i was there at the stream where we had this discussion but im still positively surprised by the quality of this video and its breakdown, major props for the effort put into it, you did a good job
Nice to see the math back up my feeling that my Half Orc 9 Barb/3 Champ Fighter with the Dead Shot in the ranged slot & drinking Elixirs of Viciousness for breakfast was a beast.
Awesome! I was wondering this myself, I did watch but maybe I missed it, did you cover the fighter fighting style Great Weapon Fighting, re-rolling a 1 or 2 on damage?
I didn't cover that actually. My instincts say it favours greatswords/mauls as it allows us to reroll the weapon damage 2/6 (1/3) of the time, although the potential increase from rerolling on 1d12 is greater? I think the overall point would probably still stand in that it doesn't make too much of a difference compared to the bonuses from weapons, buffs and character stats, including strength elixirs.
good to known that crits are slightly better with a 1d12, but i did suspect 2d6 was just better overall. also why is the average damage of 1d12 6.5 instead of 6? where is that .5 coming from, because obviously the median between 1-12 is 6.
The median of 1-12 is 6.5 as well as the mean. There are 12 numbers in the set, so the median is taken from the mean of the 6th and 7th numbers, which are 6 and 7. The mean comes from the sum, 156, being divided by 12. Or the shortcut here is just the minimum number + the maximum number/2.
I could have totally missed something, but does this take into account the “great weapon fighting” trait you can take on most martials? Seems to me that rerolling all 1s and 2s gives 2d6 weapons a substantial advantage. It also stacks with savage attacks
Interesting video. Question: Do damage riders work on each instance of damage dice or do they ride on the attack not the dice? From what I have read and seen that seems to depend on whether the additional dice are a different type of damage, but I am not entirely sure. And in Honor Mode things work differently with damage so ...what happens in Honor Mode? Thanks for any guidance.
@@hobojoe9717 it is explained on BG3.wiki. it means spells, conditions or items that add damage to every damage source. One example of many is lightning charges.
I haven't had the chance to test it, but from my understanding the extra rider apply to the attack, not the dice. So using either weapon will give the same number of damage riders, assuming there are no other differences between the weapons.
Crunching numbers is kind of fun to do, but at the end of the day I generally put a Great Axe in the hands of any Barbarian. Fairly certain it is due to years of hack n' slash barbs that always seemed to use axes instead of swords. Sometimes a maul/hammer/club, but there it is...nostalgia. XD My entire reason for putting any and all Great Axes in the hands of Karlach. Thanks for the info! :)
I might of missed it but did you mention the two handed weapon fighting style that makes it to were you can’t score less than a 2 on the dice? That would make a 2d6 weapon do 6-12 damage for an average of 9 and a 1d12 do an average of 7.5. I use this in game all the time and it does apply to both damage dice and any damage riders as well.
Well done for the math and the averages. However, there is a good argument for using 1d12 instead of 2d6, and it is the "gambling argument". I explain : With 2d6, you have 1/36 chance of doing max damage (about 2.8%), while 1d12 has 1/12 chance of doing max damage (about 8.3%). If you like gambling for maximum damage (but sometimes you get minimal), then 1d12 is more "fun" and you will do max damage more often. Thanks for the video. Cheers.
Yeah, as I mentioned about the spread of numbers I prefer having more dice because getting the low numbers just makes me feel bad! So I'd rather avoid feeling bad, but I do understand the arguement for fewer dice.
Nice breakdown. I would have liked to see great weapon fighting evaluated like others have mentioned. I think it might change a lot. On the crit point, I personally dont like crit fish, rather guaranteed crits through a CC provided from another character. Freeze them, sleep them, hold person them. Teamwork makes the dream work
I really like this kind of video. I'm not math savy, but the other day I spent hours researching into halfling luck, I just love that kind of complex bonus that the average person takes ages to understand, if we even actually get the full impact. About this video subject, I usually prefer 2D6 to 1D12, UNLESS I'm playing a half-orc, because the extra die in critical hits being larger is outright better.
I think it also feels more rewarding to work out the answer yourself rather than just reading about the final result of it because it means you really understand why something is good or not.
