Breaking the mold on OoV Paladin

[Tes]

So we all know there is more or less a cookie cutter build for the Vengeance Paladin.
Slight variations but the most common will be a VHuman with PAM + GWM. This assumes we well be aiming to use VoE+(precasted)Haste to obliterate a target that absolutely needs to meet RNGesus as fast as possible. While fun, this can get old a little fast and can be argued to lack versatility.
Here's our guy:

VHuman with GWM + PAM.
- comes online lvl1 thanks to PAM vastly increasing damage output right out of the door
- crapload of damage
- Smite allows your already very high damage to Nova even higher by burning Spellslots and synergy with Crits
- good scaling lvl progression till most campaigns end
- somewhat limited ressources outside going Nova on the BBEG, VoE is one target/Short Rest
- amazing spell selection to close the gap against a target of your choice
- locked into Glaive or Halberd
- does the killing, but isn't the sturdiest
- Assuming a somewhat hard campaign, very Feat hungry to utilize Haste or other Concentration reliably, Resilience Con is pretty much required since you will take hits.


Then there is this guy. Doing several things that wouldn't be great on it's own to somehow end with something that's better than the sum of its parts.

VHuman with Shieldmaster + Resilience Con
- more utility and tankyness early on rather than the ability to kill things faster than they can kill you
- Shieldmaster + Resilience Con + 2STR + 2STR means you can have a VHuman Sword and Board guy fully online at Lvl12.
- Paladin, Shieldmaster and Haste have a lot of synergy to salvage the otherwise lackluster Feat. Increased AC from wielding a Shield stacked with Haste, Aura+Advantage on Dex Saves+0 Damage on successfull saves+adding shield bonus against single target Dex abilities/spells increases durability my a mile. A friendly Cleric throwing a Bless on you and your weakest save to target at lvl12 might well be your AC of 22.
- Damage lags behind early, the tradeoff is the increased AC to just not get hit, Shieldmaster to shove Prone for your party Rogue, push something into a terrain/spell effect or disengage a Wizard out of melee. Note that this depends on positioning, but if you can get in between the foe and an ally, you can just shove them rather than the opponent, which is usually easy to do if he decides to contest with STR. Disengaging your allies with a Bonus Action outside of their own turn is hands down the most overlooked contribution towards action economy for Shieldmaster.
- With access to Haste, the additional action granted by it can be used to unlock the Shieldmaster Bonus Action before using your regular Action to Attack twice, giving you a handy source of Advantage outside of VoE for the entire fight.
- With easier access to Advantage while Hasted and Dueling Fighting Style you're hitting for the same damage as a Polearm and hit more often than attacks using the -5/+10 from GWM.
has fairly reliable access to Advantage with VoE or Shieldmaster and generic 1H Magic weapons are a lot less DM reliant/easier to come by than PAM.
- You have enough ASIs left to max CHA for even better saves or grab Sentinel for more control over things. Another benefit of Shieldmaster here is that prone stuff has half movement. This migh reduce their movement enough to be unable to reach someone else and works great with difficult terrain to make you sticky. Sentinel might not be necessary or allows you to control 2 opponents a turn this way.
- The build is basically done at lvl12, so achievable for most Campaigns.


Bonus hot take:
Sword and Board scales better with magical items and isn't locked into polearms. Best case if your DM is nice enough to let you have a Flametongue Glaive, then he'll probably be nice enough to get you a Flametongue Longsword and a magic shield on top. Worst case, if loot is rolled or predetermined by the campaign, odds are you're ending the campaign with a somewhat generic +1 glaive as PAM, while the Sword and Board guy gets his Flametongue or even a fancy legendary sword. Looking at the high crit chance OoV usually ends up with, extra dice from a magic weapon combined with no -5 to hit are a match for the damage increase from GWM+PAM.


