Glaivelock damage figures

[CE_Hamster]

So I'm a bit unsure on the rules for this but I want to figure out how much damage a hellfire glaivelock is capable of doing at lvl 20.

My understanding is:
9d6 eldritch, 6d6 hellfire, 2d6 mortalbane, so 17d6
3 iterative attacks, so 51d6
If quickened then 102d6
If also maximized, then 102x6=612dmg total.

Have I done this right? Am I misinterpreting the rules somewhere or is there something I'm overlooking?

I've heard others say its possible to get 1000+ damage figures with the glaivelock but I just don't see how that's possible.

[Rebel7284]

Haste and being an Eldrich Disciple and Persisting Divine Power give you two more attacks.

Replace haste with that faerunian triple strike spell for two extra attacks on a full attack and you are over 1000 damage.

Also, you probably get more damage out of Eldrich claws and Beast Strike if those are allowed in your game.

[Forrestfire]

1000+ damage figures generally come from, if I recall correctly, combining Quicken Spell-Like Ability and/or Maximize Spell-Like Ability to the glaive.

[Domar]

Use Legacy Champion to advance Hellfire Warlock.

Also a major bloodline if allowed.

Warlock 1-2
Bloodline 1
Warlock 3-5
Bloodline 2
Warlock 6
Mindbender 1
Hellfire Warlock 3
Legacy Champion 1
Bloodline 3
Legacy Champion 2-10

Eldritch blast 9d6 base + 28d6 hellfire + 2d6 greater chasuble of fell power = 39d6.

[Zaq]

Haste and being an Eldrich Disciple and Persisting Divine Power give you two more attacks.

Replace haste with that faerunian triple strike spell for two extra attacks on a full attack and you are over 1000 damage.

Also, you probably get more damage out of Eldrich claws and Beast Strike if those are allowed in your game.

Does Haste work with EG? I thought EG wasn't a full attack but was rather a full-round action that happened to give extra swings based on your BAB. If it works the way I think it does, Divine Power is legit, but Haste wouldn't help.

Also, I seem to recall that EG also allows AoOs, doesn't it? If you have ways of forcing or encouraging AoOs, that will likely increase your DPR, though you likely can't fully rely on getting all the AoOs you want every round (so your "numbers versus tofu" calculations will likely be off in one direction or another).

[Grod_The_Giant]

Does Haste work with EG? I thought EG wasn't a full attack but was rather a full-round action that happened to give extra swings based on your BAB. If it works the way I think it does, Divine Power is legit, but Haste wouldn't help.

Also, I seem to recall that EG also allows AoOs, doesn't it? If you have ways of forcing or encouraging AoOs, that will likely increase your DPR, though you likely can't fully rely on getting all the AoOs you want every round (so your "numbers versus tofu" calculations will likely be off in one direction or another).
You're right on both counts: you can make "as many attacks as your BAB allows," and you can make attacks of opportunity with your glaive. The tricky part is that you "threaten nearby squares as if wielding a reach weapon;" from the sound of it, you couldn't easily use things like Karmic Strike.

[Forrestfire]

So I did some math for a level 20 glaivelock (in this case, Warlock without bloodline stuff since those rules are pretty wonky; Warlock+casting PrCs 9/Hellfire Warlock 1/Legacy Champion 10).


Eldritch Blast: effective level 18, so 8d6
Hellfire Blast: 9 levels of it, so 18d6
Chasuble of fell power: 2d6 more
Let's add Mortalbane too, for an ideal scenario: 2d6 more


So our total is 30d6

Then, we add in a Persisted divine power each using UMD and crafting to get access to it, and our round looks like this:


Maximized, Empowered eldritch glaive - four attacks for 30*6 + (1/2 * 30d6), or on average, 930 damage (range of 780 to 1,080 damage), followed by a:
Quickened, Maximimized, Empowered eldritch glaive - the damage damage, but a swift action; average of 1,860 damage.


So without bloodline shenanigans, we can get an average 1/day damage spike of 1,860 damage. If we don't want to nova it, then it's still averaging near 1,000 damage 3/day.

[CE_Hamster]

Forrestfire; doesn't hellfire warlock restrict you to only 3 levels in that class? So would that not by extension restrict you to only 6d6 hellfire damage?

[Forrestfire]

Forrestfire; doesn't hellfire warlock restrict you to only 3 levels in that class? So would that not by extension restrict you to only 6d6 hellfire damage?

