Feat advice for dex battle master at 6th level

[Spartan_MD]

My 18 Dex rapier and shield elf fighter, dueling style, battle master just hit 6th level (with 1 level Hexblade dip). At 4th level I took elven accuracy.

Right now considering ....

Defensive Duelist, which I know can be underpowered, but I like it thematically. I also like that I'll be using my reaction raising my AC to 24.

Just raising dex to 20. Helps with stealth, initiative, but not much for AC as I have mithril full plate and a +1 shield. Or next level sell the plate and take a level in warlock to get the invocation with mage armor which with a 20 dex would give me

Fighting Initiative : Defensive fighting style, for a 22 AC against all attacks. This wouldn't work if I eventually take another dip into warlock with the mage armor invocation.

Piercer - improves damage a bit, gives 19 DEX, and is really nice on crits (especially with elven accuracy)

I don't want to sit back and shoot arrows or eldritch blast. Front liner that is graceful, quick and deadly.

thoughts?

[5eNeedsDarksun]

How does your table play Shield Master? If you can BA shove pre-attack with Athletics Expertise (Take a Rogue Level and also get sneak attack dice) that's a pretty good option. You'd be rolling 3 dice pretty much every attack.

[animorte]

I would recommend Shield Master if you're dealing with more caster threats. Defensive Duelist is really good for more melee focused fights. Shield Master basically gives the Rogue/Monk class feature, Evasion. And you can shove creatures. Also consider Alert.

If you're going with Warlock later (Hexblade, I'm assuming) Mage Armor isn't really worth your time anyway, to be honest.

[Spartan_MD]

Character with only 8 strength, do no shield master….

[animorte]

Character with only 8 strength, do no shield master….

Well, that's useful information to have up front.

What are your stats like and what does the rest of your party look like? That certainly helps to narrow down the goal.

[5eNeedsDarksun]

Well, that's useful information to have up front.

What are your stats like and what does the rest of your party look like? That certainly helps to narrow down the goal.

To the OP: This. (above)
I mean, you (the OP) took Elven Accuracy, so what's your plan to get advantage? Mounted combatant could work.
The Hexblade dip... yes it's popular, but something like Genielock would have given you Fog Cloud which with Blindfighting could also have worked depending on the rest of your group.

To animorte: Note how I worked in your favorite dip...

[animorte]

To animorte: Note how I worked in your favorite dip...

I noticed immediately! :smallbiggrin:

[Kane0]

Shield Master, Mobile, Piercer/Slasher, Fey Touched (Gift of Alacrity), Lucky...

[Keravath]

A couple things to remember ... the defensive fighting style doesn't work with mage armor - you have to be wearing armor to get the +1 AC.

Unfortunately, Elven Accuracy isn't that much use unless you have a good way to regularly get advantage on attack rolls. If your DM uses flanking then it is awesome but personally I think the flanking optional rules provide far too much benefit so I don't use them.

Your reliable advantage options would be 3 levels of warlock for darkness+devils sight or blind fighting, a level in sorcerer for fog cloud (or any other caster who gets fog cloud at first level) combined with the blind fighting style, or a friendly DM who allows you to shield master bash and knock prone as a bonus action before taking the attack action. However, bashing isn't as effective in your case with a low strength and lack of expertise in athletics.

I'm not sure piercer does that much for you either. 19 dex will require another half feat to boost to 20 and although an extra die on a crit is nice, without a good way to regularly generate advantage, it won't come into play that often. The damage re-roll is probably worth about 1-2 damage/turn on average.

Also, you just hit level 6 so you won't get your next ASI until level 7 since you get it at fighter level 6 and you have a 1 level dip in hexblade warlock already so you might have a while to think about it.

However, given everything your best bet may just be 20 dex since it boosts initiative, to hit, damage and several other useful skills.

Out of curiosity, why did you dip one level into hexblade? Was it for a story reason? The usual mechanical reasons are armor and shield proficiency or using charisma for attacks - the only thing I think you get out of it is the hexblade's curse 1/short rest and possibly either hex or the shield spell also 1/short rest, unless I am missing something.