Personally I agree that the PAM VHuman with a Glaive starts out better, easily double the damage through being able to reliably use Reaction and Bonus action on top of Reach is invalueble early on. However for campaigns on the deadlier side of things, they're usually difficult because the DM compensates for player skill and makes encounters harder. For example putting 2 high threat enemies on the board to prevent a Nova build trivializing things. After Level 5 the ability to use your bonus Action for damage starts falling off, while Push/Shove scales for double duty as control, save and damage increase.
Full disclosure: with the FAQ for Shieldmaster, I filed it away as "okay but way too situational" a long time ago. You basically need high STR and DEX at once for the full benefit, a combination that is for the most part mutually exclusive. If it weren't for a class that surprisingly works better with 1h weapons, can save a feat and the massive synergy with Haste I'd still not consider this. The OoV Paladin just got lucky and has the perfect circumstances to actually make Shieldmaster work by accident.

Leveling further down the Paladin road is far from bad. Higher level Spellslots, Cleansing Touch and the lvl15 and lvl20 ability are all going to compliment you nicely.
Alternatively you can can comfortably multiclass into Fighter for Action Surge and higher crit threat range on all your Attacks from Champion. Battlemaster for some maneavers and even more dice to roll on Crits is straight up good as well. Eldritch Knight is going to be the most exiting, getting you access to 4th Level slots and a laundry list of useful Spells and Cantrips if you get Warcaster. 8 levels into Figher means 3 extra ASIs too.

Honorable mention:
Usually impossible, but if you rolled for stats and have enough Dex/Int a level in Rogue for Expertise in Athletics(Shieldbashing) goes a long way, starting with a +1 or +2 instead of a +0 to Dex makes the whole build a good bit better. Mostly relevant to grab a big benefit if the campaign is about to wrap up at this point.
Assuming rolled stats making INT 13 possible, my favourite option here would be picking up War Mage and going Warcaster on top of Resilience Con. This gives you amazing defenses and Spellprogression to complement your kit. Only downside would be a good chunk less HP, which should be easily compensated by access to Arcane Deflection, Shield, Tactical Mastery, Mirror Image, Counterspell and up to a 7th Level Spellslot.


So far so good. Someone please poke some holes in this before I walk face first into a horrible oversight. :redcloak:

[MaxWilson]

So far so good. Someone please poke some holes in this before I walk face first into a horrible oversight. :redcloak:

Polearm Master gives you the same Shove + Attack synergy, without having to rely on Haste. If you're a variant human Polearm Master can give you three attacks per round from level 1, and you don't even have to give up using a shield for it!

I really don't see what Shield Master is bringing to the table here, damage-wise.


With easier access to Advantage while Hasted and Dueling Fighting Style you're hitting for the same damage as a Polearm and hit more often than attacks using the -5/+10 from GWM.
has fairly reliable access to Advantage with VoE or Shieldmaster and generic 1H Magic weapons are a lot less DM reliant/easier to come by than PAM.

I don't think this is true. You're using Dueling style whereas the PAM/GWM guy presumably has Defense style, so the AC gap is only +1 in your favor, and you took Resilient Con instead of GWM so you both have the same Strength. He can get advantage just as easily as you can. You're looking at 3 attacks while hasted, but he can shove first and have advantage on all three attacks, whereas you have to use your Hasted attack first if you listen to Jeremy Crawford. He also gets a fourth attack as a reaction.

Assuming Shove works:

You're making one attack at at +9/no advantage (prof + Str) for 2d8+7 and two attacks at +9/advantage (prof + Str) for 2d8+7.
He's making two attacks at +4/advantage (prof + Str - 5) for d10+d8+15, one more at +4/advantage for d4+d8+15, and one more as a reaction at +4/no advantage for d10+d8+15.

