At the time, I had not considered the impact of the Oath features of this Archetype requiring use of a reaction or bonus action. In 5th Edition, action economy is a hugely important piece of the puzzle to effective combat and character usage. The result of this build is in our party’s first real combat encounter during my player’s DM-ed adventure, we were nearly TPKed. While my Paladin did his job, and kept one or two of the other characters from dropping too low in HP, the build struggled to protect more than one character per round. This was an unintended consequence of action economy in combat, and so I rethought the usefulness of the build.
What I’ve decided to do, instead, is roll a new character with the player DMs permission. Due to the overall story arc, I am able to dip into some pretty cool hybrid combinations of classes and backgrounds, and as such I made the decision to roll a Barbarian Monk with the Archetype Way of the Kensei. I brought this build up in the ThreadRaiders Discord channel #ttrpg-classroom for some feedback, and the question came up asking why opt for the dip into Monk as opposed to either straight Monk or straight Barbarian.
Diving into the question led me to compare the three options and what features each provided or did not acquire by 7th level -- the current level of my character. This seemed like a perfect opportunity for another blog post on the ThreadRaiders blog, so how about we dive right into it?
With the bump to 7th level, the straight Barbarian build in D&D 5th Edition receives the following features:
- 4 Rages per long rest with +2 Rage Damage
- Barbarian Unarmored Defense
- Reckless Attack
- Danger Sense
- 1st Primal Path Archetype class feature
- Ability Score Improvement
- Extra Attack
- Fast Movement
- 2nd Primal Path Archetype class feature
- Feral Instinct
With the bump to 7th level, the straight Monk build in D&D 5th Edition receives the following features:
- Monk Unarmored Defense
- Martial Arts with 1d6 Martial Arts die
- 7 Ki points per long rest
- Unarmored Movement
- 1st Monastic Tradition Archetype class feature
- Deflect Missiles
- Ability Score Improvement
- Slow Fall
- Extra Attack
- Stunning Strike
- Ki-Empowered Strikes
- 2nd Monastic Tradition Archetype class feature
- Evasion
- Stillness of Mind
For the sake of simplicity, the build I have chosen will be the one we use for comparison. That build is 2 levels of Barbarian and 5 levels of Monk. Further, I will not be comparing the Archetype options for straight builds or hybrid builds, just to keep this article at a readable length.
With the 2 levels of Barbarian and 5 levels of Monk hybrid build, the character gains the following:
Barbarian (2)
- 2 Rages with +2 Rage Damage per long rest
- Unarmored Defense (Barbarian)
- Reckless Attack
- Danger Sense
Monk (5)
- Unarmored Defense (Monk)
- Martial Arts with 1d6 Martial Arts die
- 5 Ki points per long rest
- Unarmored Movement
- 1st Monastic Tradition Archetype class feature
- Deflect Missiles
- Ability Score Improvement
- Slow Fall
- Extra Attack
- Stunning Strike
The above hybrid dip assumes the character at 2nd level will meet the prerequisite Dexterity and Wisdom scores for the multiclass into Monk (13 for each).
What does the hybrid dip lose out on compared to a straight 7th level Barbarian?
- 2 Rages per long rest
- 1st and 2nd Primal Path Archetype class feature
- Feral Instinct
Before we compare the straight 7th level Monk to the hybrid dip, let’s consider what the loss of the 2 additional Rages per long rest means.
While in a Rage, while not wearing heavy armor the character gains:
- Advantage on all Strength checks and Strength saving throws
- When making a melee weapon attack using Strength, gain Rage Damage bonus as listed in the Rage Damage column of the Barbarian table (+2 at level 7)
- Resistance to bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage
It is important to note here the Rage Damage bonus for 2nd level Barbarian and 7th level Barbarian are identical.
This means the dip into Monk with the 2nd level Barbarian does not see a loss of Rage Damage per Rage, but does see a loss of 2 Rages per long rest. If we assume during the 2 extra Rages that the character is using the Attack Action and Extra Attack every round, this equals 4 Rage Damage lost per round during each Rage lost or in total approximately 40 Rage Damage at 10 rounds per Rage, or 80 Rage Damage in total per long rest -- assuming, of course, every attack by this character strikes true on its intended target.
Losing Feral Instincts hurts somewhat, as this means the straight Barbarian would likely act sooner in turn order given the advantage on initiative rolls, but on average only once out of every two combats and even then not necessarily by a large enough margin to consider this a must-have lost feature.
The extra Rage Damage, on paper, looks like an easy choice, but consider that the dip into Monk means 5 uses of Flurry of Blows per long rest, and that damage difference is muted a bit. We will dive into that more further down in the article.
What does the hybrid dip lose out on compared to a straight 7th level Monk?