Legacy Champion is used to advance the effective level of Hellfire Warlock's abilities; Hellfire Warlock's wording is "an extra 2d6 points of damage per class level", rather than hardcoding it into the level progression as 2d6/4d6/6d6.

[CE_Hamster]

Forrestfire, OK but I'm still unclear how you got 4 attacks. If the glaive allows as many attacks as BaB allows, wouldn't that be 3?

[Forrestfire]

As noted, one can use items to get access to a Persistent divine power spell (combination of minor schema of concurrent infusions and minor schema of metamagic item), which sets your BAB to your level.

[Nifft]

Legacy Champion gives full BAB, so I suspect you can get 4 attacks by hitting 16+ BAB with 10 levels of that.

Derp.

[Forrestfire]

Legacy Champion is 3/4ths BAB.

[CE_Hamster]

Forrestfire;
Thanks for the clarification. I haven't read many of the rule books outside of core, so I'm not that familiar with optimization builds some people are using.

One last question if I may, isn't 1000+ damage a bit excessive? I mean no player class can get that much HP and even a Tarasque can't survive a hit like that. Wouldn't a player dishing out quad digit damage figures make combat trivial?

[Nifft]

Legacy Champion is 3/4ths BAB.

So it is.

Thanks for the correction.

[flappeercraft]

Forrestfire;
Thanks for the clarification. I haven't read many of the rule books outside of core, so I'm not that familiar with optimization builds some people are using.

One last question if I may, isn't 1000+ damage a bit excessive? I mean no player class can get that much HP and even a Tarasque can't survive a hit like that. Wouldn't a player dishing out quad digit damage figures make combat trivial?

Yes and No, in a regular game 4 digit damage is way more than enough as even level 20s are probably at around 400 HP in a standard game. On the other hand in games with high optimization like one I'm DMing, level 20s can get their HP into the high billions or low trillions, where 1,000 is not even 0.01% of their HP

Although I do agree than on a normal game nobody will survive 1,000 damage

[CE_Hamster]

Flappeercraft;

Wow, Billions of HP? I'm not even going to ask how that's possible. What sorts of enemies would even be appropriate for such a character? Certainly nothing from the monster manual.

[flappeercraft]

Flappeercraft;

Wow, Billions of HP? I'm not even going to ask how that's possible. What sorts of enemies would even be appropriate for such a character? Certainly nothing from the monster manual.

Well some stuff from the MM will be used (We haven't started, still in character creation) but mostly as cannon fodder, really only those with spellcasting keep up and even them very limitedly. For the most part it will be deities, archdevils, archdemons and NPCs doing the combat. Although for the deities, archdevils and archdemons will not be the printed ones, more optimized, like a lot more.

[Grod_The_Giant]

Forrestfire;
Thanks for the clarification. I haven't read many of the rule books outside of core, so I'm not that familiar with optimization builds some people are using.

One last question if I may, isn't 1000+ damage a bit excessive? I mean no player class can get that much HP and even a Tarasque can't survive a hit like that. Wouldn't a player dishing out quad digit damage figures make combat trivial?
In like 90-plus percent of games? Yeah, that's more than you'll ever need. (Though you are only doing that much 3/day, and that is assuming all your attacks hit).

[CE_Hamster]

So then for a standard game, would 500-600 DMG average be considered decent Nova damage?

[Galacktic]

By level 20, a great nova in a normal game is 300ish. There's no need to optimize harder than that, given that you'd just overshadow every other PC damage wise and make the DM either boost the enemies to be threatening to you (making the other players obsolete) or leave it be and leave everyone bored in combat because you'll inevitably oneshot it.

[Axel_690]

It is possible to get into Telflammar Shadowlord as a Warlock without taking any dips. Pair with any effect that gets you an extra Standard Action and the Martial Maneuver(Shadow Stride) Feat for 3 full attacks per Round plus any AoO's you get.

[GilesTheCleric]

So then for a standard game, would 500-600 DMG average be considered decent Nova damage?


By level 20, a great nova in a normal game is 300ish. There's no need to optimize harder than that, given that you'd just overshadow every other PC damage wise and make the DM either boost the enemies to be threatening to you (making the other players obsolete) or leave it be and leave everyone bored in combat because you'll inevitably oneshot it.

You can benchmark to whatever numbers you please, though 300 at 20 seems good enough to me. See here (https://web.archive.org/web/20170108060719/http://www.minmaxboards.com/index.php?PHPSESSID=sfln0v6sf6bkp6m63lmi8ltmb1&topic=3472) for numbers to benchmark against.

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