Which is better, a 3rd attack or more damage per hit?

[samcifer]

While looking over lvl 11 class features, I just find more damage per hit feels better than a second extra attack. A fighter making 3 attacks per turn at lvl 11 doesn't feel as good on dps as a paladin's improved smite for example (or a blood hunter doing the same ammount of damage with their crimson rite). I was wondering on other players thoughts on an extra attack being more or less desirable than extra damage per hit from a dps viewpoint when you can only have one of the two choices (and excluding the Haste spell for both choices on the same character).

[Lolzyking]

The third attack is honestly better for damage per round. When you consider its already on the most asi filled class the fighter will have maxed out there attack stat and if applicable have their ss + ce or gwm+pam. Heck even an eldritch knight chucking around a shadowblade is doing better at this point since that third attack scales with every bonus you've stacked onto your attack already

Edit also bringing up blog hunter isn't a fair comparison, its literally non wotc homebrew.

You are correct that haste is a bad spell, except when cast on the parties rogue

[5eNeedsDarksun]

3rd attack is better. There are multiple ways to add damage as a multiplier effect for that attack. In a game that is low magic without feats and multiclassing perhaps there could be an argument for the other, but I don't get the sense most tables are in that boat.

[Frogreaver]

While looking over lvl 11 class features, I just find more damage per hit feels better than a second extra attack. A fighter making 3 attacks per turn at lvl 11 doesn't feel as good on dps as a paladin's improved smite for example (or a blood hunter doing the same ammount of damage with their crimson rite). I was wondering on other players thoughts on an extra attack being more or less desirable than extra damage per hit from a dps viewpoint when you can only have one of the two choices (and excluding the Haste spell for both choices on the same character).

As with most things it depends.

That said you’ve got to go pretty far out of your way in 5e before adding extra damage is better than adding an extra attack.

Characters with bonus action and reaction attacks can be better with more damage. This is why a Paladin with a spear and polearm mastery and improved divine smite comes out stronger than a fighter with that same setup in at will damage.

[Chronos]

I don't know what "feels better" is doing in this question. This is a question that's answered simply and directly by the numbers. It's easy to calculate the damage per round, and easy to see which number is larger. Those numbers might be changed by feats or magic items or buff spells or whatever, but in any given case, they're still easy to compare.

[Amechra]

You're generally going to be better off with gaining more attacks, simply because a martial character's base damage per attack is actually pretty solid. Ignoring specialized damage bonuses, martial characters end up dealing at least ~10 damage per attack by the end of Tier 2, so your damage bonus across all of your attacks has to beat that to be worth more than an extra attack.

+1 attack is better than Improved Divine Smite if you already have two attacks, but it's generally going to be worse if you have three.

[Keravath]

3rd attack is usually better ..

Let's use IDS as an example. Adding 1d8 to every swing only adds 9 damage on average or 13.5 with PAM (but then that is also 3 attacks so not a fair comparison).

The extra attack also includes the attack stat. So for a fighter with a longsword this is d8+5 or 9.5 on average - for a greatsword this is 12 extra damage on average. This is almost as much damage as IDS on three attacks from the paladin. So in general, 3 attacks offers more than 2 with IDS. Also, if the character has any way to boost damage/hit like Hunter's Mark/Hex/Divine Favor - all of these scale better the more attacks there are. So again more attacks are usually better than a damage increase on fewer attacks (though the size of that increase matters - d8 isn't as good but more than that could exceed the damage from one extra attack.)

[Frogreaver]

I don't know what "feels better" is doing in this question. This is a question that's answered simply and directly by the numbers. It's easy to calculate the damage per round, and easy to see which number is larger. Those numbers might be changed by feats or magic items or buff spells or whatever, but in any given case, they're still easy to compare.

