How Important is Threat Range to DPR?

[DocShock]

We're getting ready to reboot with a new campaign here pretty soon, and I would like to encourage the team to stop using the same weapons over and over and over again. Everyone who made attack roll in our last campaign used a Falchion, a Nodachi, or a Scimitar, and then cashed in every other weapon they found for the duration (with the exception of the DR-crushing, cold-iron morning star they each toted).

Their reasoning given for this is that extended threat ranges have the greatest DPR, as per the Viking Irishman's Guide to Weaponry. But has anyone actually figured out the amount of DPS you're giving up by switching to a 20 x3 axe or the like? Are we talking about a roughly 12% difference across levels, as indicated by the guide? Does the gap widen or narrow with feats like critical focus and improved critical?

I'm curious because I certainly don't want to encourage my players to hamper their own characters, but I would also like to be able to give out a long sword without feeling like it might as well just be gold pieces.

Edit: No one uses the Blinding, Deafening, etc. Critical feats by the way, we usually let the party arcane caster handle debuffs.

[Ssyvan]

DPR is in my lowly opinion one of the worst metrics out there. It doesn't take into account enemy HP, or the whiff factor of a given attack.

EX.

What I mean by whiff factor. Say an enemy has 10 HP, you have a choice between an attack that hits 50% of the time for 10 damage, or one that hits 5% of the time for 1,000,000 damage. DPR for weapon 1 is 5, and the DPR for weapon 2 is 50,000. But, clearly weapon 1 is the best weapon for the job.

IMO, you can usually "get the job done" with any weapon. I've had players come to the table dealing more than twice the HP the enemy had on a hit, but doing so at the cost of other abilities. Usually raising DPR comes at the cost of a defense or utility, I try to highlight that in my games whenever it comes up. (Mind you I'm not beating players over the head with it, but I will casually mention stuff like "oh hey he only hit you by 1, if you'd only had a shield you wouldn't be unconscious")

EDIT Addition:

This really comes up when players are always using power attack. So often the difference in their damage is one hit kill vs. bigger one hit kill that they end up shooting themselves in the foot by just increasing their chance to miss.

[Artanthos]

The answer will vary by level and build, but a 10th level raging barbarian with a keen nodachi would give up an average of roughly 1-2 DPR on his highest attack if he switched to a keen battleaxe.

The differences become more slightly more pronounced at higher level, but not numerically game changing. The real benefit is consistency and overkill. The nodachi is going to produce consistent damage while the battleaxe will produce more spikes where much of the damage may be wasted on an opponent that would have already been dead.

[Elro the Onk]

Artanthos wrote:

The answer will vary by level and build, but a 10th level raging barbarian with a keen nodachi would give up an average of roughly 1-2 DPR on his highest attack if he switched to a keen battleaxe.

The differences become more slightly more pronounced at higher level, but not numerically game changing. The real benefit is consistency and overkill. The nodachi is going to produce consistent damage while the battleaxe will produce more spikes where much of the damage may be wasted that would have already been dead.

Whilst I absolutely agree with this analysis, there is something to be said for the (rare!) awesome satisfaction of critting the big bad on round 1 at lower levels with your battleaxe and killing it completely dead. Your nodachi can't do this!

[DocShock]

@Artanthos

Thanks, that barb example helps (I'm assuming you or someone else has actually done the math out). I won't feel bad for not flooding the group with falchions next time around.

[Lemartes]

What your group hasn't heard of the falcata? ;)

[Deighton Thrane]

If you want the math for this you can use the DPR olympics formula to figure that out. Generally before you get improved critical you need to do 20 damage above weapon damage for it to be worth going from a 19-20 weapon like the longsword to a 18-20 weapon like the scimitar since you have a 5% increase in critical chance (basically consider this a 5% increase to dpr) and the damage difference between a longsword and scimitar is 1 on average, or 5% of 20. So up until that point it's actually better to have the longsword. After you can do that much damage it's better to have a high crit range weapon, especially if you take improved critical. Also it's worth noting that mechanically a 4x crit weapon is equal to an 18-20 2x crit weapon when it comes to DPR. Same thing for 3x and 19-20.

EDIT - Sorry, wasn't thinking right there, it's 20 average damage with the weapon when it increases DPR by 1, not before weapon damage. So 16.5 damage before weapons with a scimitar.

[Aelryinth]

With the caveat being that a x4 crit weapon wastes a lot more damage then an 18-20 weapon, since it has lots more overkill.

===Aelryinth

[Bob Bob Bob]

Threat range is less important to general DPR but fairly important in practical DPR. An 18-20/x2 is functionally identical to a 20/x4 but on the people made to use weapons x4 will supermurder anything they're facing. Additionally there's all the classes who rely on effects that trigger on a crit (magus, swashbuckler, anyone with crit feats) making threat range something they tend to focus on.

Short answer: too much stuff triggers off of crits, including an endorphin rush for players.

[Deighton Thrane]

Also forgot to mention, criticals are just fun to get, I would actually give up DPR to get criticals more often. Didn't realize how much I enjoyed it til a buddy started running a 3.5 module using monster rules from 3.5. Almost nothing was susceptible to critical hits, which meant when I started rolling my dozen plus 20's in the first session, all I got for it was frustration and disappointment.

[Covent]

Scimitar + Keen + Death From Above + Mythic Death From Above + Flying = 15-20 X 4 Weapon!

Sorry had to share but on topic I would agree that what Artanthos said is true.

Artanthos wrote:

The differences become more slightly more pronounced at higher level, but not numerically game changing. The real benefit is consistency and overkill. The nodachi is going to produce consistent damage while the battleaxe will produce more spikes where much of the damage may be wasted on an opponent that would have already been dead.

Basically 18-20 X 2 weapons are generally better for consistency, however the differences will be very small.

Also One PC with Butterfly sting and a 15-20 weapon along with another one with Mythic Death from Above and a Scythe is basically a 15-20 X 6 weapon O.o *Giggle*

[Renegadeshepherd]

simple answer is, it depends. Most damage comes from a) crits, b) flat bonuses per attack with lots of attacks, or c) a balance between the two. option b is most typically archery or TWF styles where and is pretty successful but usually feat intensive. Option A is most simply a fighter or similar class that grabs improved critical feat and hits crits often. Option C is something along the lines of longsword wielding combatant with good bonuses on the side.

All said most of these options at full optimization end up doing comparable amounts of damage, statistically. What differentiates these is the related perks or ease of the options. Archers with option B are ranged combatants with high reflex, option A is relatively narrow in who can access it but offers a safe path to go down. and option C is open to almost everyone but offers few benefits beyond scaling your damage (thus why it is often the DPR formula basis)

Bottom line: crits have their role to play and should never be ignored but my first priority is accuracy with consistent damage.