Thanks for putting so much detail into this! I’d always assumed the 2d6 was better but it’s interesting to see why the difference is actually pretty insignificant. My takeaway is that I now have a mathematical reason to just use whatever makes my character feel more badass ⚔️
The big difference is the damage spread. With a 1d12 great axe, you're more likely to get a lucky hit and take down an enemy in a single hit. You're just as likely to do minimal damage, of course. The odds of doing max damage with 1d12 is 1/12, but max damage on 2d6 is 1/36 - 3x more likely. The advantage of a single hit eliminating a foe in one attack means you have one less foe attacking you and no one else needs to spend an attack on that guy. So, on average, they're really about the same, but there's a range where the 1d12 will speed up fights a bit.
Personally I really dislike getting the low damage, more so than getting the high numbers! You're correct with what you say of course, and having the greatest chance to take an enemy out is a good thing.
I think play style is a factor here. Especially in the early game here percentages are lower I base my decisions on average damage instead of getting a high role. In this case having a weapon that more reliable hits the average allows me to safely play with more aggression. Which speeds up my gameplay. I realize i’m mixing human nature into the math here but I do think in reality, if the focus is the speed of the fight, the risk aversion of the player in regards to the weapon type plays a roll. Even if it is an unconscious reaction like a player regularly feeling big highs and lows. One player gets excited by the highs another becomes cautious because of the lows.
I like 1d12 because I like running crit builds. Barb 9 and half orc lets crits hit for 4d12 48, while it would be 6d6 32 for 1d6 swords. Sadly I don't really like any great axes for their side effects, so I generally go from the invisible spear that has 1d10 and then Balduran's giantslayer
Ignoring hit chance is flawed. For the most obvious example if you have 5% chance to hit all your hits will be a crittical and then half orcs will deal more dmg with a great axe. This is the other extreme 100% hit means that 5% of your HITS are criticals instead.
You aren't ignoring hit chance, you're effectively assuming attacks never miss. Put differently: the "Average with crits" numbers apply the critical chance to the number of hits when it should be the number of swings. As miss chance increases, the percentage of attacks that land (non-misses) which are critical hits should increase as well. For example, for Greatsword with crit on 19 you have W * (1 + C) = 7 * (1 + 10%) = 7.7 average damage per non-miss. The expectation should be [W * (1 - M - C) + W * 2 * C] / (1 - M) = W + (W * C) / (1 - M) = 7 + 0.7 / 0.95 = 7.737 damage. When miss chance goes up to 30%, that expectation rises to 8. Observe that plugging in 0 for M in this equation produces your equation, hence my claim that you assume attacks never miss. To be fair, the effect is small when miss chance in small and like so many other effects in the analysis it's similar for both weapon types. I don't think it affects your conclusions since you aren't looking things like "When should I turn off Great Weapon Mastery?" that often involve huge swings (pun intended) in miss chance. Nitpicks aside, this is an excellent video =)
You're right, I did it for simplicity sake as well. I wasn't sure how to show the difference including the chance to hit without adding in a graph for all the chances to hit for each roll needed for a critical hit i.e. drowning in data and graphs! Perhaps I could have chosen an arbitrary chance to hit, like 90%? Although that misses the added bonus of the lower critical numbers when trying to hit high AC targets..... Thanks for the feedback, it certainly gives me something to think about if I do something like this again!
>in first 2mins of video tells multiple times that difference is insignificant >proceeds to show us excel table for next 13 minutes this is what called [a] weaponized autism, guys
@@ambientorange9360 Lol x) averages don't have to be full numbers even if you can't have them in game.... Heres a basic example: you do 2 damage, next turn you 3 damage, thats 2.5 average damage... Pretty simple math friend :P
i was there at the stream where we had this discussion but im still positively surprised by the quality of this video and its breakdown, major props for the effort put into it, you did a good job
Thanks, it was certainly a different experience for me compared to my usual type of video.
Great weapon fighting style gives similar advantage as savage attack to 2d6 as 1s and 2s can be rerolled.
I had honestly been wondering about the numbers on this exact thing. Thanks for taking the time!
Happy to help!
Nice to see the math back up my feeling that my Half Orc 9 Barb/3 Champ Fighter with the Dead Shot in the ranged slot & drinking Elixirs of Viciousness for breakfast was a beast.
Seeing the big numbers when you crit must have felt good!
My exact build. Feelsgood
Awesome! I was wondering this myself, I did watch but maybe I missed it, did you cover the fighter fighting style Great Weapon Fighting, re-rolling a 1 or 2 on damage?