Averaging over all ACs from 15 to 20, that set of assumptions yields a total of 39.47 damage on average for the Hasted Shield Master, and 55.86 for the PAM/GWM. Link to anydice program: https://anydice.com/program/1ace9

Without pre-casting Haste it's 24.96 to 39.83. Link: https://anydice.com/program/1ace8

[stoutstien]

part of the perks of pally is they are very hard to mess up. you could grab a couple of hand axes and twf with defense style and do just fine and frees up ASI/feats. at the same time they can pick up and use practically every melee weapon with worrying about 1/2 their choices not being active. so much of the pallys damage comes from smites the base weapon is mostly just a delivery device. use a dagger and be a cult fanatic or where ever you want.

[Tes]

Polearm Master gives you the same Shove + Attack synergy, without having to rely on Haste. If you're a variant human Polearm Master can give you three attacks per round from level 1, and you don't even have to give up using a shield for it!

I really don't see what Shield Master is bringing to the table here, damage-wise.



I don't think this is true. You're using Dueling style whereas the PAM/GWM guy presumably has Defense style, so the AC gap is only +1 in your favor, and you took Resilient Con instead of GWM so you both have the same Strength. He can get advantage just as easily as you can. You're looking at 3 attacks while hasted, but he can shove first and have advantage on all three attacks, whereas you have to use your Hasted attack first if you listen to Jeremy Crawford. He also gets a fourth attack as a reaction.

Assuming Shove works:

You're making one attack at at +9/no advantage (prof + Str) for 2d8+7 and two attacks at +9/advantage (prof + Str) for 2d8+7.
He's making two attacks at +4/advantage (prof + Str - 5) for d10+d8+15, one more at +4/advantage for d4+d8+15, and one more as a reaction at +4/no advantage for d10+d8+15.

Averaging over all ACs from 15 to 20, that set of assumptions yields a total of 39.47 damage on average for the Hasted Shield Master, and 55.86 for the PAM/GWM. Link to anydice program:

Without pre-casting Haste it's 24.96 to 39.83. Link:

Completely fumbled the part that obviously a PAM build can use an Action to shove all the same (whoops, talk about missing something obvious in plain sight).
Thanks for the reminder. It ends up not relevant to the numbers though. First and foremost because the PAM build needs 5 ASIs to get to STR 20 and PAM+GWM+Res Con. Your Math requires Lvl 16 on the PAM guy and something triggering the Reaction Attack. By lvl 16 we're pretty much done with the campaign if it ever gets there for the most part.

Any reason to completely ignore everything else in the OP?

For the sake of the argument let's assume offical RAW here. Ofc Shieldmaster is much better if you don't need Haste to benefit from it yourself.
PAM being able to just use an Attack to shove himself puts us at the same action economy, while having better defenses. When would you say you pick up GWM? When do you pick up resilient CON?
The biggest argument for Sword and Board is eating less random hits, having higher effective HP and minimizing the worst case scenario of losing concentration while Hasted. We get the added AC and passive defense boni of using Shieldmaster on top of the same damage by the time we hit 3rd level Spellslots on level 9. PAM bulds usually don't have Resilience Con by lvl 8. With Sword and Board you're fine delaying STR20 till 12.

As you correctly point out Polarm Master can give you 3 attacks per round.
On early levels when you bascially just DPS race opponents PAM is as mentioned amazing, sword and board can't compete in raw numbers, no question.
However you're not the only member of your party. So a raw increase in damage on the early levels for just yourself isn't the end all be all.
Things change a lot around Level 5 when you get your second Attack and will ususally spend the first and maybe second Bonus Action casting VoE, Misty Step, Hunters Mark (or bonus action Move HM). While you save a Spellslot on not using HM for the PAM build, it significantly bridges the gap for S&B till lvl 9 or easier encounters after. As usual unless you can precast, in which case you'll probably use Concentration on Bless. With +1 AC and Resilience Con 8 levels earlier (there's a point to be made for picking it up at lvl4 and just cast Bless for every hard fight). Getting to use your Reaction every round also looks as much of an assumption of ideal circumstances to me as is assuming Advantage in a Round with 4 Attacks for PAM.
It makes the core mistake to compare one build under ideal circumstances in a vacuum without factoring in any relevant circumstances.
Assuming a 3-4 round fight at lvl 12 the PAM guy shouldn't risk casting Haste and is likely better off blowing the Spellslot on a Smite for security.

