Let’s discuss the martial caster divide, grab a snack this is gonna be a long one. It’s dense so if you are confused about anything let me know. If you have any better martial builds with no multiclassing let me know and I can put it up if you’d like.
So we will do it in 3 steps, 1 where I discuss the disparity in terms of damage, then I will discuss the disparity in defensive capabilities, then finally where I discuss the disparities in control, for this hypothetical subclasses and halfcasters don’t exist.
I will be assuming 3 builds with this
1. Longsword subclassless fighter
2. Great weapon master pole arm master fighter
3. Crossbow expert sharpshooter fighter
If I get enough demand I will also compare other builds.
Let’s go through from level 1 - 11 because after that fighter doesn’t get a damage increase until level 20 and at level 17 the game is over because the casters are gods,
Longsword fighter, a few things we need to make clear here. I am assuming average rolls and hit chance. An easy way to calculate hit chance is the lowest roll + the highest roll then halve your answer. So for a d8 that would be 1+8=9 then you divide 9/2 for an average of 4.5 so 4.5+ 3 (str) +2 (duelling) and we assume a 65% hit chance unless we have a bonus or a decrease.
The Pam gwm fighter has a bonus action attack that deals 1d4 + str. Assuming a quarter staff you deal
The ranged fighter has archery so has a +2 attack roll +1 is 5% so +2 is 10%
Optimised Range and optimised melee are keeping up with each other at this level.
Let’s have a look at the casters,
The main example we will look at is a warlock. But we will stray away to show that other casters who can out damage the fighters. warlock uses eldritch blast for damage
Yes at level 1 fighters are dealing more damage. This is how the game should be. It’s not much less though. Let’s see what happens if we add the world most overrated warlock spell, hex.
(5.5+3.5)x.65=5.85 you are now close to the longword fighter and magic missile (a mediocre spell) from the wizard is capable of dealing 10.5 damage. Nova v sustained is something to keep in mind though. This also doesn’t include any riders that are tagged on at the end, Ray of frost as an example giving -10 ft move speed. This won’t be included in this part.
. Now we shall include a new concept into the calculations. The adventuring day. If we assume an adventuring day is 6-8 encounters per long rest as stated in the dmg, we shall assume we get one short rest every 2 encounters. The fighter at this level gets an ability called “action surge” which allows you to gain an extra action. This is what we call NOVA damage. This damage isn’t sustainable but what do we do with it? Do we have 2 different catagories? Do we add them together? This is where “the adventuring day” comes into play. I Assume we go 2 fights, short rest, 2 fights, short rests, 3 fights, long rests. Action surge is a short rest feature therefore we get 3 uses of it. We find average damage by calculating how many instances of each damage is added and then divide it by the number of turns in combat which I will asssume to be 4. So with that stuff out the way.
Average damage over an adventuring day (6.175x25+12.35x3)/28 =6.837
Dpr (3.5+5+2.5+5)x.65=10.4
NOVA (7+10+2.5+5)x.65=15.925
Average damage over an adventuring day (10.4x25+15.925x3) /28 =10.992
NOVA (3.5+3)x3x.75=14.625
(9.75x25+14.625x3)/28 =10.272
So now that we have calculated the average damage we can compare them better.
Warlock is capable of out damaging longsword fighter. I hope this trend doesn’t continue.
Longsword fighter took a +2 str (1/6 example)
(6.825x25+13.65x3)/28=7.556
Optimised melee we took great weapon master (-5 hit chance +10 damage) and swapped our weapon from quarter staff to pike/glave -5 hit chance =-0.25 to the hit chance part of the equation.
(5.5+3+10+2.5+3+10)x.4=13.6
Optimised range took sharpshooter same as great weapon master but because we took archery fighting style it’s .5 instead of .4
(16.5x25+24.75x3)/28=17.384
Wow that’s big damage from 2 members. here we see 2 of the problems with 5e martials, 1. You need specific feats otherwise you are dealing cantrip damage, and 2. Range deals a noticeable bit more damage than melee. Let’s see how the casters are doing…
Let’s assume that all the great control spells of this level are not being used for whatever reason to auto win encounters, the big damage spells of this level are, shatter, rimes binding ice, upcast magic missile, (not scorching ray) and also spike growth.
Assuming monoclass warlock, we start every encounter off with with a shatter that’s 2 shatters per short rest. I shall assume we hit 2 targets as that is reasonable for an AoE of that size and they have a 60% chance of success on the saving throw. We take res con as next level we want more conc protection..
