13th Age DPR builds by class (level 1)

This article aims to figure out what damage output typical character builds in 13th Age bring to the table. 

The most important stat to measure this is "DPR" or damage per round. This measure assumes that the character can do this every round, i.e. he does not burn any resources like once per battle racial features or daily spells.

However, this measure does not give the complete picture for classes like the Sorcerer, who rely on daily spells for their major damage output. For these classes, more complicated considerations are necessary.

The Highlights

Class	Build	DPR	Condition / Resource cost
Barbarian	2H + Rage	9.78	Recharge 16+
	2H + Slayer (+feat)	8.20	Target staggered, not engaged at start of turn
	2H + Rage + Slayer (+feat)	14.27	Target staggered, not engaged at start of turn
	2H + Rage + Whirlwind	18.95	Must be engaged to two enemies at start of turn
Paladin	Smite (+feat) + Hammer of Faith	14.45	1/battle + Cha/day // 1 battle/day
Ranger	Double Melee Attack + Two Weapon Mastery + Favored Enemy / First Strike / Lethal Hunter + feat		1 enemy group / 1 attack per enemy / 1 enemy per battle
Ranger	Double Melee Attack + Animal Companion	8.76	None!
Ranger	Drow + Heritage of the Sword + TWF + Double Melee Attack + Animal companion (Panther)		Win initiative against target (for panther crit bonus)
Rogue	Improved Sneak Attack + Murderous (+feat) + Deadly Thrust	9.90	Target staggered, engaged to ally

 

 

Basics

Before diving into class features, let's calculate DPR for a basic melee attack. On the monster side, we'll assume a standard level 1 monster: AC 17 / PD 15

We'll also assume an 18 (+4) in the main attack stat, for +5 to attack (including +1 for level) and +4 to damage.

This gives us the following possible attack results:

Result	Die roll	Chance	Damage
Critical hit	20	5%	2x hit
Hit	12 - 19	40%	die + 4
Miss	2 - 11	50%	1
Fumble	1	5%	-

 

To calculate the DPR, all we need to do is multiply the damage of each of the four outcomes by their chance, and add it up. As a result we get the following DPRs for different weapon dice.

Die	Average	Hit damage	Hit damage * (Hit chance + crit chance * crit multi) + miss damage * miss chance	DPR
d4	2.5	6.5	6.5 * (0.4 + 0.05 * 2) + 1 * 0.5	3.75
d6	3.5	7.5	7.5 * (0.4 + 0.05 * 2) + 1 * 0.5	4.25
d8	4.5	8.5	8.5 * (0.4 + 0.05 * 2) + 1 * 0.5	4.75
d10	5.5	9.5	9.5 * (0.4 + 0.05 * 2) + 1 * 0.5	5.25
d12	6.5	10.5	10.5 * (0.4 + 0.05 * 2) + 1* 0.5	5.75

So what is the effect of the escalation die? Each round, your chance to hit goes up 5% and to miss down by 5%. That means your DPR goes up by 5% times the difference of hit and miss. For a d10 damage die, that's (9.5 - 1) * 0.05 = 0.425.

 

Two Weapon Fighting

Two-weapon fighting rule allows you to reroll natural 2 on the attack roll. The reroll counts, so the reroll could result in a 2.

That means every number on the die, except two, has a chance of 1/20 + 1/400 = 21/400 = 0.0525 to be rolled. The chance for a 2 is 1/400 = 0.0025.

A hit on 12 - 19 now means a chance to hit of 8 * 0.0525 = 0.42. Miss on 3 - 11, plus 2 on reroll is 9 * 0.0525 + 0.0025 = 0.475.

Die	Average	Hit damage	TWF DPR
d4	2.5	6.5	6.5 * (0.42 + 0.0525 * 2) + 0.475 = 3.8875
d6	3.5	7.5	7.5 * (0.42 + 0.0525 * 2) + 0.475 = 4.4125
d8	4.5	8.5	8.5 * (0.42 + 0.0525 * 2) + 0.475 = 4.9375
d10	5.5	9.5	9.5 * (0.42 + 0.0525 * 2) + 0.475 = 5.4625
d12	6.5	10.5	10.5 * (0.42 + 0.0525 * 2) + 0.475 = 5.9875

(Note: There are no one-handed weapons with a damage die higher than d8. The last two table entries are only relevant if you have an ability to boost the damage die, such as the Hammer of Faith spell)

  

Barbarian

We'll start with a two-handed martial weapon = d10 = 5.5. Average damage on a hit is 1d10+4 = 9.5. A quick look at the table above gives a total "naked" DPR without talents and class features of 5.25.