The numbers you came up with are right on paper.
- They don't factor in actually being able to use Haste at minimal risk.
- doesn't factor in any sort of level progression and the main draw, S&B being able to relatively safely use Haste to pull ahead at lvl 9
- ignores ranged opponents, casters or simply enemies not triggering AoO
- ignores engaged enemies triggering AoO anyway or through lvl 15 OoV Feature
- not accurate for a lvl 16 PC
- assume Advantage which obviously favours GWM
- assume Bonus Action Attack is available to flat out do damage which obviously favours PAM+GWM
- assume 1 turn of Burst, try 3 rounds with Haste vs no Haste, and that's a short fight not a difficult one


Not sure why we are talking about ideal circumstances for GWM. We know what that looks like.
PAM+GWM is a solid build. No way are we going to beat this at where it is meant to be best at.

You're often doing the engaging and only have the one Reaction. Assuming you use it up against the first enemy that comes charging at you (without Sentinel) he can just keep going straight past you as you took away his incentive to stick it out with an angry Paladin. Even with Sentinel (yet another Feat you'll need a slot for, probably lvl19) any other enemy, i.e. the Mage you're already engaging, is free to just casually walk away and start blasting you at this point. There's a lot of things Shieldmaster either gives a bonus for or can completely avoid damage against. Which leaves you a better chance to live through the inevitable 30 damage Crit or antimagic effect breaking your Concentration anyway and leaving you hung out to dry for a turn.

As a guy in plate at the front you'll definitely go down at some point during a campaign. Unless the DM is pulling punches, added survivability directly translates into better action economy for the party. By the time a PAM build has everything you need (16) the S&B build has been reliably mitigated damage to the party for 7 levels by being able to go for the most valueable or dangerous target to either kill quickly or occupy. And he has been doing pretty much the same damage all the time, the PAM build didn't have GWM to be actually better at being a Nova or didn't have Resilience Con to maintain Concentration, all that while taking on average a good chunk extra damage whenever AC or DEX saves have been involved.

That's assuming we didn't have another Martial who loves us for pushing targets prone. It's also pretty human to do the "I'm DPS" thing and just use all your attacks to selfishly attack, while Shieldmaster doesn't give you the option and forces you to look for a smart play benefiting your allies (outside Haste). Or ran into the likely scenario of finding a useful magic 1H weapon/shield before the +1 Glaive. Again to make the OoV PAM build in your calculations we're looking at a lvl 16 PC. While you're probably not running around in +3 Plate and legendary weapons at this point, not having access to a +1 Shield at this point seems like a stretch for most settings.


part of the perks of pally is they are very hard to mess up. you could grab a couple of hand axes and twf with defense style and do just fine and frees up ASI/feats. at the same time they can pick up and use practically every melee weapon with worrying about 1/2 their choices not being active. so much of the pallys damage comes from smites the base weapon is mostly just a delivery device. use a dagger and be a cult fanatic or where ever you want.
Have been wondering about a good Dex build with Shieldmaster since forever. Just for what is essentially Evasion. But it looks pretty meh since it isn't able to use the Shove Bonus Action efficiently and you might as well just go straight Rogue for full blow Evasion instead. Best thing I could come up with was a Hexblade dip so you can avoid MADness and only go about 16 Dex on top of your +5 to saves from Aura. But that probably still needs a Rogue dip for Expertise Acrobatics to avoid getting grappled.

[da newt]

Is it more efficient to start Fighter 1 for another FS, 2nd wind and CON save proff, to free up an ASI?


How do you get 3 attacks as a lvl 1 PAM (or are you assuming a OA every round)?

[Tes]

Is it more efficient to start Fighter 1 for another FS, 2nd wind and CON save proff, to free up an ASI?