P.S. Another poster suggested Mobile which I personally think is a very fun feat letting you move faster and attack and move back without taking op attacks - so it might be one to consider.

[Frogreaver]

I personally like feats that open up new playstyles and tactics.

With that in mind,

Sentinel - Will be a great feat for you. Will either significantly up your damage or significantly reduce team enemies damage by having them focus on your high AC. Just stay near an ally.
Ritual Caster - find familiar is a ritual that at your level is cheap. This can help you generate advantage for using your elven accuracy. The other rituals are just gravy.
Mobile - Hit and run tactics can be very effective and fun. Though you have such a high AC, I wouldn't use this one.
Inspiring Leader/Healer - The more advantages your short rests can provide the party the more likely they are going to be willing in character to stop for one. Battlemasters with more short rests are significantly stronger.


Honorable mention for Lucky, as it doesn't really provide a new playstyle or tactic, but it feels right on a dex guy and can be used to turn some otherwise awful situations into good ones (disadvantage on an attack roll, addition dice on a save or skill check).

[animorte]

Inspiring Leader/Healer - The more advantages your short rests can provide the party the more likely they are going to be willing in character to stop for one. Battlemasters with more short rests are significantly stronger.
That is a brilliant idea. Passively guide your allies to give you more short rests by granting them a bonus.

[Frogreaver]

That is a brilliant idea. Passively guide your allies to give you more short rests by granting them a bonus.

Works great with the rally maneuver as well. You can dump any unused superiority dice on allies right before a short rest.

[animorte]

Works great with the rally maneuver as well. You can dump any unused superiority dice on allies right before a short rest.

Which is another reason to not dump Charisma stat as a Fighter.

[Frogreaver]

Defensive Duelist, which I know can be underpowered, but I like it thematically. I also like that I'll be using my reaction raising my AC to 24.

Defensive duelist will have more of an impact on being hit than defensive fighting style. So there's that at least. It's going to be pretty rare that you get hit more than once in a turn such that defensive duelist could help turn more than 1 hit into a miss (at least until your proficiency bonus increases more). Thus, as long as you aren't facing an absurd amount of attacks, it's going to come out pretty close to increasing your AC by your proficiency bonus.

That said at your current proficiency bonus you would need to be hit 5 times on a turn to even have greater than a 50% chance of having it turn one hit into a miss. You would need to be hit 3 times on a turn to even have greater than a 33% chance of having it turn one hit into a miss. In short, it's likely not an ability you will be using most turns. Then depending on how the DM plays enemies, they may pick up on the fact that you are very hard to hit due to your special reaction ability and start attacking you even less, especially since you only really do moderate damage and nothing else. IMO, being a moderate damage + high AC melee character, the last thing I want to do is disincentivize enemies from attacking me too much.

[Spartan_MD]

Thank you for all the feedback!

Apologies for not mentioning the character’s lack of Strength score. S8 D18 C16 I8 W8 Ch14. I’m trying to be succinct, but obviously I’ve missed some relevant details.

The one level dip in warlock was for role playing reasons. The type is homebrew combo /amalgamation of the feylock and hexblade. No CHA to hit or armor.

I don’t have a reliable way for advantage to have elven accuracy to kick in other than using a Feint maneuver or using action surge and aTrip attack.
I can cast Fairy fire which also is useful.

[da newt]

Might not be what you are looking for (your AC will suffer) but Revenant Blade feat w/ a double scimitar is a fun one for more attacks / more damage / more opportunities for BM moves.

I also like Alert as a simple go to feat.

[5eNeedsDarksun]

Thank you for all the feedback!

Apologies for not mentioning the character’s lack of Strength score. S8 D18 C16 I8 W8 Ch14. I’m trying to be succinct, but obviously I’ve missed some relevant details.

The one level dip in warlock was for role playing reasons. The type is homebrew combo /amalgamation of the feylock and hexblade. No CHA to hit or armor.

I don’t have a reliable way for advantage to have elven accuracy to kick in other than using a Feint maneuver or using action surge and aTrip attack.
I can cast Fairy fire which also is useful.