Rage

Barbarians can RAGE!!! Rage allows you to roll twice and take the better result.

The easiest way to calculate this is to ignore fumbles for now and look at the miss chance. You have Y% chance to miss the first time. Of those misses, Y% will also miss the second roll, for a total miss chance of Y%*Y% = Y%^2. Ignoring crits, your hit chance then is 100%-Y%^2. With a 55% chance to miss or fumble, we're looking at 1 - 0.55^2 = 1 - 0.3025 = 0.6975 = 69.75% hit chance during Rage. So rolling twice is almost a +5 bonus to hit in this case.

Rage has a second advantage. You crit when both rolls are natural 11+. That's a 0.5 * 0.5 = 0.25 chance.

Plus, there is the chance that either the first or the second roll is a natural 20, in which case you crit even when the second roll is 10 or lower. Doesn't look like much, but there is still 0.05 * 0.5 * 2 = 0.05 chance for that to happen, for a total of 0.3 to crit. (Although if you're very thorough, a double 11 is a miss in our scenario, so the crit chance is 1/400 = 0.0025 lower...)

Substracting our crit chance from the hit or crit total: 0.6975 - 0.3 = 0.3975

For miss damage, we're looking at a 0.3025 chance to miss, but we need to exclude a 0.0025 chance of a double 1 fumble for 0.3.

9.5 * (0.3975 + 0.30 * 2) + 0.3 = 9.5 * 0.9975 + 0.3 = 9.47625 + 0.3 =  9.77625

Slayer

Slayer requires a staggered enemy that you were not engaged with at the start of your turn to give +1d6 damage on hit.

(9.5 + 3.5) * (0.40 + 0.05 * 2) + 0.5 = 13 * 0.5 + 0.5 = 7

With the Adventurer feat, you add +2 to attack (for 55%).

(9.5 + 3.5) * (0.50 + 0.05 * 2) + 0.4 = 13 * 0.6 + 0.4 = 8.2

Raging Slayer: 13 * ((1 - 0.45^2) - 0.3 + 0.3 * 2) + 0.45^2 - 0.0025 = 13 * (0.7975 + 0.3) + 0.2025 - 0.0025 = 13 * 1.0975 + 0.2 = 14.2675

Barbaric Cleave

A 1/battle bonus attack, so that adds whatever your DPR is that round.

Building Frenzy

This one is a PITA to calculate as you end up with a decision tree of hit / miss every round, with each consecutive miss adding 1d4 = 2.5 damage to each hit down the road. So each round, either you hit, in which case you "collect" the extra damage from each previous miss, or you miss, which adds another d4 to the pool.

We can calculate the average damage from Building Frenzy as (chance to gain a die = miss chance) * (damage per die) * (chance to trigger = hit chance) * (number of remaining rounds). So damage output depends on the length of combat.

In the following table, I'll ignore the effect of the escalation die and just set the hit/miss chance at 50%. Keep in mind that these are not the precise numbers. In-game numbers will be lower since the formula uses hit * miss. For hit + miss = 1, Max(hit * miss) = 0.5 * 0.5 = 0.25.

Round	Extra damage	Cumulative	Bonus DPR
Last	0	0	0
Last -1	0.5 * 2.5 * 0.5 * 1 = 0.625	0.625	0.3125
Last -2	0.5 * 2.5 * 0.5 * 2 = 1.25	1.875	0.625
Last -3	0.5 * 2.5 * 0.5 * 3 = 1.875	3.75	0.9375
Last -4	0.5 * 2.5 * 0.5 * 4 = 2.5	6.25	1.25
Last -5	0.5 * 2.5 * 0.5 * 4 = 3.125	9.375	1.5625

 

What that means is that a battle has to last at least 5 rounds for Building Frenzy to be better than Barbaric Cleave.

