TxSam88 |
I've built up various characters looking at DPR without inclusion of magic items, but with the inclusion of class features.
all of the below is my opinion based on close to 40 years of playing.
Archery is by far the best at DPS. with Rapid shot and many shot, an 11th level fighter can be firing 5 arrows/round without the need to move. I've seen builds that tend to break the game, so bad in fact we have had to ban them Archers in our game.
TWF and Two handed fighting tend to be on par with each other. with maybe a slight edge to TWF simply due to the increased attacks. the fact that they have to move is sometimes hampering.
Thrown can be nasty if you have a way to ready enough weapons, Magic is the best way to do this, Blinkback belt (good) or Sharding weapons (Best). without either of these 2 items, thrown suffers from magic weapon costs.
Crossbow seems to be the worst of the batch, and seems to be very feat intensive, and highly dependent on class and which specific crossbow. I have seen decent damage from them however.
I know a lot of people say the 2 handed giant weapon vital strike build can be very nasty, which it is, but by being limited to a single attack per round, a single miss causes the average DPS to drop significantly.
This is all speculative, many things can greatly affect these numbers, especially class abilities (which you didn't want considered, which is hard since feats are class based and play a big part)
Derklord |
Any comparison would be meaningless for actual characters, because class features would dramatically alter the result in practise. The different fighting styles take a different number of feats, and profit differently well from attack roll and damage roll bonuses, making different style more suited for different classes. And that's not even including class features that e.g. enchant a weapon, which is usually worse for TWF.
You can't even do a comparison on a hypothetical class with no class features, because BAB changes things! The number of feats requires is also extremely uneven, whatever one would set the number of invested feats to can completely warp the comparison. Plus, of course, the level, and what range the hypotehtical enemy isat.
VoodistMonk |
Yeah, it gets pretty useless trying to generalize...
If you go by level, alone, then less than full BAB classes are seeing fewer attacks.
If you go by BAB, alone, then less than full BAB classes are getting more HD/feats.
If you go by number of feats, alone, classes with bonus feats get lower BAB/HD.
Throw in class features and literally all comparisons are screwed...
Firebug |
Thrown can be nasty if you have a way to ready enough weapons, Magic is the best way to do this, Blinkback belt (good) or Sharding weapons (Best). without either of these 2 items, thrown suffers from magic weapon costs.
Also Martial Focus->Ricochet Toss gets you to a single enchanted weapon. Startoss Style also allows some splash damage when you would normally get a single attack anyway.
I know a lot of people say the 2 handed giant weapon vital strike build can be very nasty, which it is, but by being limited to a single attack per round, a single miss causes the average DPS to drop significantly.
Greater Weapon of the Chosen really helps out those single attack(action) builds. Better for accuracy and fishing for crits.
This is all speculative, many things can greatly affect these numbers, especially class abilities (which you didn't want considered, which is hard since feats are class based and play a big part)
Yeah, Swashbuckler makes single 1h weapon style competitive, Gunslinger for Guns (or even Crossbows in Bolt Ace), Warpriest for uncommon weapons, Medium for... everything.
Styles OP missed:
Natural attacks, lots of optimization possible. Low floor, high ceiling.
Unarmed might deserve a look, but if you are not looking at class features it's pretty weak.
Combat Maneuvers: Feint, Sunder, Trip, etc. Though these tend to be addition to the others.
'Come and get me' retribution style, which tends to overlap with the Attacks of Opportunity style, though again tends to be in addition.
And of course, Wizard is one of the best for the Volley style (Telekinesis on a rack of large longswords).
VoodistMonk |
Crossbows can be quite effective... Elves can replace Weapon Familiarity with Crossbow Training, negating the need for Rapid Reloading if you use a Light Crossbow. Easy enough... Heavy Dwarven PelletBows load like Light Crossbows. Word.
Five levels of Bolt Ace Gunslinger gets you proficiency with that Heavy Dwarven PelletBow, and jacks its crit multipler to x4... that's right, 19-20/×4 bludgeoning crossbow. Oh yeah, Grit and Deeds and two good saves and full BAB...
Now we jump into Arsenal Chaplain Warpriest, aiming for that sweet Weapon Training at level 10 (Warpriest 5)... right around the time you can be expected to afford the Gloves of Dueling. Pick up Improved Critical as soon as you can (Warpriest levels count as full BAB for Bonus Feats, so take it with your Warpriest 3 feat at level 8)... now you have a 17-20/×4 bludgeoning crossbow. Lol.