We can calculate DPR under a given set of parameters. However, there's more to damage than DPR. There is needing to account for overkill as it will have an impact on who actually performs better in an encounter (can easily result in a 10-20% damage loss for GWM style characters). We also need to account for changing decision trees based on the exact characteristics of the martial. We've got to factor in OA's. We've got to factor in damage distributions and their meaning to the situation at home. Most importantly we have to weight all the buffs, how often OA's occur, etc. None of this is easy.

DPR is a great starting point, but it's not the end all be all when it comes to comparing which martial setup is overall better.

[stoutstien]

A 3rd attack is also an additional chance to shove or grapple. When applicable shove then 2 attacks means advantage which is pretty big when talking about swinging weapons at something.

[Amechra]

Yeah, that's the thing — 4 chunks of 5 damage each is better than one big chunk of 20 damage, simply because it protects you from overkilling enemies or losing everything from "missing" a single chunk.

[ender241]

This looks like a job for LudicSavant's Comprehensive DPR Calculator:
https://tinyurl.com/y4cvx47n

But I agree with what most have already said. A 3rd attack is typically going to be better, but the best way to know for sure is to crunch the numbers.

[Kane0]

One attack being something like 1d6 +4 (7.5) to 2d6 +5 (12), and +1d8 on two existing attacks being 9, it comes out close to even depending on your weapon die and stat bonus.

A third attack is an extra chance to hit, crit and apply per-hit damage riders (hunter's mark/enlarge person/spirit shroud, +X magic weapon, Rage, etc) though, so there's that. And there are generally lots of ways to get more damage on an attack but not as many ways to get more attacks (especially without increasing your action usage).

[Lunali]

The real answer is it depends on how much damage you're doing per attack and how much extra damage per hit you'd be doing. Since you're comparing to improved divine smite, we'll assume d8 extra per hit or 2d8 per round. Comparing to a fighter doing d8+6 per hit, an extra hit comes out ahead, most fighters at that level will manage to do better than that.

[Frogreaver]

The real answer is it depends on how much damage you're doing per attack and how much extra damage per hit you'd be doing. Since you're comparing to improved divine smite, we'll assume d8 extra per hit or 2d8 per round. Comparing to a fighter doing d8+6 per hit, an extra hit comes out ahead, most fighters at that level will manage to do better than that.

How many OA's are you factoring in?

[samcifer]

Well as an example, let's say there's a choice between a blood hunter and a fighter, both at lvl 11 with the polearm master feat. (BH or paladin without the regular smiting feature so it comes down to more damage on 3 hits or 4 hits without extra damage per hit.) That's how I'm factoring a 4th attack vs extra damage on the 3 hits you have as a non-fighter.

[Nounverber]

Going from 1 attack to 2 means you're doubling your damage (double the attack and damage rolls). Going 2 to 3 gets you only half as much, and 3 to 4 is a third more damage. If you already have or can easily add extra damage on your usual hits (hex, magic weapon, gwm with an accuracy boost) then the extra hit is better. If you have ways of getting extra attacks with varying qualities of dice (flurry of blows, polearm master, claw barbarian, rogue twfing) then extra damage is the better bet

[Chronos]

True, more attacks does make you more consistent. And that's a good thing: Consistency favors the side of a battle that was already favored to begin with, because the underdog needs an unexpected result in order to win. And in the vast majority of D&D battles, the PCs are the side more likely to win, so they like things to be consistent.

[OvisCaedo]

I think it's also worth questioning how many classes actually get a level 11 feature that adds significant damage to every attack. I think Paladins might be something of a stand out there for an always-on resourceless damage boost.

the presence or absence of reliable bonus action attacks (or competition for that bonus action) also make it a question of whether a fighter's level 11 is going from 2 attacks to 3, or 3 attacks to 4.

[tiornys]

It's a level later, but Pact of the Blade Warlocks get a very similar damage boost as Paladins from Lifedrinker.