OK, so based on that the best long term plan for mulitple fights as you get more attacks and superiority dice is the Trip attack. Once you get 3 attacks per round it'll be a worthwhile trade to use 1 for the trip and 2 for attacks with 3 dice. Base your decisions around that. Dex is never a bad option and will help your trip, so consider that unless you have a clear plan that is decisively better.

[animorte]

OK, so based on that the best long term plan for mulitple fights as you get more attacks and superiority dice is the Trip attack. Once you get 3 attacks per round it'll be a worthwhile trade to use 1 for the trip and 2 for attacks with 3 dice. Base your decisions around that. Dex is never a bad option and will help your trip, so consider that unless you have a clear plan that is decisively better.

The trip early grants you advantage. Though prone may not assist your ranged allies much, the other utility involved is worth mentioning based on how threatening that particular enemy is.

[JohnDaBarr]

Consider Martial Adept, it doesn't sound like much but it is one of those feats you get to use constantly.

Also the best thing for your AC would be if you could get your hands on Serpent Scale Armor (Candlekeep Mysteries)

[Khrysaes]

Off the top of my head, im not sure if it works, but fey touched with faerie fire could work well as it gives you another 1 to 2 ways to get advantage as you can use it with the feat and your warlock level.

EDIT: YOU CANT CHOOSE FAERIE FIRE, which just doesn't fit the theme of the feats name.

Other good spell choices include Silvery Barbs (ask your DM), bless, Gift of Alacrity (ask your DM), , maybe Heroism. Depending on your CHA maybe compelled duel, bane, dissonant whispers, Hideous Laughter (causes prone), Sleep(ask if it can be switched at higher levels)

My table allows dex based shield master shoves, with the logic being that if a fighter (bm) can trip attack and use other manuevers with dex, then it should be possible to trip someone using dex and a shield. Ask your dm.


To the OP: This. (above)
I mean, you (the OP) took Elven Accuracy, so what's your plan to get advantage? Mounted combatant could work.
The Hexblade dip... yes it's popular, but something like Genielock would have given you Fog Cloud which with Blindfighting could also have worked depending on the rest of your group.

To animorte: Note how I worked in your favorite dip...



I also would have picked Genie, and chosen Dao to combine with Crusher Feat.

[qube]

Defensive Duelist, which I know can be underpowered, but I like it thematically. I also like that I'll be using my reaction raising my AC to 24.Underpowered? This is the first I heard of it.

Edit: I recall I did some maths around this, and the bonus (while it depends on the amount of attacks you get, and your base AC), as rule of thumb, it's about equal to a permanent AC boost of 1 less. (though it costs you your reaction; which can be a problem if you have a build that requires it)

[Contrast]

Character with only 8 strength, do no shield master….

This isn't great but not as bad as you might expect.

Lets looks at a yeti - its a big strong opponent. It has...+4 Str and no prof in Athletics or Acrobatics.

If you have prof in Athletics your bonus is +2, or -1 if not.

If you have prof that gives you a 37% chance of winning. If not, a 21% chance.

If you aren't doing anything else with that Bonus Action (assuming the more permissive interpretation of Shield Master) even without prof you've just gained a 1/5 chance of getting advantage for free each turn even against an opponent much stronger than you, plus the other defensive benefits of Shield Master stacking better with high dex.

Picking up Skill Expert Athletics at a later date will obviously improve things substantially.

[heavyfuel]

If you have an odd Wis score, I think Resilient:Wis is amazing.

Enemies don't care about your AC if they can Frighten/Charm/Paralyze you.

Lucky also boosts saves if you're smart with its uses (that means you should almost never use a Lucky roll on an attack). It's probably better than Resilient if you have an even Wis score.

Still, I'd go for +2 Dex at 6th, and get either feat at 8th


Underpowered? This is the first I heard of it.