Whirlwind

Simple, two attacks = double DPR. You don't get piddly miss damage without the feat but it's still amazing: 2 * 4.75 = 9.5 before adding in any other talent. While raging, this improves to 2 * 9.47625 = 18.9525. Nice.

However, getting yourself engaged to two enemies and then taking a voluntary AC penalty could mean a quick death.

 

Cleric

The Cleric is a supporter class, not a striker. Still, in 3E they were famous (notorious?) for using all those buffs meant for the other PCs on themselves, so let's see how we can build a damage-dealer Cleric in 13th Age.

 

 

Paladin

Str 18 and a two-handed martial weapon (d10) again. Baseline DPR is 5.25 as per the Basics chapter.

Smite

The Paladin's most important class feature and damage source. +1d12 damage and half damage on miss. Base damage increases to 9.5 + 6.5 = 16.

DPR: 16 * (0.4 + 0.05 * 2 + 0.3 * 1/2) = 16 * 0.65 = 10.4

Not bad, but if we add the feat for +4 to attack, we're in business.

16 * (0.6 + 0.05 * 2 + 0.3 * 1/2) = 16 * 0.85 = 13.6

You get one free smite per battle and one per day per Charisma bonus. Fewer combats or faster victories allow you to smite more often between full heal-ups, which brings up your average DPR. For example, assuming Cha 14 and 4 3-round battles in a day, that's 6 smites in 12 turns or exactly half. Your DPR over that day would be 5.3 * 0.5 + 13.6 * 0.5 = 9.45. Too bad Smite doesn't scale well and is much stronger (relatively) at 1st level than at 4th level.

 

Cleric Training: Hammer of Faith

Increases your damage die from d10 to d12, for 10.5 base damage. DPR 5.75 as per table.

If you combine with Smite + feat, we're looking at (10.5 + 6.5) + 0.85 = 17 * 0.85 = 14.45.

Unfortunately, this spell costs you a standard action (5.3 damage) to activate until 3rd level, so it's not really worth it at low levels unless you expect an unusually long, drawn-out fight over 10 rounds or more, or if you're planning to thrown in all your smites. If you normally wield a Shield and a d8 weapon normally the spell is more desirable as your damage without it is lower.

 

There are a number of other good talents for Paladins, but nothing that effectively increases DPR.

 

Ranger

Let's start with an 18 Strength or Dexterity and a d8 = 4.5 weapon for 8.5 base hit damage. As per the table in Basics, this nets us a base DPR of 4.75.

 

First Strike / Favored Enemy / Lethal Hunter

All of these expand your crit range by 2 under different circumstances. In other words, you gain double damage on 3 instead of 1 number on the die. Before we get into the complicated interactions with Double Attack, let's look at the baseline with a d8 weapon. By the way, you can take several of these talents, they stack, it's just unlikely you'll get to apply them all at the same time. You can also take a feat to increase the crit range by 3.

For comparison, I'll include the numbers in case you decided to wade into melee with a greatsword / greataxe...

Weapon	Crit Range	Hit damage * (hit chance + crit chance + crit multiplier) + miss damage * miss chance	DPR
d8	+2	8.5 * (0.3 + 0.15 * 2) + 1 * 0.5 = 8.5 * 0.6 + 0.5	5.6
d8	+4	8.5 * (0.2 + 0.25 * 2) + 1 * 0.5 = 8.5 * 0.7 + 0.5	6.45
d8	+6	8.5 * (0.1 + 0.35 * 2) + 1 * 0.5 = 8.5 * 0.8 + 0.5	7.3
d10	+2	9.5 * (0.3 + 0.15 * 2) + 1 * 0.5 = 9.5 * 0.6 + 0.5	6.2
d10	+4	9.5 * (0.2 + 0.25 * 2) + 1 * 0.5 = 9.5 * 0.7 + 0.5	7.15
d10	+6	9.5 * (0.1 + 0.35 * 2) + 1 * 0.5 = 9.5 * 0.8 + 0.5	8.1

 

Double Melee Attack

With this talent, we'll take the two weapon fighting (the the basics chapter at the top), reduce the d8 damage die to d6 for 7.5 average hit damage and add a 50% chance of getting a second attack.