It's funny, because it is literally as awesome as it is ridiculous.
My preferred method is:
Bolt Ace
1. PBS
3. Precise Shot
4. Rapid Shot
5. Far Shot
Arsenal Chaplain
6. Weapon Focus
7. Snap Shot
8. Improved Critical (17-20/×4)
9. Weapon Trick
10. WEAPON TRAINING +1/+1
11. Overwatch Style
11. Overwatch Tactician
12. Quicken Blessing
13. Overwatch Vortex
At 13:
BAB +11
Base Saves +10/+6/+7
CL 8, 3rd level spells
3D6 Fervor
+2 Sacred Weapon
20pt buy Stats
11,19,12,12,16,10
(Dex +1 @ 4 & 12, Wis +1 @ 8)
Deeds
1st level
... Gunslinger's Dodge
... Sharp Shoot
... Vigilant Loading
3rd level
... Gunslinger's Initiative
... Pistol-Whip
... Shooter's Resolve
Chell Raighn |
Ya’ll are really blowing things out of proportion here and making things far more complicated than it needs to be.... while yes, different combat styles can have vastly different degrees of power when fully optimized with the right feats and classes, that has nothing to do with their baseline values which is what was being asked about.
To get baseline you simply need to look at the raw output of the combat styles without any external factors. However, you also need to assume a bare minimum of +2 strength mod, because without that minimum the results for two-handed and two-weapon fighting get completely skewed. It is also a good practice to run the numbers a second time with a much higher strength mod, and then average the results for each to get a proper look at the baseline output for any given combat style.
The only real challenging part is deciding on the weapons to use as a sample group for each category... each weapon category has 3-4 different variations to the weapon stat formats as well as some obviously superior or inferior weapon choices... however, at least one of each of the following common weapon formats should be used for each comparison...
1) high crit chance weapons - normally these are relatively small damage dice weapons, getting most of their damage from their increased crit chance.
2) high crit multiplier weapons - the exact opposite of crit chance weapons, these most commonly have the largest damage die.
3) average weapons - your standard 20/x2 crit weapons, probably a 1d6 variant would be best....
Next up you calculate chance to hit with each BAB progression at levels 1, 5, 10, 15, and 20 against level appropriate AC with your low and high strength mods (dex for ranged) and average to totals for each BAB progression... once you have that done repeat with TWF penalties, both with and without feats, and with and without a light offhand... then again average the results for each BAB progression.
With the averaged BAB progression numbers you can now factor the chance to hit with your average damage values for each category and get the baseline damage for each weapon sample. Repeat the process while factoring for Crits. You can then average the results from each category to get your baseline for each combat style.
I haven’t run the numbers myself, but I am fairly certain that from a baseline perspective, you’re going to find them all to be fairly even...
Wonderstell |
To get baseline you simply need to look at the raw output of the combat styles without any external factors.
You say that, and then you start making assumptions about strength scores, BAB, crit weapons, number of feats, and types of weapons. BAB, feats, and access to weapons are all class-dependent.
I haven’t run the numbers myself, but I am fairly certain that from a baseline perspective, you’re going to find them all to be fairly even...
From a baseline perspective TWF will never measure up to Two-handed as the only thing you've accomplished is spending three extra feats (TWF, ITWF, GTWF) to get the exact same Strength bonus (1+0.5=1.5) and dmg dice total. While tanking your accuracy by -2.
From a baseline perspective Thrown will never measure up to Archery as you've spent the same number of feats but are missing out on Range and Manyshot.
From a baseline perspective Crossbow will never measure up to Archery as you've spent the same number of feats but are missing out on Str to dmg and Manyshot.
2) high crit multiplier weapons - the exact opposite of crit chance weapons, these most commonly have the largest damage die.
High crit multiplier weapons are treated the same way as high crit range weapons. The higher it goes, the lower your dmg dice. Just as 18-20 weapons, the highest dmg dice for x4 weapons is 1d10.
TxSam88 |
TxSam88 wrote:Thrown can be nasty if you have a way to ready enough weapons, Magic is the best way to do this, Blinkback belt (good) or Sharding weapons (Best). without either of these 2 items, thrown suffers from magic weapon costs.Also Martial Focus->Ricochet Toss gets you to a single enchanted weapon. Startoss Style also allows some splash damage when you would normally get a single attack anyway.
TxSam88 wrote:I know a lot of people say the 2 handed giant weapon vital strike build can be very nasty, which it is, but by being limited to a single attack per round, a single miss causes the average DPS to drop significantly.Greater Weapon of the Chosen really helps out those single attack(action) builds. Better for accuracy and fishing for crits.