[Chronos]

Quoth OvisCaedo:

I think it's also worth questioning how many classes actually get a level 11 feature that adds significant damage to every attack. I think Paladins might be something of a stand out there for an always-on resourceless damage boost.
Most martial classes get an always-on resourceless damage boost at 11. For paladins, it's improved divine smite. For fighters, it's another attack. For rangers, it depends on your subclass: Hunters get an area-effect attack, beastmasters get another attack from their beast, and I don't feel like digging up the subclasses in other books. Barbarians and monks, admittedly, get defensive boosts at 11 instead of offense.

[Kane0]

Mercy monks are the exception though IIRC, they get a damage output boost.

[stoutstien]

Mercy monks are the exception though IIRC, they get a damage output boost.

Off the top of my head MA increase to 1d8, kensei get sharpen blade, and astral get a mini smite as well.

[Corran]

While looking over lvl 11 class features, I just find more damage per hit feels better than a second extra attack. A fighter making 3 attacks per turn at lvl 11 doesn't feel as good on dps as a paladin's improved smite for example (or a blood hunter doing the same ammount of damage with their crimson rite). I was wondering on other players thoughts on an extra attack being more or less desirable than extra damage per hit from a dps viewpoint when you can only have one of the two choices (and excluding the Haste spell for both choices on the same character).
Entirely hypothetically, consider a paladin dealing 30 dpr with 2 attacks and a fighter dealing 30 dpr with 3 attacks.

Which option is better in terms of performance?
Well, they both deal the exact same damage on average, but the fighter has more attacks, which means that their damage can be distributed more efficiently (and it will be, since room for error is mostly theoritical and very unlikley to happen in practice in such cases where decision making is trivial). With three attacks your damage also has reduced variance, ie the effect of chance is slightly reduced. You want to reduce variance when you think you are winning (which is most of the time in a typical campaign), but you want to increase variance when you think you are on the losing side.

Synergy
The both improve by either adding attacks or by improving the damage of every attack, but the paladin with two attacks benefits more from the former while the fighter benefits more from the latter (at least initially). So, something like twf works better on a paladin, since each of their attacks is individually more powerful than the fighter's attack. And something like hex works better on the fighter since the extra damage gets added more times since they have more attacks.

Additionally
More attacks means your are better at grappling and shoving (plus anything else that can replace individual attacks; nothing comes to mind though). You are better at that, because more attack increase the chance of being successful. But also because more and individually weaker attacks reduce the opportunity cost when using grappling/shoving instead of attacking.

[Witty Username]

How much more damage? 1d8 feels nice but not great, +1/+2 is bit crap. I like damage. I think +10 damage is about the point where it is worth more than the extra attack.

[CMCC]

The answer is: how much more damage?

[samcifer]

The answer is: how much more damage?

My reasoning is this:

Without gwm/ss feats and just raw damage, it would be (with 20 str and a basic longsword) 1d8 + 5 damage per attack. An extra 1d8 damage on 2 hits would basically equal the damage of a 3rd attack. In that light I ask which would be better?

[Frogreaver]

My reasoning is this:

Without gwm/ss feats and just raw damage, it would be (with 20 str and a basic longsword) 1d8 + 5 damage per attack. An extra 1d8 damage on 2 hits would basically equal the damage of a 3rd attack. In that light I ask which would be better?

At the same accuracy and DPR, the character that does the DPR over more hits is better - on average he doesn’t waste as much DPR upon killing an enemy and thus has more opportunities to apply the comparatively wasted DPR to an alternate enemy.

[ender241]

At the same accuracy and DPR, the character that does the DPR over more hits is better - on average he doesn’t waste as much DPR upon killing an enemy and thus has more opportunities to apply the comparatively wasted DPR to an alternate enemy.

Yep, and the damage is also more consistent. DPR may even out over time but in general it's better to do lots of smaller attacks vs 1 or 2 big ones, especially in short fights. The only exception could be if you have something granting you advantage on the first attack only (like a familiar helping).

[Reynaert]

Side thought: This (more hits outperforms more damage per hit) seems to be a good reason to houserule damage-reduction into your games. That way there is more variation between who is most effective at damage output between different fights or even in the same fight.