How do you get 3 attacks as a lvl 1 PAM (or are you assuming a OA every round)?
Counting PAM as 3 attacks lvl1 isn't much of a stretch. At that level you're probably fighting somewhat basic enemies that will actually allow you to use everything on all out smashing stuff.
The part that irks me about it that I'm more concerned about two low CR enemies walking past me to oneshot the 9 HP Wizard after the Reaction is gone. Keeping that Reaction will usually mean the two Goblins stick to the S&B instead. Sure he'll do less damage, but those Goblins will on average do muss less against an AC18 Paladin than an AC12 Wizard (or force him to blow his Spellslots on Shield).

It also somewhat assumes the S&B does something less useful than attacking for 1D4+3 with his Bonus Action. The whole point of the S&B build is to be better prepared for a GM throwing a somewhat decent challenge at you.

Good question about starting as Fighter actually. Does delay everything by a level but frees up Feats to max STR first.
You could go Fighter1-Pally5-Fighter2 which gets you Action Surge and both +1AC and Dueling to frontload raw defenses and Nova Potential on the mundane side of things.
Would take till level 13 to get Improved Divine Smite though and gets everything you want from Paladin (Extra Attack, Aura, Spell Profression).
Problem here is you lose Proficiency in CHA and WIS Saves. Planning to pick up Resilience WIS probably means you start with a 9. Also means you'll never get Proficiency in Charisma saves but have it for STR instead.
That's a tough one, overall would prefer going straight Paladin from lvl1. Stuff targeting WIS/CHA is usually nastier and more frequent than STR and you'll have +5 and Aura for STR saves.

[MaxWilson]

The part that irks me about it that I'm more concerned about two low CR enemies walking past me to oneshot the 9 HP Wizard after the Reaction is gone. Keeping that Reaction will usually mean the two Goblins stick to the S&B instead. Sure he'll do less damage, but those Goblins will on average do muss less against an AC18 Paladin than an AC12 Wizard (or force him to blow his Spellslots on Shield).

Why would the goblins stay on the paladin? Not only do they have missile weapons, they also have Nimble Escape. You're not getting any opportunity attacks.

RE: first post, the two builds are both ready at or before level twelve because GWM/PAM guy doesn't take Resilient (Con). But if you want to take it instead of Str 20, he'll still do more damage than the Shield Master guy.

RE: why did I respond only to the part about doing more damage than the GWM/PAM guy, because that claim seemed central to your build. You want to have your cake and eat it too by being tougher AND more damaging, but it turns out that you can't have both. It's a trade-off. That's why I fact-checked your damage claims.


How do you get 3 attacks as a lvl 1 PAM (or are you assuming a OA every round)?

Exactly. Especially once you start Shoving Prone and kiting. (Yes, Shoving does cost an attack but it's often worth it especially after level 5.) Call it something around 2.5-2.8 attacks per round depending on your DM.



It also somewhat assumes the S&B does something less useful than attacking for 1D4+3 with his Bonus Action. The whole point of the S&B build is to be better prepared for a GM throwing a somewhat decent challenge at you.

Both builds are using their bonus action already, for Shield Master or PAM.

I'd be more concerned about times when you don't have time to pre-buff Haste, which is why I highlighted the non-Hasted DPR too. Spending an action is more costly than spending a bonus action.

[MrStabby]

I think if I were to sword and board an oath of vengeance paladin I would be looking for a half elf dex build using a rapier and elvish accuracy. The channel divinity for on demand advantage and great smiting on critical hits is pretty good.

OoV is pretty loaded on bonus actions anyway, I get that more bonus actions is great, but if you are passing round hunters mark, casting smite spells, using your vow of enmity and so on, not having a feat that gives you bonus action stuff isn't so bad.

Worth noting that you get some vicious tanking tools if you are able to use the unearthed arcana with the alternative class features that gives you access to spirit guardians - it's easy to focus on the damage but the slowing effect makes it really difficult for people to get past you, especially when you can follow them so their whole movement is slow.