Edit: I recall I did some maths around this, and the bonus (while it depends on the amount of attacks you get, and your base AC), as rule of thumb, it's about equal to a permanent AC boost of 1 less. (though it costs you your reaction; which can be a problem if you have a build that requires it)

It only affects one attack. Most monsters at this level have multiattack. If you're facing 2 enemies with 3 attacks each, you only get your AC bonus against 1/6th of the attacks. It's a terrible, horrible feat.

[Frogreaver]

It only affects one attack. Most monsters at this level have multiattack. If you're facing 2 enemies with 3 attacks each, you only get your AC bonus against 1/6th of the attacks. It's a terrible, horrible feat.

Facing 6 attacks per round with prof bonus +3.

The following probabilities show the chance X attacks fall into the range defensive duelist can cause to miss.

These can all be obtained using the binomial distribution.

0 attacks - 37.7%
1 attacks - 40%
2 attacks - 17.6%
3 attacks - 4.1%
4 attacks - 0.5%
5 attacks - 0%
6 attacks - 0%

There’s only a 22.4% chance more than 1 attack falls into the attack roll range that defensive duelist can modify.

Or to give another view, even in this scenario it is 69.2% as effective as having +3 AC.

That seems pretty dang effective to me.

[Rukelnikov]

Facing 6 attacks per round with prof bonus +3.

The following probabilities show the chance X attacks fall into the range defensive duelist can cause to miss.

These can all be obtained using the binomial distribution.

0 attacks - 37.7%
1 attacks - 40%
2 attacks - 17.6%
3 attacks - 4.1%
4 attacks - 0.5%
5 attacks - 0%
6 attacks - 0%

There’s only a 22.4% chance more than 1 attack falls into the attack roll range that defensive duelist can modify.

Or to give another view, even in this scenario it is 69.2% as effective as having +3 AC.

That seems pretty dang effective to me.

That assumes you always know whether it will turn the hit into a miss or not.

Players can usually guess the AC of the of the enemis after a couple attacks, but for incoming attacks, unless the DM tells you, you are mostly in the dark.

[stoutstien]

That assumes you always know whether it will turn the hit into a miss or not.

Players can usually guess the AC of the of the enemies after a couple attacks, but for incoming attacks, unless the DM tells you, you are mostly in the dark.
You do know your own AC and possibly your allies as well. since you know the attack needs to hit that means you know the minimum value needed to hit. Attack bonuses arent directly tied to CR but roughly the average attack bonus of NPCs you face is ~1-3 below the PCs assuming they are facing CR equal to their level. Boss and mooks obviously are outliners here. Part of the joy of bounded accuracy is you don't need to have all the information to make a judgment call.

It has a pretty sweet spot right there in the middle halfway through tier 2 in the middle of tier 3. For some builds it is as effective as having shield at will.

[Frogreaver]

That assumes you always know whether it will turn the hit into a miss or not.

Players can usually guess the AC of the of the enemis after a couple attacks, but for incoming attacks, unless the DM tells you, you are mostly in the dark.

Yes. Though some things can be estimated relatively easily (not with perfect knowledge but with enough). AC and attack bonuses are one of them. Because of bounded accuracy you have a fairly tight range for where the attack bonus is likely to be. After a few attacks that normally starts getting narrowed down.

It might be interesting to see how fast that can be narrowed down.

[5eNeedsDarksun]

This isn't great but not as bad as you might expect.

Lets looks at a yeti - its a big strong opponent. It has...+4 Str and no prof in Athletics or Acrobatics.

If you have prof in Athletics your bonus is +2, or -1 if not.

If you have prof that gives you a 37% chance of winning. If not, a 21% chance.

If you aren't doing anything else with that Bonus Action (assuming the more permissive interpretation of Shield Master) even without prof you've just gained a 1/5 chance of getting advantage for free each turn even against an opponent much stronger than you, plus the other defensive benefits of Shield Master stacking better with high dex.

Picking up Skill Expert Athletics at a later date will obviously improve things substantially.

That was my experience with Shield Master with a similar sort of character (Mostly Paladin, 1 level of Rogue and a mediocre Str[13]). Because the benefit of Expertise scales at double the rate of proficiency it gets better and better. Though, that also means it can be taken later. And there are other benefits to the feat, though I'm not sure the one of them came up more than a few times over the duration of the campaign.

