Which would be more powerful at level 8: sentinel+GWM or polearm master+GWM?

[The_Senate]

My DM is very generous with feats, giving them to us along with ASIs whenever we get them. I'm creating a level 7 half-orc vengeance paladin whose primary goal is to as much damage in melee as possible, and I already have the Great Weapon Master feat and a greatsword. Would my damage be better maximized with the Sentinel feat at level 8, or if I switched to a halberd and Polearm Master feat? Thanks

[Specter]

I say Polearm Master, because the bonus action attack is guaranteed, and if you crit you apply your racial feature to it.

[MrStabby]

For damage I would say PAM and GWM - people won't attack anyone else if you are dishing out this much damage.

On the other hand for"best" I would say sentinel and PAM is the better combo.

[Khrysaes]

For even more potential damage, take a level of fighter or ranger, and get Tunnel Fighter fighting style, if you can. use the bonus action with PAM and Oath of Vengeance to maneuver and get lots of Op Attacks. It won't be 1 shot damage, but it would probably help.

If you want more cheese. Mystic has a Giant Form Discipline, which when focused(buff passive without need for concentration), grants 5ft more reach, and you can spend points and conc to get 5ft more than that. I also really like the Nomad archetype, and Nomadic Mind discipline. There is a talent for 120ft telepathy, and a lot of disciplines that when focused, provide advantage on skill checks.

[Zman]

PAM + GWM is the biggest damage Feat combination you've got.

Make levels 9 and 10 Barbarian for a reckless attack and make all those attacks at advantage.

[Asmotherion]

personally, I'd leave GWM for latter, and get PAM+Sentinel. Oh, well.

GWM is rather difficult to use effectivelly at lower levels, as the -5 penalty to attack is huge with a low Prof Bonus if you're not a Reckless Attacking Barbarian/Vengence Paladin against your sworn enemy or have Faerie Fire in your spell repertoir. Also, the secondary attack is too situational to happen at the right time, most of the time.

[Zman]

personally, I'd leave GWM for latter, and get PAM+Sentinel. Oh, well.

GWM is rather difficult to use effectivelly at lower levels, as the -5 penalty to attack is huge with a low Prof Bonus. Also, the secondary attack is too situational to be a sure-thing most of the time.

I wouldn't say it's hard to use, you just have to make sure you pick the right targets. Don't power attack against high AC opponents without advantage, never do it when you have disadvsntage, and always do it against low AC opponents.

[Asmotherion]

I wouldn't say it's hard to use, you just have to make sure you pick the right targets. Don't power attack against high AC opponents without advantage, never do it when you have disadvsntage, and always do it against low AC opponents.

It's true that this way it's usefull, but you usually really need the +10 damage bonus in a boss fight, were the opponent will usually have a high AC. Granted, it's a good fodder-killer though.

[JAL_1138]

It's true that this way it's usefull, but you usually really need the +10 damage bonus in a boss fight, were the opponent will usually have a high AC. Granted, it's a good fodder-killer though.

Cast Bless on yourself to help mitigate it.

Oath of Devotion gets more mileage out of GWM thanks to their Channel Divinity giving their Cha mod as a bonus to hit. Between that and Bless they can pretty much completely counter the GWM accuracy penalty. Vengeance has Vow of Enmity and can get advantage against a target, which also really helps GWM. Ancients doesn't get any accuracy boost as a class feature, so is less effective with it. Even so, Bless is a pretty effective buff, especially when paired with a bonus action attack from PAM (on subsequent rounds) for an extra chance to land the hit.

Another useful perk of GWM is conserving Smite slots to help nova later. If you run up against a low-AC sack of hit points, you can chop it to bits without needing to spend Smites to boost damage.

[Corran]

My DM is very generous with feats, giving them to us along with ASIs whenever we get them. I'm creating a level 7 half-orc vengeance paladin whose primary goal is to as much damage in melee as possible, and I already have the Great Weapon Master feat and a greatsword. Would my damage be better maximized with the Sentinel feat at level 8, or if I switched to a halberd and Polearm Master feat? Thanks
Forget about sentinel, it is not a good feat for vengeance palys due to the overlap it has with soul of vengeance (lvl 15). That said, since you are using houserules that facilitate taking lots of feats, and since you want to maximize damage, you could still take sentinel at some point, but definitelly after you have taken GWM, PAM and resilient con. Personally I would still avoid it though.

Suggestion: change race to vhuman, so that you can have all of GWM, PAM and resilient con and a STR of 20 by level 9 when you get haste. Without resilient con, no haste. Without haste, no additional attack which can profit from VoE (advantage), GWM and IDS (from level 11 onwards).
Also, with vhuman you will start with a better charisma as opposed to a better constitution from starting a halforc, and charisma is better. If you are not attached to the halforc for fluff reasons, change it.

You should be aiming to at least 15 levels in vengeance paly for soul of vengeance (at which point you get to make 5 attacks per round against your VoE target, all with advantage, all with GWM, and all with IDS on). That reactionary attack from SoV is a big deal. That said, the free feats make it so in your case, that if your party is melee heavy, you could stop at paladin 12 (if vhuman, for GWM, PAM, resilient con, and sentinel since you are multiclassing out of paladin before level 15 and soul of vengeance) the earliest and multiclass to something else (something that will give you a way to get advantage, for when VoE is not available or not a good idea such as when figthing hordes). Normaly this isnt a good idea (not reaching level 15 with OoV) but the free feats make it possible as long as you can get sentinel to work (ie as long as you have melee allies, they fight next to you -not hard to imagine with your auras- and the enemies hit them).

ps: Obviously raise cha after you max str, leave con for last.

[Sans.]

PAM. RAW you can also -5/+10 the 1d4 bonus attack.