses feats (note, without feats, the ranger is head and shoulders above the fighter)
4. A 2 rest adventuring day.

To me, that's too many presumptions to come to your conclusion. Sure, if all the above is true, the fair enough, the fighter is edging out the ranger. Not by a whole lot, but, sure, a bit. And, not the revised ranger either because he's hitting a heck of a lot better than 66% when you gain advantage on your first round attacks most of the time. Change your presumptions and your argument doesn't work very well.

I thought we were talking about the most optimized fighter for combat vs the most optimized ranger for combat. If you want to move those goal posts somewhere else then have at it. If you want to talk about less optimized fighters of course the most optimized ranger can beat out them. I get you don't like the precision attack concept. Maybe you don't understand the math involved in it? I find people that don't understand the math involved tend to throw around the whiteroom insult a lot and you use it quite often.

Here's what I can tell you. A ranger with just crossbow expertise and not SS takes 3 attacks to finally surpass what he could have done if he would have just attacked with his bonus action. I find that means I am typically using at least 2 bonus actions an encounter on hunters mark (unless we are fighting a large solo enemy).

A ranger with CE + SS takes 5 attacks to finally surpass what the ranger that just attacked with his bonus action could have done. If you've taken CE + SS and are helping an ally focus fire down an enemy as is typically the best strategy then chances are that enemy is going to be dead before you make the 5 attacks needed to make hunters mark be worth casting.

Conclusion, with crossbow expertise on a ranger, against all but solo's hunter's mark just isn't worth casting. The spell slot at that point is more valuable as healing.

Once you realize that your ranger that always can SS + CE + Hunter's Mark + Collosus Slayer every round of the day is ultimately revealed as the fake whiteroom masterpiece.

 

[Hussar]

What optimized ranger? This is a bog standard ranger using bog standard stuff. I mean, hunters mark or colossus slayer are hardly corner case examples. Versus a battle master fighter (which excludes the other two archetypes) who only uses a single option, spamming it over and over again (excluding the other, what, dozen options he could do), taking every single bonus feat he gets to up his damage, just to equal what the bog standard ranger does out of the gate.

This is my problem. If the fighter is supposed to be "combat master" then that's what he should be - combat master. I shouldn't have to turn my character into a one trick pony just to equal what other classes can do.

Or, put it another way. Let's see your champion fighter keep up with the ranger.

 

[Merudo]

I didn't say the cleric wasn't good. Wizards are good too. Most everything is good.

But if you think 14 average in 2-3 fights per day is good in tier 1 then I don't think you understand optimization.

SS BM Fighter with a longbow can do 17.5 average damage at a comparable accuracy rate to the clerics all adventuring day long. A few times per day he can hit for 35.

The Variant Human SS CE BM Fighter with a hand cross bow can do 33 average damage at a comparable accuracy rate to your clerics all adventuring day long. He can do 49.5 when action surging. This is all by level 4.

The accuracy of the SS CE BM Fighter is far lower than the Cleric. The Fighter has a -3 to hit while using SS, while the Cleric has likely raised his Wisdom to 18 at level 4. So we are looking at the Fighter hitting ~20% less often than the Cleric.

If we assume the Cleric hits 65% of the time for 14 damage - that's an average of 9.1 damage.

The Fighter will hit 45% of the time for 33 damage - that's an average of 14.85 damage.

Now suppose 3 such Fighters are Blessed by the Cleric. This will increase their accuracy from 45% to 57.5%, meaning the Cleric increases their expected damage by 12.5% * 33 = 4.125 damage. Since there are 3 of them, the Cleric increases the party's damage by 4.125 * 3 = 12.375.

So adding the Cleric to the party increases the damage per round by 9.1 + 12.375 = 21.475 > 14.85.

Now of course the Fighter can spend his Action & Battle Dices too - but then the Cleric can cast other spells & use its domain abilities.

I'll add that the highly optimized crossbow wielding VHuman Battlemaster you proposed is not representative of how most Battlemasters perform at the table.

 

[5ekyu]

Are you limiting your definition of "in combat" to direct DPR?

A bard, for example, can hugely increase others DPR (especially an optimized BM fighter) AND increase the survivability of the group.

It must be considered that 5e is rarely a solo game. Effectiveness in combat includes how much better you make those around you.

Yup.

For all around sudden impact on a group, I gotta say the Glamour Bard is big imx. With +4 Cha you get four uses (LR at 3-4 Szr at 5+) of his bardic inspires and his Mantle st 3rd is a big changer in s lot of circumstances (each use is four folks getting 5-8 THP *and* a reaction move thats AO proof. As part of any coordinated part tast is a big play and one that comes up frequently enough to be extremely useful. Especially do if the group has feats that make positioning strong.

 

[Merudo]

A ranger with CE + SS takes 5 attacks to finally surpass what the ranger that just attacked with his bonus action could have done. If you've taken CE + SS and are helping an ally focus fire down an enemy as is typically the best strategy then chances are that enemy is going to be dead before you make the 5 attacks needed to make hunters mark be worth casting.

We'll consider the best Ranger around for this discussion - the Gloom Stalker.

The Gloom Stalker starts each fight with a Heavy Crossbow in hand. His first action is to cast Hunter's Mark, then fire two bolts with the Heavy Crossbow (22 + 26.5 = 48.5 damage). He then stows his Heavy Crossbow as a free action.