TxSam88 wrote:This is all speculative, many things can greatly affect these numbers, especially class abilities (which you didn't want considered, which is hard since feats are class based and play a big part)Yeah, Swashbuckler makes single 1h weapon style competitive, Gunslinger for Guns (or even Crossbows in Bolt Ace), Warpriest for uncommon weapons, Medium for... everything.
Styles OP missed:
Natural attacks, lots of optimization possible. Low floor, high ceiling.Unarmed might deserve a look, but if you are not looking at class features it's pretty weak.
Combat Maneuvers: Feint, Sunder, Trip, etc. Though these tend to be addition to the others.
'Come and get me' retribution style, which tends to overlap with the Attacks of Opportunity style, though again tends to be in addition.
And of course, Wizard is one of the best for the Volley style (Telekinesis on a rack of large longswords).
I found the Startoss tree to be a bit feat intensive, but some builds may be ok with that, I'd rather invest in a sharding weapon and spend those feats elsewhere. Aside from that all great additional commentary/
VoodistMonk |
You can just math the weapons at 100% accuracy with average damage... or choose some arbitrary percentage, like 75%...
Once you math each of, say:
Kukri (×2)
Katana (1H and 2H)
Curveblade/Fauchard
HornBow
PelletBow
Then just work probability of each BAB to hit whatever arbitrary accuracy you used to math the weapons.
More arbitrary numbers that can be added are Strength and Dexterity scores of 20/ea... and the absolute minimum effective feat investment could be added, but then everyone would have to agree on which feats are "standard"...
Like, do you chase Two Weapon Rend as the capstone of TWF, or do you actually try for GTWF? I have always understood GTWF to be a trap for most builds not involving a pair of Sawtooth Sabers and Obedience to Achaekek. But that is far outside what can possibly be considered your average TWF build.
"Standard" feats...?
TWF, Double Slice, ITWF, Two Weapon Rend
Power Attack, Furious Focus, Maybe assume some extra attack shenanigans like Hurtful, or Great Trip, or some other AoO nonsense? Weapon Focus and Specialization?
Point Blank Shot, Precise Shot, Rapid Shot, Manyshot
Point Blank Shot, Precise Shot, Rapid Shot, Improved Critical
Lelomenia |
You can just math the weapons at 100% accuracy with average damage... or choose some arbitrary percentage, like 75%...
Once you math each of, say:
Kukri (×2)
Katana (1H and 2H)
Curveblade/Fauchard
HornBow
PelletBowThen just work probability of each BAB to hit whatever arbitrary accuracy you used to math the weapons.
More arbitrary numbers that can be added are Strength and Dexterity scores of 20/ea... and the absolute minimum effective feat investment could be added, but then everyone would have to agree on which feats are "standard"...
Like, do you chase Two Weapon Rend as the capstone of TWF, or do you actually try for GTWF? I have always understood GTWF to be a trap for most builds not involving a pair of Sawtooth Sabers and Obedience to Achaekek. But that is far outside what can possibly be considered your average TWF build.
"Standard" feats...?
TWF, Double Slice, ITWF, Two Weapon Rend
Power Attack, Furious Focus, Maybe assume some extra attack shenanigans like Hurtful, or Great Trip, or some other AoO nonsense? Weapon Focus and Specialization?
Point Blank Shot, Precise Shot, Rapid Shot, Manyshot
Point Blank Shot, Precise Shot, Rapid Shot, Improved Critical
one of the big factors is full attack reliance, which no amount of consensus on appropriate default builds answers..
In general though i would say
Archery > Reach Weapon > Blob of Natural Attacks > Other Ranged > Non Reach Two Handed Weapon > Two Weapon Fighting.
Chell Raighn |
Chell Raighn wrote:To get baseline you simply need to look at the raw output of the combat styles without any external factors.You say that, and then you start making assumptions about strength scores, BAB, crit weapons, number of feats, and types of weapons. BAB, feats, and access to weapons are all class-dependent.
Excuse me, but the only assumption listed in my post is for a minimum strength score and an explanation for why that must be had is given. Everything else is just proper diligence while testing, covering all variations from the baseline level. The only reason why TWF feats specifically get testing while all other feats are ignored is because TWF is the only combat style that 100% requires feats in order to be functional. And even then, I’m not saying to test with all of the most optimal feats for TWF, just the basic TWF feat itself. Not even saying to factor in ITWF or GTWF... just TWF itself to get a proper average with and without the penalty reductions.
