Gloomstalker Vs Hunter debate

[Revan619]

So this is one I've theory debated with people for a while and the argument has always boiled down to, the one round of damage makes gloom build better. Does it though?

So I decided to do some testing using the house of grief. I took our favourite vampire lord and did a solo run with two variants. 5 gloom 4 assassin 3 champion Vs 8 hunter 4 thief.

So they very much use the same gear in callous ring, executioners ring, medium armour that allows full dex and the two hand crossbows from yugir. However the main difference is gloom gets two feats and hunter had 3. Gloom I took sharpshooter and got Dex up to 18 with the intention of getting +2 from the mirror. Hunter I did the same but also had crossbow expert.

First round with gloom I picked off the trash that spam darkness with a lot of damage wasted as they only have around 50 health. However the rest of the fight was awful. I was using disengage actions and only getting two attacks a round because of it. I survived fairly easily due to high AC. Good 7 attacks as I had no one to use haste and I didn't want the potion to run out after two turns to get 9.

Hunter however I was consistently doing 6 attacks a round with no change in the amount I was able to burst that first round. I was able to drop terrain spell or move hunters mark then make five attacks, six if I didn't move the mark. Finishing the fight much quicker and easier as I could cross terrain as needed or shoot in melee. Towards the end comfortably using haste potion to up it to 8 attacks for the last two rounds.

Act 3 might not be the best for gloom as there are very few encounters where you can setup long range with a bow to pick off some people in a surprise round then leave combat. So it might be better in act 1 or 2 but in 3 where it is mostly boss battles, hunter seems better to me.

Not discounting the pure hunter that uses black hole to group for the level 11 ability but I'm not the biggest fan of that goofy strategy.

[guard65]

the only thing I can say is the off-hand crossbow dexterity bonus may not be around for to much longer. Your not supposed to get the dexterity bonus on the off hand attack without the dual wield fighting style. Expect it to disappear with one of the future updates. It will skew the number some since you will no longer get the ability modifier on the off-hand with out the fighting style.

[Revan619]

There are way more bugs than that. Thief giving two bonus actions for attacks. Lightning charge interactions. Haste giving martial classes more than one attack. The bugged eldritch blast / evocation interactions. How easy it is to abuse the consumable arrows. Swapping items after applying buffs but keeping the effect. Critical stacking on half orc paladins. Spell lots giving paladins higher than level 3 spells.

Having dex on off hand is nothing lol

[Crow]

Clearly "Hunter", The lvl 11 ability makes it worth it, especially if you coat or poison your weapon on top of it.

[Fluff]

There are way more bugs than that.

Originally posted by Revan619:

Thief giving two bonus actions for attacks

That's not a bug

Originally posted by Revan619:

Haste giving martial classes more than one attack

That's not a bug

Originally posted by Revan619:

How easy it is to abuse the consumable arrows

That's not a bug

Originally posted by Revan619:

Critical stacking on half orc

That's not a bug

Originally posted by Revan619:

Spell lots giving paladins higher than level 3 spells.

That's not a bug

The only 'unchecked' thing from your list is abililty to use Divine Smite twice - before crit and after, if you got lucky with crit.

[Fluff]

People doing solo runs on tacticianl limiting themselves to not use speed potions, explosives etc. So suggest to try those than min max for full party. It's really not needed.

https://youtu.be/3UJ3peI9mMg?si=_cVqs-uVGRa8yOJr&t=1012

[Edstyles]

Originally posted by guard65:

the only thing I can say is the off-hand crossbow dexterity bonus may not be around for to much longer. Your not supposed to get the dexterity bonus on the off hand attack without the dual wield fighting style. Expect it to disappear with one of the future updates. It will skew the number some since you will no longer get the ability modifier on the off-hand with out the fighting style.

Why ? Fighting stances are for meele not range. So i dont think it will change

[victorvnv]

Yougir only drops one hand crossbow. Or am I missing something , how do you get 2 from him ??

[Niradin]

Originally posted by StepBroccoli:

There are way more bugs than that.

Originally posted by Revan619:

Thief giving two bonus actions for attacks

That's not a bug

Originally posted by Revan619:

Haste giving martial classes more than one attack

That's not a bug

Both doesn't work like that in tabletop game. Thief's bonus action is fairly limited to thief related activities (cunning actions, slight of hand, using a potion), and haste can't be used with an extra attack feature. It may be intended by Larian to work like so, though at this point I'm honestly at a loss what is a bug and what is a feature, but both dose break balance of the game by quite alot. Then again, showering players with magic items and not limiting them with attunement breaks the game even more, so there's that.

[Scheneighnay]

Originally posted by Niradin:

Originally posted by StepBroccoli:

That's not a bug



That's not a bug

Both doesn't work like that in tabletop game. Thief's bonus action is fairly limited to thief related activities (cunning actions, slight of hand, using a potion), and haste can't be used with an extra attack feature. It may be intended by Larian to work like so, though at this point I'm honestly at a loss what is a bug and what is a feature, but both dose break balance of the game by quite alot. Then again, showering players with magic items and not limiting them with attunement breaks the game even more, so there's that.

Still not a bug, it's a port to make up for mechanics not existing in the game and the devs deciding to do away with racial stat bonuses

[WeenerTuck813]

I like Gloomstalker a lot more - but that Gloomstalker build you did I don’t like.

Thief is a lot better than assassin. Go 5 Gloom - 4 Thief - 3 Gloom and get your last ASI. You especially gimped yourself not capping dex.