Well, almost. See, natural 2 (5% chance) is natural even, but you reroll that one, and then there is a 50% chance to get a second attack through that reroll. So you only get a reroll with a 50% - 5%*0.5 = 47.5% chance.

(Hit damage * Hit chance + crit chance * crit multiplier) + miss damage * miss chance) * (1 + chance of second attack) = 

(7.5 * (0.42 + 0.0525 * 2) + 1 * 0.475) * 1.475 = 4.4125 * 1.475 = 6.50844

But what if you have the feat for +2 attack on the second attack against a different target?

7.5 * (0.42 + 0.0525 * 2) + 0.475 + 0.475 * (7.5 * (0.525 + 0.0525 * 2) + 0.37) = 4.4125 + 0.475 * 5.095 = 6.83263

As an elf, you could burn a feat on Heritage of the Sword for +2 damage. Unfortunately, the feat doesn't scale, so the bonus becomes negligible as you level. It also says doesn't specify whether the bonus applies only to hits or to misses too. (I assume not, but there is no FAQ ruling yet)

(9.5 * (0.42 + 0.0525 * 2) + 0.475) * 1.475 = 5.4625 * 1.475 = 8.05719

There are quite a few other talents you can take to boost damage further: Two Weapon Mastery, the crit boosters First Strike, Lethal Hunter and Favored Enemy, and Ranger Ex Cathedral for Hammer of Faith. Of course, you only have two talent slots left, so you need to decide. I'll quickly analyze the option and then give a table with the results.

 

Double Melee Attack + Two Weapon Mastery

With the two weapon mastery talent, we're adding +1 to hit.

And even though we just reduced our chance to miss with that talent, it offers the option to burn a feat on +1 miss damage. Note that this feat gets less useful the higher the escalation die climbs. When the die is 6, we attack at +5+1+6=+12. Unless we roll a 3 or 4 against that AC 17 monster, the feat does nothing.

 

Double Melee Attack + Ranger Ex Cathedral: Hammer of Faith

You can use this popular daily cleric spell to boost your weapon die to d12, although Double Weapon Fighting shrinks it back to d10.

Ranger Options

Talent 1	Talent 2	Talent 3	(feat)	DPR calculation	Result
Double Melee Attack	--	--	--	(7.5 * (0.42 + 0.0525 * 2) + 0.475) * 1.475 = 4.4125 * 1.475	6.50844
Double Melee Attack	--	--	DMA	7.5 * (0.42 + 0.0525 * 2) + 0.475 + 0.475 * (7.5 * (0.525 + 0.0525 * 2) + 0.37)	6.83263
Double Melee Attack	--	--	HotS	(9.5 * (0.42 + 0.0525 * 2) + 0.475) * 1.475	8.05719
Double Melee Attack	Two Weapon Mastery	--	--	(7.5 * (0.4725 + 0.0525 * 2) + 0.4225) * 1.475	7.01178
Double Melee Attack	Two Weapon Mastery	--	TWM	(7.5 * (0.4725 + 0.0525 * 2) + 2 * 0.4225) * 1.475
Double Melee Attack	Favored Enemy / First Strike / Lethal Hunter	--	--	(7.5 * (0.315 + 0.1575 * 2) + 0.475) * 1.475
Double Melee Attack	Favored Enemy / First Strike / Lethal Hunter	--	crit +3	(7.5 * (0.2625 + 0.21 * 2) + 0.475) * 1.475
Double Melee Attack	Favored Enemy / First Strike / Lethal Hunter	Two Weapon Mastery	--	(7.5 * (0.3675 + 0.1575 * 2) + 0.4225) * 1.475
Double Melee Attack	Favored Enemy / First Strike /  Lethal Hunter	Two Weapon Mastery	crit +3	(7.5 * (0.315 + 0.21 * 2) + 0.4225) * 1.475
Double Melee Attack	Ranger Ex Cathedral: Hammer of Faith	--	--	(9.5 * (0.42 + 0.0525 * 2) + 0.475) * 1.475
Double Melee Attack	Ranger Ex Cathedral:  Hammer of Faith	Two Weapon Mastery	--	(9.5 * (0.4725 + 0.0525 * 2) + 0.4225) * 1.475
Double Melee Attack	Ranger Ex Cathedral:  Hammer of Faith	Favored Enemy / First Strike /  Lethal Hunter	--	(9.5 * (0.315 + 0.1575 * 2) + 0.475) * 1.475
Double Melee Attack	Ranger Ex Cathedral:  Hammer of Faith	Favored Enemy / First Strike /  Lethal Hunter	crit +3	(9.5 * (0.2625 + 0.21 * 2) + 0.475) * 1.475