On subsequent turns the Gloomstalker switches to the Hand Crossbow for 33 + 7 (Hunter's Mark) = 40 damage.

If the Gloom Stalker doesn't use Hunter's Mark on the first turn but instead shoots 3 times his Hand Crossbow, he'll do 16.5 + 16.5 + 21 = 54 damage. That's only 5.5 damage more than casting Hunter's Mark.

On the second turn, Hunter's Mark increases the damage by 7, with 7 > 5.5.

So, as long as Hunter's Mark lasts a full round, casting it is the superior option.

 

[FrogReaver]

We'll consider the best Ranger around for this discussion - the Gloom Stalker.

The Gloom Stalker starts each fight with a Heavy Crossbow in hand. His first action is to cast Hunter's Mark, then fire two bolts with the Heavy Crossbow (22 + 26.5 = 48.5 damage).

On subsequent turns he drops the Heavy Crossbow and switches to the Hand Crossbow for 33 + 7 = 40 damage.

If the Gloom Stalker doesn't use Hunter's Mark on the first turn but instead shoots 3 times his Hand Crossbow, he'll do 16.5 + 16.5 + 21 = 54 damage. That's only 5.5 damage more than casting Hunter's Mark.

On the second turn, Hunter's Mark increases the damage by 7, with 7 > 5.5.

So, as long as Hunter's Mark lasts a full round, casting it is the superior option.

Note that against high AC targets, casting Hunter's Mark & not taking the -5/+10 option of SS is even better.

So think this through against an average non-solo enemy encounter.
Turn 1: Hunters Mark + Heavy Crossbow Attack + Heavy Crossbow Attack = 5.5+13+3.5=22*2 = 44+4.5 = 48.5 damage
Turn 2: Hand Crossbow Attack * 2 = 3.5+13+3.5 = 20*3 = 40
Turn 3: Hand Crossbow Attack + Hunters Mark (moving to change targets) = 20
Turn 4: Hand Crossbow Attack * 2 = 40

Total = 148.5

Compare with non hunter's mark
Turn 1: Hand Crossbow * 3 = 16.5*3 = 49.5
Turn 2: Hand Crossbow * 2 = 33
Turn 3: Hand Crossbow * 2 = 33
Turn 4: Hand Crossbow * 2 = 33

Total = 148.5

You wasted a spell slot to do essentially the same damage as the guy that didn't cast hunters mark. Hunter's mark is fine on a solo enemy. For a SS CE Ranger, it's pretty much a wasted spell almost every other time. Instead of using that spell slot for hunter's mark, instead save it for after combat healing.

 

[Ancalagon]

I rate overall generally.

Offensive
Defensive
Utility

Maybe with a slight focus on offensive, if you kill stuff faster you take less damage. But if the defensive ability is powerful I will rate it over some offensive abilities. Or in the 3 pillars I would probably go with 40/30/30 something like that with the 40% being combat.

For example I don't think most of the fighters are that good because they are not even that good comparatively in the combat pillar relative to say Hunter Rangers who are arguably better level 1-10, but also have more exploration and out of combat stuff. The base fighter class is still decent though but the BM is better than the other 2.

The tier list is based on a "formal" test, not just a gut feeling about combat and utility. Specifically, it is how useful a PC is in each of the following situations:

Situation 1: A Black Dragon has been plaguing an area, and he lives in a trap filled cave. Deal with him.

Situation 2: You have been tasked by a nearby country with making contact with the leader of the underground slave resistance of an evil tyranical city state, and get him to trust you.

Situation 3: A huge army of Orcs is approaching the city, and should be here in a week or so. Help the city prepare for war

source: http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?266559-Tier-System-for-Classes-(Rescued-from-MinMax)

This results in a tier system that promotes versatility and problem solving above all else, and is why the full spellcasters tended to be tier 1.

That being said, I fully agree with you that level 1-10 are far more important than 11-20

Edit: the fact that the word tier is used for power level and "adventure class" (beginners, veterans etc) is confusing.

 

[Merudo]

Turn 3: Hand Crossbow Attack + Hunters Mark (moving to change targets) = 20

Two comments:

First, in this scenario I probably wouldn't bother moving the target of Hunter's Mark unless I expected it to stick for 2+ rounds. I'd rather do 2 attacks with the Hand Crossbow.

Second, the Gloomstalker will of course switch to the Heavy Crossbow every time he spends a Bonus Action on Hunter's Mark.

 

[FrogReaver]

Two comments:

First, in this scenario I probably wouldn't bother moving the target of Hunter's Mark unless I expected it to stick for 2+ rounds. I'd rather do 2 attacks with the Hand Crossbow.

Second, the Gloomstalker will of course switch to the Heavy Crossbow every time he spend a Bonus Action on Hunter's Mark.

In the scenario I presented you would be best off just attacking the 2nd time with your hand crossbows. If you do that your damage total goes up to 154.5 instead of my quoted 148.5. Is 6 total damage over 4 rounds (without accuracy even factored in) enough to make hunter's mark worth using? DPR wise that's going to come up to less than 1 DPR. A less than 1 DPR increase is not worth wasting your spell slot on IMO.