Shatter ((4.5x3)x.4+(4.5x3)x.6x.5)x2=18.9
Eldritch blast (5.5+3)x.65=5.525
(5.525x22+18.9x6)/28=8.391
We can beat this number if we had a Druid on our party but I will not assume that.
(13.65x25+27.3x3)/28=15.113
((5.5+3+10)x2+2.5+10+3)x.4=21
((5.5+3+10)x4+2.5+10+3)x.4=35.8
(24.75x25+41.25x3)/28=26.518
Okay… so let’s address the elephants in the room. Conjure animals, is a spell that can summon creatures. I am going to assume a competent party is capable of piloting this spell. Assuming no conjure airstrike, conjure animals deals 45 damage. That is enough single target damage to wipe out the martials and it lasts 1 hour which I assume to mean 2 combats. So assuming the Druid does nothing on the other 3 encounters they deal
That is almost more than the ranged fighters average damage over a day. But let’s just assume conjure animals doesn’t exist then it goes to clerics with spirit guardians which is a big aoe spell that deals 10.8 damage to everyone who is in the aoe.assuming 2-3 gets you 21.6 and 32.4 respectively. Then after that it’s the long duration summons like tiny servant and animate dead and such. I’m not going to assume that we have that as we are a warlock. As a warlock our only big blast spell is still shatter but just keep in mind that if the warlock took a spell race such as mark of handling human it would have short rest conjure animals.
((4.5x4)x.4+ (4.5x4)x.6x.5)x2=25.2
(11.05x22+25.2x6)/28=14.0821
This is assuming we are wasting slots on shatter instead of hypnotic pattern or fear,
This is an asi for fighter, we missed level 6 cause it would be like 1 damage more
(14.95x25+29.9x3)/28=16.552
((5.5+15)x2+2.5+15)x.4=23.4
((5.5+15)x4+2.5+15)x.4=39.8
(23.4x25+39.8x3)/28=25.157
(27.75x25+46.25x3)/28=29.732
Warlock casts summon greater deamon. It summons a balgura
+7 to hit so 65% and three attacks, a bite for 2d6+4 and 2 claws for 1d10+4 it also has reckless attack. And lasts an hour. I will assume summon greater deamon lasts one encounter due to the demon trying to leave your grasp.
Ebarb damage (5.5+3)x2x.65=11.05
Balgura damage (4x3.5+5.5+12)x.877=27.626
Warlock average damage (24x11.05+24x27.626)/28=33.151
From here on out no martial is able to keep up with warlock. Martials couldn’t keep up 3 levels ago with Druid and cleric and wizard, they can’t keep up with wizard, cleric and Druid now, they have been left behind, spells like summon greater demon, conjure animals, conjure fey, sickening radiance, conjure minor elementals, wall of fire, Polymorph (overrated but still good), Mordenkainens faithful hound. The fact that they only do anything better than a warlock for 35% of the game is upsetting and they aren’t even by that much, the warlock is playing martial stimulator, the second they want to they can cast a big control spell and do more than the martials could dream of. Martials you should be better than this. Also martials being better at damage doesn’t mean anything as you will see soon
Level 11 fighters third attack
(25x22.425+3x44.85)/28=24.828
((5.5+15)x3+2.5+15)x.4=31.6
((5.5+15)x6+2.5+15)x.4=56.2
(31.6x25+56.2x3)/28=34.236
(37x25+64.75x3)/28=39.973
I’m just going to say. I am assuming no 6th level spell is used and planar binding isn’t allowed because otherwise our damage is 78 + ebarb damage suffice to say planar binding is broken and that’s why I’m not allowing it for the final comparison. Instead we will be opting for the more balanced danse macabre. Issue a general command of attack who I attack and let them go wild.
I’ll do 3 damage calcs 1 assumes shortbow, 2 assumes magic stone is used, 3 assumes dual wielding short swords
2 ((3.5+3+3)x3x.7)+(3.5+2+3)x2x.65=31
Ebarb deals (5.5+3)x3x.65=16.575
1 (27.625x28+16.575x21)/28=40.0563
2 (31x28+16.575x21)/28=43.431
3 (48.75x28+16.575x21)/28=61.181
There is a secret fourth option which is a wand of magic missile but we aren’t assuming we have access to any magic items
I hope you enjoyed this and are interested in the next post where I talk about the actual reason the martial caster divide exists