[Keravath]

Yes. Though some things can be estimated relatively easily (not with perfect knowledge but with enough). AC and attack bonuses are one of them. Because of bounded accuracy you have a fairly tight range for where the attack bonus is likely to be. After a few attacks that normally starts getting narrowed down.

It might be interesting to see how fast that can be narrowed down.

Doesn't this assume the DM tells you what the die roll was other than just saying it was a hit (which is all they need to tell you)?. If you don't know what was rolled and do not know the creature to hit modifier (though you could guess +5 to +7 most likely in early tier 2)

If you have an AC of 18 in tier 2 and the DM says a monster hits you, do you use it or not?

With a typical +6, they would have needed a 12 to hit. Assuming that the DM will let you know when it was a crit and the ability would have no effect, the creature could have rolled anything from a 12 to 19. If they rolled 15 to 19 then the creature will hit even if you use the ability so odds wise it has a 3/7 chance of changing the hit into a miss ... given bounded accuracy, I'm not sure it gets much different than 50% chance of success unless you have a very high AC or the monster has a very low to hit modifier.

On the other hand, if the DM tells you the die roll (which they are under no obligation to do and there are lots of DMs who roll everything behind a screen), then it might have more value since it increases the odds of when it can be used effectively - if you know the creature rolled a 17+, you wouldn't use the ability - but there is no guarantee that you have that information.

[Frogreaver]

Doesn't this assume the DM tells you what the die roll was other than just saying it was a hit (which is all they need to tell you)?. If you don't know what was rolled and do not know the creature to hit modifier (though you could guess +5 to +7 most likely in early tier 2)

Yes. But in all fairness, I've rarely seen a table where the DM doesn't roll monster attacks in the open.


On the other hand, if the DM tells you the die roll (which they are under no obligation to do and there are lots of DMs who roll everything behind a screen), then it might have more value since it increases the odds of when it can be used effectively - if you know the creature rolled a 17+, you wouldn't use the ability - but there is no guarantee that you have that information.

There is no guarantee you don't know what was rolled either. I mean - he is under no obligation to hide it from you either.

[5eNeedsDarksun]

Yes. But in all fairness, I've rarely seen a table where the DM doesn't roll monster attacks in the open.



There is no guarantee you don't know what was rolled either. I mean - he is under no obligation to hide it from you either.

I wonder if rolling in the open is a practice that will become obsolete though. In 2e, which our group played before this it wasn't much of an issue, as I hear is the case for other editions in between. 5e has so many reactions where players clearly benefit (against RAI) from knowing this information it seems to be bad practice to me. Many of these reactions (Shield spell, Silvery Barbs) are strong enough without the additional information. Our DMs, including me, have moved to using DM screens almost exclusively as a result.

[Frogreaver]

I wonder if rolling in the open is a practice that will become obsolete though. In 2e, which our group played before this it wasn't much of an issue, as I hear is the case for other editions in between. 5e has so many reactions where players clearly benefit (against RAI) from knowing this information it seems to be bad practice to me. Many of these reactions (Shield spell, Silvery Barbs) are strong enough without the additional information. Our DMs, including me, have moved to using DM screens almost exclusively as a result.

I think that's a knee jerk reaction to something that isn't actually a problem.

You mention Silvery Barbs but it is explicitly used when a creature succeeds on an attack roll, ability check or saving throw. Knowing the roll with it doesn't matter 1 way or the other.

But more importantly, I look at an ability like cutting words which says "You can choose to use this feature after the creature makes its roll, but before the DM determines whether the attack roll or ability check succeeds or fails, or before the creature deals its damage.". While it's not explicit, that definitely sounds to me like they wanted you to be able to base your decision on the dice roll - there would be little reason to put that disclaimer in there if not IMO. So to me RAI is the dice are rolled in the open, but RAW is not explicit and thus they can be rolled either way.

[Keravath]

I think that's a knee jerk reaction to something that isn't actually a problem.