At no point did I assume anything about number of feats (I set a pretty clear restriction of 0, with the one exception of TWF). BAB was never assumed (infact I was explicit that all three standard BAB progressions should be tested multiple times and at obvious break points). As for the weapons, you could test with absolutely every weapon in the game if you want, or you can determine a sample set that includes atleast one of each type of weapon... it is called being thorough, not making assumptions.
My reasoning behind my whole post is a true baseline... no one is ever going to agree on what is standard for any type of build, so to get a baseline you have to eliminate everything that is disputed... so absolutely no feats, racials, or class abilities are factored outside of the one singular “required” feat for one style alone.
Also... while yes, TWF logistically won’t measure up to 2handed due to the feat investment in the long run, at pure raw baseline it really doesn’t fall behind either. What truly makes TWF pull ahead in the end is bonuses from its own feat investments. When you ignore feats there is no significant difference between thrown weapons and bows... as for crossbows... yeah no argument there, crossbows at baseline are the absolute worst DPR output... crossbows rely on specific class abilities and enchantments to even come close to competing with other ranged options, but even with everything going for them your usually better off not using a crossbow unless you have a strength penalty...
Derklord |
Ya’ll are really blowing things out of proportion here and making things far more complicated than it needs to be...
Or maybe we just assume that the OP isn't interested in utterly meaningless trivia that doesn't help for any decision.
while yes, different combat styles can have vastly different degrees of power when fully optimized with the right feats and classes, that has nothing to do with their baseline values which is what was being asked about.
Here's what you apparently don't understand: It's not at all about "fully optimized"! Even at low levels of optimization do class features change how good a combat style is so much that any baseline without them is meaningless. Dito for feats.
To get baseline you simply need to look at the raw output of the combat styles without any external factors.
Those "external factors" (range to opponent, feat investment, feat beneficiality, weapon enchantment cost, ability score cost, and so on) are what makes the fighting styles different in the first place. There can be no baseline for a comparison between the fighting styles without external factors.
What you've been talking about isn't a baseline to compare fighting styles, as it would only compare weapons plus the damage bonus from strength, not what actually differentiates the styles.
TWF is the only combat style that 100% requires feats in order to be functional.
Crossbow requires Rapid Reload to full attack (except for the Dwarven Pelletbow, which is exotic), as do almost all thrown builds (with the exception being a shuriken build).
Dragonchess Player |
There are really way too many variables in actual play to do some generic "comparison on martial fighting styles (ie, two-weapon fighting, archery, crossbow, two-handed, thrown) in terms of baseline dpr, as in not taking into account any magic items or class features or spells and the like." The effectiveness of any given style is heavily dependent on which weapons, magic items, class features, feats, and/or spells are used.
That said, there are some trends. Generally speaking, the effectiveness in DPR is usually something like archery > two-handed > two-weapon > thrown > crossbow. However, there are also opportunity costs; it is often easier (less feat commitment, resource use, system mastery, etc.) for a two-handed weapon user to be "effective" in DPR (basically not requiring much more than a high Str and Power Attack for minimum competency) than other styles.
Also, there are specific options (i.e., a high-Str crit-fishing TWF ranger or slayer using the Combat Style feats, to avoid needing to invest heavily in Dex, and Bleeding Critical) that can be more "effective" in DPR than the general trends. Not to mention that pure DPR may not even be the best metric on judging the "effectiveness" of a fighting style; for example, two-weapon fighting with a weapon/shield (and the Improved Shield Bash/Shield Slam/Shield Master feat chain) will have a lower DPR and require more feat investment than other two-weapon fighting options, but will will be more survivable due to a higher AC (possibly significantly higher).
TL; DR: Any fighting style can be an "effective" choice with the appropriate choices in "magic items or class features or spells and the like." Trying to impose some sort of ranking in the styles without taking into account all of the possible factors that could impact the styles is, IMO, probably not going to give any worthwhile result.
VoodistMonk |
For however much use observing obvious trends does this conversation, there is the fact that TWF will always have an accuracy penalty associated with it (outside of very specific builds involving a pair of Sawtooth Sabres and Obedience to Achaekek).
So, without feats or class abilities factored in... TWF is prohibitibly ineffective, in my opinion. In order to take the required feats to even make the penalties playable, you need high Dex, or specific class options. In order to take advantage of the required investment in Dex, you need MORE feats, or entirely different class options.
It's a trap! Lol.
Heather F Customer Service Representative |