- 2 Ki points per long rest
- 5 ft of Unarmored Movement
- Ki-Empowered Strikes
- 2nd Monastic Tradition Archetype class feature
- Evasion
- Stillness of Mind
This means the dip into Monk with the 2nd level Barbarian does not see a loss of Unarmed Strike damage per Ki point use, but does see a loss of 2 Ki points per long rest. If we assume the use of the 2 extra Ki points as 2 uses of Flurry of Blows, this equals an average of 7 damage per use of Flurry of Blows to a maximum of 12 damage per use of Flurry of Blows. This extra damage plays out to be roughly 14 damage on average per long rest, and 24 damage at maximum per long rest.
On paper, the extra damage from the additional uses of Flurry of Blows may seem worthwhile, but consider the hybrid dip means the character would also receive the extra Rage Damage twice per long rest while Raging.
Stillness of Mind, Evasion, and Ki-Empowered Strikes are nice, but are only situationally useful. If the character isn’t subjected to a Dexterity saving throw, then Evasion is muted. If the character isn’t affected by any effects causing the charmed or frightened conditions, then Stillness of Mind is muted. If the character’s foes are not resistant or immune to bludgeoning damage, then Ki-Empowered Strikes are muted.
With all of the above taken into account, the real question is what is the average damage output per round given the right scenario?
For this scenario, we will give the straight Barbarian a Greatsword for the slight increase in damage on average over a Greataxe or similar heavy, 2-handed weapon. We will give the straight Monk and hybrid Barbarian Monk a Quarterstaff.
In determining the number of rounds we should compare for this article, I fell upon a few places where most consider the average combat in an average D&D session for an average group of 4-5 characters to last for roughly 5 rounds or fewer.
With this said, we will consider the Barbarian to rage for the full 5 rounds of combat while using an Attack Action each round coupled with the Extra Attack from 5th level Barbarian. We will consider the Monk to use the Attack Action coupled with the Extra Attack from 5th level Monk, and then use their bonus action each turn to Flurry of Blows for the same 5 rounds of combat as the Barbarian. Lastly, we will consider the hybrid to rage for the full 5 rounds of combat while using an Attack Action each round coupled with the Extra Attack from 5th level Monk, and then use their bonus action each turn to Flurry of Blows for the same 5 rounds of combat.
The average attack for the straight Barbarian with the Greatsword is 7 damage. When we add in the 4 damage from Strength modifier, the 3 damage from Proficiency bonus, and the 2 Rage damage, we find the average successful strike while raging to deal 16 damage with a Greatsword. The straight Barbarian does get the Extra Attack from using the Attack Action, so this character’s average damage per round in the above scenario is 32. Not bad.
The average attack for the straight Monk with the Quarterstaff or Unarmed Strike is 4 damage. When we add in the 4 damage from Strength modifier, and the 3 damage from Proficiency bonus, we find the average successful strike to deal 11 damage either using Quarterstaff or Unarmed Strike. The straight Monk does get the Extra Attack from using the Attack Action followed by a Flurry of Blows using their bonus action for a full 4 attacks per round, which equals 44 damage.
Did you see that coming? I was caught off-guard while working up these numbers by the difference between the straight Monk and straight Barbarian when looking at average damage per round.
Now, let’s look at the average damage of the hybrid. The average attack for the hybrid with the Quarterstaff and Unarmed Strike is 4 damage. When we add in the 4 damage from Strength modifier, the 3 damage from Proficiency bonus, and the 2 Rage damage, we find the average attack with the Quarterstaff or Unarmed Strike to deal 13 damage. The hybrid does get the Extra Attack with the Quarterstaff from using the Attack Action with the Quarterstaff followed by a Flurry of Blows with Unarmed Strike using their bonus action, which equals 26 damage with the Quarterstaff and 26 damage with Unarmed Strike, for a total of 52 points of damage on average.
It is important to note I did a lot of research into whether Unarmed Strikes receive the Rage Damage from raging, and since Unarmed Strikes are considered a melee weapon attack, they do.
If we consider the full 5 rounds of an average combat, that is a difference of 40 points of damage between the hybrid Barbarian Monk and the straight Monk, and 100 points of damage between the hybrid Barbarian Monk and the straight Barbarian.
Hopefully, this article can shed some light on a very rarely used multiclass option which as you can see from just the average numbers can be fairly handy at dealing large amounts of damage consistently. This is also without considering the Archetype choices for each build which could change the numbers quite a bit, but then we get into a lot more variables and things become significantly harder to truly quantify accurately.
If you liked this article, feel free to give me a follow on Twitter @SeanRingrose, or hit me up in the ThreadRaiders Discord #ttrpg-classroom chat channel. Also, make sure to check out the ThreadRaiders on Twitter for more articles like this one, as well as plenty of great TableTop RPG content.