[Niradin]

First of all, I would recommend battle master over the champion - using your supperiority dice for damage or boost to your attack is better then bumping crit chance, considering that it's already guarantied by assassin dip.
Second, you're calling fish stupid, because it can't climb a tree. Point of Nova Ranger is to blast high priority targets on the first turn, and leave anything else for your team. Ofcource it's not as good as Hunter solo, or in a prolongued fights. It's not what it supposed to do.

[Scheneighnay]

Originally posted by Niradin:

First of all, I would recommend battle master over the champion - using your supperiority dice for damage or boost to your attack is better then bumping crit chance, considering that it's already guarantied by assassin dip.
Second, you're calling fish stupid, because it can't climb a tree. Point of Nova Ranger is to blast high priority targets on the first turn, and leave anything else for your team. Ofcource it's not as good as Hunter solo, or in a prolongued fights. It's not what it supposed to do.

Yeah that about sums it up

Gloomstalker: making kills turn 1 before they can do anything
Hunter: long-term damage

[Revan619]

Originally posted by StepBroccoli:

There are way more bugs than that.

Originally posted by Revan619:

Thief giving two bonus actions for attacks

That's not a bug

Originally posted by Revan619:

Haste giving martial classes more than one attack

That's not a bug

Originally posted by Revan619:

How easy it is to abuse the consumable arrows

That's not a bug

Originally posted by Revan619:

Critical stacking on half orc

That's not a bug

Originally posted by Revan619:

Spell lots giving paladins higher than level 3 spells.

That's not a bug

The only 'unchecked' thing from your list is abililty to use Divine Smite twice - before crit and after, if you got lucky with crit.

All bugs. That is not how tabletop works.

Originally posted by WeenerTuck813:

I like Gloomstalker a lot more - but that Gloomstalker build you did I don’t like.

Thief is a lot better than assassin. Go 5 Gloom - 4 Thief - 3 Gloom and get your last ASI. You especially gimped yourself not capping dex.

You cap Dex after this fight via the mirror. Thief loses the whole point of gloomstalker so you should just use hunter. The point of gloom is to combine with the assassin first round abilities. I find the damage is in a weird spot. Too high for trash so wasted potential. Too low for bosses.

Originally posted by Scheneighnay:

Gloomstalker: making kills turn 1 before they can do anything
Hunter: long-term damage

Gloomstalker doesn't really seem to serve any purpose. The sustained damage is way lower than hunter potential and it will never compete with warlock which can do 2.5k+ from a setup the dexterity character can provide via perilous strike.

Originally posted by Niradin:

First of all, I would recommend battle master over the champion - using your supperiority dice for damage or boost to your attack is better then bumping crit chance, considering that it's already guarantied by assassin dip.
Second, you're calling fish stupid, because it can't climb a tree. Point of Nova Ranger is to blast high priority targets on the first turn, and leave anything else for your team. Ofcource it's not as good as Hunter solo, or in a prolongued fights. It's not what it supposed to do.

It is kinda too weak to blast anything. Sure I can save every special arrow in the game to have one decent fight. But that is it and a fighter can do it better. If you want nova you go warlock/wizard/sorc because of the insane damage they can output with lightning charges and shriek. Hunter seems way more consistent for trash clearing and terrain control. Combined with a barb BM hybrid / paladin and a bard/cleric then you have a very strong all round team.

[Scheneighnay]

Originally posted by Revan619:

Originally posted by StepBroccoli:

That's not a bug



That's not a bug



That's not a bug



That's not a bug



That's not a bug

The only 'unchecked' thing from your list is abililty to use Divine Smite twice - before crit and after, if you got lucky with crit.

All bugs. That is not how tabletop works.

Originally posted by WeenerTuck813:

I like Gloomstalker a lot more - but that Gloomstalker build you did I don’t like.

Thief is a lot better than assassin. Go 5 Gloom - 4 Thief - 3 Gloom and get your last ASI. You especially gimped yourself not capping dex.

You cap Dex after this fight via the mirror. Thief loses the whole point of gloomstalker so you should just use hunter

Originally posted by Scheneighnay:

Gloomstalker: making kills turn 1 before they can do anything
Hunter: long-term damage

Gloomstalker doesn't really seem to serve any purpose. The sustained damage is way lower than hunter potential and it will never compete with warlock which can do 2.5k+ from a setup the dexterity character can provide via perilous strike.

Originally posted by Niradin:

First of all, I would recommend battle master over the champion - using your supperiority dice for damage or boost to your attack is better then bumping crit chance, considering that it's already guarantied by assassin dip.
Second, you're calling fish stupid, because it can't climb a tree. Point of Nova Ranger is to blast high priority targets on the first turn, and leave anything else for your team. Ofcource it's not as good as Hunter solo, or in a prolongued fights. It's not what it supposed to do.

It is kinda too weak to blast anything. Sure I can save every special arrow in the game to have one decent fight. But that is it and a fighter can do it better. If you want nova you go warlock/wizard/sorc because of the insane damage they can output with lightning charges and shriek. Hunter seems way more consistent for trash clearing and terrain control. Last slot I'd use for a barb BM hybrid or paladin

This isn't tabletop.

[Indure]

It seems like an odd test to judge the difference between Hunter and Gloomstalker by making 2 completely different builds that pull from 3 other subclasses.

The difference between Gloomstalker and Hunter should be easy. 1 additional attack on round 1 for Gloomstalker, vs colossus slayer/horde breaker for Hunter.