You mention Silvery Barbs but it is explicitly used when a creature succeeds on an attack roll, ability check or saving throw. Knowing the roll with it doesn't matter 1 way or the other.

But more importantly, I look at an ability like cutting words which says "You can choose to use this feature after the creature makes its roll, but before the DM determines whether the attack roll or ability check succeeds or fails, or before the creature deals its damage.". While it's not explicit, that definitely sounds to me like they wanted you to be able to base your decision on the dice roll - there would be little reason to put that disclaimer in there if not IMO. So to me RAI is the dice are rolled in the open, but RAW is not explicit and thus they can be rolled either way.

Yes. There are some abilities that are written in way where it seems to expect the player to know the die roll before deciding to use their ability.

Others are worded to a particular circumstance, shield spell is triggered by an attack that hits, defensive duelist bonus is also triggered by an attack that hits. Neither of these contain verbiage indicating that the die roll should be known to the player.

As for DM screens, up until 5e, in every group I played in, the DM used one. The players never knew the rolls only the results.

In 5e, I've found it much more common to roll all the dice where the players can see, though I have run into a few DMs using screens. I roll in the open myself these days. The main reason for me is to allow for a bit more tension in encounters and avoid the players thinking that the DM will fudge the dice on their behalf when nasty things happen. When playing, I like that tension, and the swings that luck brings.

It does mean that DM options to adjust encounter balance dynamically are more limited which can also be fun and an interesting challenge from the DM perspective.

[werescythe]

Defensive Duelist and Piercer are good. Also don't forget Martial Adept for more battle master maneuvers and another dice.

[5eNeedsDarksun]

I think that's a knee jerk reaction to something that isn't actually a problem.

You mention Silvery Barbs but it is explicitly used when a creature succeeds on an attack roll, ability check or saving throw. Knowing the roll with it doesn't matter 1 way or the other.

But more importantly, I look at an ability like cutting words which says "You can choose to use this feature after the creature makes its roll, but before the DM determines whether the attack roll or ability check succeeds or fails, or before the creature deals its damage.". While it's not explicit, that definitely sounds to me like they wanted you to be able to base your decision on the dice roll - there would be little reason to put that disclaimer in there if not IMO. So to me RAI is the dice are rolled in the open, but RAW is not explicit and thus they can be rolled either way.

Knowing the roll for Silvery Barbs absolutely does matter in many cases. For example, if the creature succeeds on a particularly low roll, say rolls a 6 on a Wis save, then the player knows his foe has a significant bonus to that save and likely won't burn the slot and reaction as it would be a waste of both. Without knowing that, they probably would. Shield... well, we all know you're giving away the exact info needed to counter a hit; there seems to be a consensus that Shield is OP, yet many of the posters saying that are rolling open.

So far as calling rolling behind a shield a 'knee jerk reaction' it seems to me implicit in that comment that it's inherently bad to be doing that. I know opinions differ, but I don't see it that way. I like the mystery, and providing additional info beyond what's required to players detracts from the tension, and therefore fun.

On RAI, I guess I'll just agree to disagree on that one.

[Frogreaver]

Knowing the roll for Silvery Barbs absolutely does matter in many cases. For example, if the creature succeeds on a particularly low roll, say rolls a 6 on a Wis save, then the player knows his foe has a significant bonus to that save and likely won't burn the slot and reaction as it would be a waste of both.

I find this persuasive. I think there's still a few caveats like if it's a particularly dangerous foe and the spell cast on it was hold monster then you may still risk a level 1 slot on silvery barbs for the chance that it lands. That and there are few enemies that are going to pass a save on a 6+ IME. By level 5 a Caster has a 15 Save DC. An enemy would need a 9+ save for that to happen. That's going to be pretty rare I think.

But yes, it will help weed out times when the enemy has a high save.


Without knowing that, they probably would. Shield... well, we all know you're giving away the exact info needed to counter a hit; there seems to be a consensus that Shield is OP, yet many of the posters saying that are rolling open.