I didn't cover that actually. My instincts say it favours greatswords/mauls as it allows us to reroll the weapon damage 2/6 (1/3) of the time, although the potential increase from rerolling on 1d12 is greater?
I think the overall point would probably still stand in that it doesn't make too much of a difference compared to the bonuses from weapons, buffs and character stats, including strength elixirs.
super interesting! Thanks for putting this together!
I was wondering this myself. I feel like I hit less with the ax. Your timing on this is synchronous. Collective bg3 hive mind. lol. top notch video.
its called the Absolute, not hive mind. Someone flay this goblin
Hi CVG thanks for the video. Numbers are great.
Lovely! Always wondered about this.
Glad it was helpful!
good to known that crits are slightly better with a 1d12, but i did suspect 2d6 was just better overall.
also why is the average damage of 1d12 6.5 instead of 6?
where is that .5 coming from, because obviously the median between 1-12 is 6.
The median of 1-12 is 6.5 as well as the mean. There are 12 numbers in the set, so the median is taken from the mean of the 6th and 7th numbers, which are 6 and 7.
The mean comes from the sum, 156, being divided by 12. Or the shortcut here is just the minimum number + the maximum number/2.
Wow always wondered why there was even a difference. Never realized it was swords vrs axes.
I could have totally missed something, but does this take into account the “great weapon fighting” trait you can take on most martials? Seems to me that rerolling all 1s and 2s gives 2d6 weapons a substantial advantage. It also stacks with savage attacks
Interesting video. Question: Do damage riders work on each instance of damage dice or do they ride on the attack not the dice? From what I have read and seen that seems to depend on whether the additional dice are a different type of damage, but I am not entirely sure. And in Honor Mode things work differently with damage so ...what happens in Honor Mode? Thanks for any guidance.
What do you mean by “damage riders”?
@@hobojoe9717 it is explained on BG3.wiki. it means spells, conditions or items that add damage to every damage source. One example of many is lightning charges.
I haven't had the chance to test it, but from my understanding the extra rider apply to the attack, not the dice. So using either weapon will give the same number of damage riders, assuming there are no other differences between the weapons.
Crunching numbers is kind of fun to do, but at the end of the day I generally put a Great Axe in the hands of any Barbarian. Fairly certain it is due to years of hack n' slash barbs that always seemed to use axes instead of swords. Sometimes a maul/hammer/club, but there it is...nostalgia. XD My entire reason for putting any and all Great Axes in the hands of Karlach. Thanks for the info! :)
You're right, there is something that makes a greataxe fit perfectly with a barbarian!
I might of missed it but did you mention the two handed weapon fighting style that makes it to were you can’t score less than a 2 on the dice? That would make a 2d6 weapon do 6-12 damage for an average of 9 and a 1d12 do an average of 7.5. I use this in game all the time and it does apply to both damage dice and any damage riders as well.
Well done for the math and the averages. However, there is a good argument for using 1d12 instead of 2d6, and it is the "gambling argument". I explain : With 2d6, you have 1/36 chance of doing max damage (about 2.8%), while 1d12 has 1/12 chance of doing max damage (about 8.3%). If you like gambling for maximum damage (but sometimes you get minimal), then 1d12 is more "fun" and you will do max damage more often.
Thanks for the video. Cheers.
Yeah, as I mentioned about the spread of numbers I prefer having more dice because getting the low numbers just makes me feel bad! So I'd rather avoid feeling bad, but I do understand the arguement for fewer dice.
I argue the difference is too minimal to actually affect a thing like having fun. Just use a weapon that you like.
Nice breakdown. I would have liked to see great weapon fighting evaluated like others have mentioned. I think it might change a lot.
On the crit point, I personally dont like crit fish, rather guaranteed crits through a CC provided from another character. Freeze them, sleep them, hold person them.
Teamwork makes the dream work
I really like this kind of video. I'm not math savy, but the other day I spent hours researching into halfling luck, I just love that kind of complex bonus that the average person takes ages to understand, if we even actually get the full impact.
About this video subject, I usually prefer 2D6 to 1D12, UNLESS I'm playing a half-orc, because the extra die in critical hits being larger is outright better.
I think it also feels more rewarding to work out the answer yourself rather than just reading about the final result of it because it means you really understand why something is good or not.
i was too. Kinda crazy
Thanks for putting so much detail into this! I’d always assumed the 2d6 was better but it’s interesting to see why the difference is actually pretty insignificant.