 

Animal Companion

As the only talent in the core book that costs double, this better be good. The companion has its own attack, so it adds a fixed amount to your DPR regardless of what your other stats are. Its attack bonus (+5) is the same as yours. It doesn't use the escalation die... so while the DPR from your own attacks goes up as the combat progresses, this remains a flat bonus. Damage die for a lvl 0 companion is d8. It doesn't look like there's a way to get a bonus to that. 

There is no specific rules text on that but it appears that animal companions can crit on 20 but deal no miss damage.

4.5 * (0.4 + 0.05 * 2) = 2.25

Panther animal companions get +2 crit range against enemies with lower init...

4.5 * (0.3 + 0.15 * 2) = 3.15

Double Melee Attack + Animal Companion

Adding the two entries, we're looking at 6.50844 + 2.25 = 8.75844

That's in fact the best DPR so far that doesn't require any special condition or daily / per battle resources (not that this PC would have any...). However, this is blown out of the water by what can only be called "The Drizzt"

Drow + Heritage of the Sword + TWF + Double Melee Attack + Animal companion (Panther) + Win initiative

 

(This build also gets to deal 5 ongoing damage on an even hit 1/battle...) 

Rogue

We'll start with 18 Dexterity and a d8 = 4.5 weapon for 8.5 base hit damage. As per the table in Basics, this nets us a base DPR of 4.75.

Sneak Attack

Sneak attack is fairly easy to get in 13th Age, but at first level only gives +1d4 damage, for a total 11 base damage.

11 * (0.4 + 0.05 * 2) + 0.5 = 6

Not impressive yet, but we can add the Improved Sneak Attack talent for a 1d6 sneak attack die or 12 base damage.

12 * (0.4 + 0.05 * 2) + 0.5 = 6.5

Mhh. Still not impressed. Not sure why Sneak Attack was nerfed during playtest.

Sneak Attack + Murderous + Deadly Thrust (against Staggered)

There are some options to increase Rogue DPR. This one only works against staggered enemies though. Murderous gives +2 crit range and Deadly Thrust adds Strength to attack. Let's assume a Str 14 (+2).

11 * (0.4 + 0.15 * 2) + 0.4 = 8.1

There is room for improvement. Add the Murderous feat for another +2 to attack.

11 * (0.5 + 0.15 * 2) + 0.3 = 9.1

And finally, we're adding Improved Sneak Attack...

12 * (0.5 + 0.15 * 2) + 0.3 = 9.9

Shadow Walk

This is counter-intuitive but Shadow Walk doesn't do that much to increase your damage per round. Yes, you deal double damage, but you could have attacked twice instead. The biggest advantage of Shadow Walk is in defense, because monsters can't attack what's not on the map. It also makes it easier to get Sneak attack as you can effortlessly get into flanking positions.

There is a little damage benefit still because of the escalation die. When you reappear, it's one higher. So that's double damage at +1 attack instead of single damage at +0 and +1 each.

Two consecutive Sneak Attacks: 11 * (0.4 + 0.05 * 2) + 0.5 + 11 * (0.45 + 0.05 * 2) + 0.45 = 6 + 6.5 = 12.5

Shadow Walk + Sneak Attack: (11 * (0.45 + 0.05 * 2) + 0.45) * 2 = 13

Shadow Walk + Sneak Attack + Sure Cut

This works more reliably if your DM agrees that the Shadow Walk "attack" counts as an attack for granting Momentum. 

Shadow Walk + Sneak Attack: (11 * (0.45 + 0.05 * 2) + (2.5 + 1) * 0.45) * 2 = (6.05 + 1.575) * 2 = 7.625 * 2 = 15.25