We roll open. I think shield is solid but overrated. People focus too much on the damage it can prevent without considering how much damage and attacks they will take to get it to prevent that much. Like a Wizard that gets 19 AC with medium armor and a shield via multiclassing and then can cast the shield spell to get to 24. At some point we probably don't care that much about the cost of level 1 slots so I'll ignore that, but is the wizard really getting attacked 20+ times per adventuring day? I think that's fairly rare. Probably closer to 10 times. In which case over the whole adventuring day I'd say a good estimate is that shield prevents on average 2-3 attacks on the wizard. Nice but not overpowered IMO.


On RAI, I guess I'll just agree to disagree on that one.

Works for me.

[heavyfuel]

There’s only a 22.4% chance more than 1 attack falls into the attack roll range that defensive duelist can modify.

True... If you knew exactly how much the opponent rolled. Most DMs don't say "the monster hits you with an attack roll of 22, so you can use DD to stop this attack". You'll be using it blindly against pretty much every DM.

If you have AC 20 (Plate and Shield), and the monsters have +8 to hit, they need a 12 on the d20 (9 in 20 chances to hit you)

If you increase your AC by +3, you stop any attack that has rolled bellow a 15. But you don't know how well they rolled, so when you're hit, you'll use DD. You don't know if they rolled a 12 or a 20.

So there's only a 3 in 9 chance of DD actually doing anything against 1 in 6 attacks.

[Frogreaver]

True... If you knew exactly how much the opponent rolled. Most DMs don't say "the monster hits you with an attack roll of 22, so you can use DD to stop this attack". You'll be using it blindly against pretty much every DM.

If you have AC 20 (Plate and Shield), and the monsters have +8 to hit, they need a 12 on the d20 (9 in 20 chances to hit you)

If you increase your AC by +3, you stop any attack that has rolled bellow a 15. But you don't know how well they rolled, so when you're hit, you'll use DD. You don't know if they rolled a 12 or a 20.

So there's only a 3 in 9 chance of DD actually doing anything against 1 in 6 attacks.

If you can see the enemy dice rolls then that’s a significant underestimate. If you just know whether they hit or miss then your analysis is accurate.

[heavyfuel]

If you can see the enemy dice rolls then that’s a significant underestimate. If you just know whether they hit or miss then your analysis is accurate.

Reading a previous post of yours, seems like your DM(s) always roll out in the open. That does make the feat better (especially if you sprinkle in some extra metagame knowledge like average to hit per CR) in this edge case, but the feat is still worthless for most people whose DMs don't roll out in the open

[JNAProductions]

Reading a previous post of yours, seems like your DM(s) always roll out in the open. That does make the feat better (especially if you sprinkle in some extra metagame knowledge like average to hit per CR) in this edge case, but the feat is still worthless for most people whose DMs don't roll out in the open

What makes you think your experience is more common?

I roll in the open, for one.

[heavyfuel]

What makes you think your experience is more common?

I roll in the open, for one.

I could ask you the same. :smalltongue:

But, fair question. There are a few reasons I think so

- Most media portrayals of D&D have the DM rolling behind a screen;
- The fact that DM screens are popular enough to justify the logistics of producing, shipping, and stocking them;
- Every D&D event I've been to in my 20+ years of gaming had well over 90% of DMs using screens.

Not a huge a sample size, but enough that I'm comfortable stating "most DMs use screens"

[animorte]

I could ask you the same. :smalltongue:

But, fair question. There are a few reasons I think so

- Most media portrayals of D&D have the DM rolling behind a screen;
- The fact that DM screens are popular enough to justify the logistics of producing, shipping, and stocking them;
- Every D&D event I've been to in my 20+ years of gaming had well over 90% of DMs using screens.

Not a huge a sample size, but enough that I'm comfortable stating "most DMs use screens"

Honestly for me the DM screen is used more for keeping some of my notes on it about the PCs, the NPCs, and enemies. I have listed page numbers for quick reference and some other static information. I also have a notepad for making a bunch of notes etc. Me rolling in the open adds a lot to the experience. You know that concept of rolling dice at random times just to keep the players anxious? That's so much better in the open, whether you have a cause for the roll or not. I generally do, it's just not always necessary to communicate what.