My takeaway is that I now have a mathematical reason to just use whatever makes my character feel more badass ⚔️
I don't think anyone should need any more reason than feeling badass to make whatever character they want!
@@CasualVeteranGamer of course! Just nice to have the numbers to back it up lol
Probably worth noting that SA does not reroll the brutal critical or half orc extra crit dice
Very nicely done.
Thank you.
The big difference is the damage spread. With a 1d12 great axe, you're more likely to get a lucky hit and take down an enemy in a single hit. You're just as likely to do minimal damage, of course. The odds of doing max damage with 1d12 is 1/12, but max damage on 2d6 is 1/36 - 3x more likely. The advantage of a single hit eliminating a foe in one attack means you have one less foe attacking you and no one else needs to spend an attack on that guy. So, on average, they're really about the same, but there's a range where the 1d12 will speed up fights a bit.
Personally I really dislike getting the low damage, more so than getting the high numbers! You're correct with what you say of course, and having the greatest chance to take an enemy out is a good thing.
I think play style is a factor here. Especially in the early game here percentages are lower I base my decisions on average damage instead of getting a high role.
In this case having a weapon that more reliable hits the average allows me to safely play with more aggression. Which speeds up my gameplay.
I realize i’m mixing human nature into the math here but I do think in reality, if the focus is the speed of the fight, the risk aversion of the player in regards to the weapon type plays a roll. Even if it is an unconscious reaction like a player regularly feeling big highs and lows. One player gets excited by the highs another becomes cautious because of the lows.
The only important thing is crit and resistance 🙌
I like 1d12 because I like running crit builds. Barb 9 and half orc lets crits hit for 4d12 48, while it would be 6d6 32 for 1d6 swords. Sadly I don't really like any great axes for their side effects, so I generally go from the invisible spear that has 1d10 and then Balduran's giantslayer
It is a shame that there aren't many good greataxes to choose from, especially compared to some of the greatswords we can find in Act 3.
Ignoring hit chance is flawed. For the most obvious example if you have 5% chance to hit all your hits will be a crittical and then half orcs will deal more dmg with a great axe. This is the other extreme 100% hit means that 5% of your HITS are criticals instead.
Thank you
I was perfectly fine with my 1d10 damage and reach.
You aren't ignoring hit chance, you're effectively assuming attacks never miss. Put differently: the "Average with crits" numbers apply the critical chance to the number of hits when it should be the number of swings. As miss chance increases, the percentage of attacks that land (non-misses) which are critical hits should increase as well.
For example, for Greatsword with crit on 19 you have W * (1 + C) = 7 * (1 + 10%) = 7.7 average damage per non-miss. The expectation should be [W * (1 - M - C) + W * 2 * C] / (1 - M) = W + (W * C) / (1 - M) = 7 + 0.7 / 0.95 = 7.737 damage. When miss chance goes up to 30%, that expectation rises to 8. Observe that plugging in 0 for M in this equation produces your equation, hence my claim that you assume attacks never miss.
To be fair, the effect is small when miss chance in small and like so many other effects in the analysis it's similar for both weapon types. I don't think it affects your conclusions since you aren't looking things like "When should I turn off Great Weapon Mastery?" that often involve huge swings (pun intended) in miss chance. Nitpicks aside, this is an excellent video =)
You're right, I did it for simplicity sake as well. I wasn't sure how to show the difference including the chance to hit without adding in a graph for all the chances to hit for each roll needed for a critical hit i.e. drowning in data and graphs!
Perhaps I could have chosen an arbitrary chance to hit, like 90%? Although that misses the added bonus of the lower critical numbers when trying to hit high AC targets.....
Thanks for the feedback, it certainly gives me something to think about if I do something like this again!
>in first 2mins of video tells multiple times that difference is insignificant
>proceeds to show us excel table for next 13 minutes
this is what called [a] weaponized autism, guys
Do you call it weaponised because the video is about weapons!?
The average of a 1d12 weapon is 6.5 not 7...
I didn't realize you could do 6.5 damage in D&D! What a gross oversight /s
Correct, and that's what I used in all my calculations.
@@ambientorange9360 Lol x) averages don't have to be full numbers even if you can't have them in game.... Heres a basic example: you do 2 damage, next turn you 3 damage, thats 2.5 average damage... Pretty simple math friend :P