The Proving GroundsD&D 5.5 · DPR Lab

Damage-per-round calculator · 5.5 (2024) ruleset

Theorycraft the build.
Measure the damage.

Assemble a hero level by level and watch damage-per-round update in real time — with snapshots at common campaign breaking points. No account, no spreadsheet; every number runs in your browser.

Every 2024 PHB class is live single-classed — all six martials, plus Wizard, Sorcerer, Bard, Cleric, and Druid with real player-picked spell loadouts, including Circle of the Moon’s Wild Shape beast forms. Artificer and expansion subclasses aren’t modeled yet.

— pick a build —avg dpr by tier

Lv 7

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avg dpr

tier I

Lv 11

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avg dpr

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Lv 15

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avg dpr

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Lv 20★

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peak dpr

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or

Load a sample build from belowOptimized presets to explore

Character Setup

Combat Strategy

Fixed Combat Assumptions

3 combats × 4 rounds · 1 short rest after combat 1

Calculator assumes a burst (Nova) round happens as soon as possible — round 1 if the build enables it.
Concentration spells are assumed to be cast round 1 and are maintained for the full four round combat.
AOE abilities 10 ft+ radius assume 2 targets. A 5-ft-radius AOE assumes 1 target.
Vex is assumed to provide advantage on 50% of attacks.
Assumes rogues are able to use sneak dice each round.
No magic items are assumed — all numbers are mundane-gear only.

Build — Level by Level

★ rows are DPR snapshots

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Pick a Class

Campaign length

Lv	Class	Key Feature / Choice	Avg DPR

Peak average · Level 20 — ★

These assumptions are the basis of the calculator's damage math.

How the numbers are defined

The 4-Round DPR is a calculated adventuring-day average: 3 combats of 4 rounds each (12 rounds total).

The results table also shows three per-round figures:

Typical Round — sustainable damage in an ordinary round.
Best Burst (Nova) — your single highest-damage round of the day, uses limited resources like Action Surge or your best spell.
Opening Round (R1) — the first round of a combat. Higher for burst builds, lower for builds that use a setup round or concentration spells.

For most builds Best Burst is round 1, so those two match. Builds that open with a concentration spell are the exception: their opening round is lower and the damage spike lands later.

Core assumptions

The day: 3 combats of 4 rounds each, with one short rest after the first combat.
Target AC: AC starts at 15 and increases to 17 at level 9, 18 at level 13 and 19 at level 17.
Burst timing: Burst round is calculated as early as possible in a combat — round 1, if the build allows it.
Concentration spells are cast in round 1 and held for the full four rounds.
Area effects: AOE of 5-ft area assumed to hit one target, 10-ft or larger, 2 targets.
Vex grants advantage on 50% of attacks if no other source of advantage is present.
Sneak Attack rogue damage assumes they can utilize sneak every round.
No magic items. This damage calculator assumes mundane gear as the baseline. Magic items will increase DPR.

Universal assumptions

Topple. On a hit, the target may be knocked Prone. While Prone it grants advantage on your remaining attacks that turn; first attack gains no benefit. On by default if wielding a topple weapon; can be switched off.

Cleave. Assumed to find a second target in reach on 25% of rounds (once per combat).

Great Weapon Master's Hew. The bonus-action attack fires on a crit, or on an assumed flat 25% chance per round that a normal hit drops the target to 0.

Fighting styles. Dueling adds its +2 only with a melee weapon (a thrown melee weapon like a handaxe or spear still counts); it is not applied to a bow or hand crossbow. Thrown Weapon Fighting grants its +2 only on a thrown attack — the calculator doesn't track throw-vs-melee per attack, so picking this style with a thrown weapon assumes every attack with that weapon is a throw.

Reactions and once-per-combat features are credited at a steady average rate rather than assumed to trigger every time they could:

Polearm Master's reach reaction — once per combat (3 of 12 rounds).
Sentinel's opportunity attack — once per combat (3 of 12 rounds).
War Caster's Reactive Spell — uses cantrip's full damage. Ranged spell attacks are calculated without disadvantage, so a build reacting with Fire Bolt, Ray of Frost, or Eldritch Blast shows slightly more than a real table would produce. Save-based cantrips and melee True Strike are unaffected.

Grappler. The target's saving throw to resist is assumed to use its higher of Strength or Dexterity.

Hunter's Mark retargeting. Assumed to switch targets on 50% of turns. On those turns your bonus action goes to moving the mark.

Magic Initiate. The 1st-level spell is one free cast per day, used only when it beats whatever else you'd have cast that round. Of the two cantrips, one is modeled as a damage cantrip that competes with your class cantrip; the other is assumed to be a utility pick. Both halves use your class's own spellcasting ability. Warlocks assume the damage cantrip does not outdamage Eldritch Blast; characters with no spellcasting at all get neither as it typically represents a damage decrease. Shillelagh earned through Magic Initiate is available via the weapon menu.

Species traits. Currently modeled only for martial classes. Spellcasters will be added later.

Halfling Luck, Human Resourceful / Versatile — Resourceful's reroll is spent on the day's first missed attack.
Dragonborn Breath Weapon — replaces one weapon attack, and is only used on rounds where it beats a normal swing.
Goliath Giant Ancestry — the damage options (Fire's Burn, Frost's Chill, Hill's Tumble) share one pick; the non-damage options aren't modeled.
Aasimar Celestial Revelation — used once per day, covering one full combat; the frightened condition on Necrotic Shroud does not add DPR.

Spell assumptions

General

A concentration spell is cast in round 1 and held for all 4 rounds of that combat.
Where a spell offers several effects, the caster is assumed to pick the damage option.
Damage that scales with slot level is cast from your highest available slot; damage that doesn't scale uses the lowest slot that works.
Nothing is assumed to be cast before combat unless it lasts 8 hours and doesn't need concentration.
An emanation spell that costs an Action to cast deals its area damage on the casting round, but that round gets no weapon attacks or cantrip use.
Where you pick your own spells: each spell level selects one concentration and one non-concentration pick for damage calculation. Leaving a level blank isn't wasted — that slot upcasts your nearest lower-level pick of the same type. The day's 3 concentration casts (one per combat) come from your 3 highest castable slots.
Portent dice are assumed to force enemy saves to fail on your best save-based burst spell, never to guarantee your own attack rolls.
Arcane Recovery restores one slot once per day, after the short rest, at the highest level the feature allows.
Spell Mastery replaces an ordinary cantrip on a filler round whenever the free spell deals more damage. Signature Spells compete with slot-based spells for the day's high-damage rounds rather than being used regardless of value.

Particular spells

Power Word Kill — assumes the target is above 100 HP and deals 78 damage (12d12); the instant-kill result is not counted.
Bestow Curse — its damage option is modeled as a flat 1d8 (4.5) per round, assuming you're landing another hit on the cursed target each round.
Control Water — only the Whirlpool effect deals damage, and it assumes the target is already standing in water. In a fight with no water, this spell deals nothing.
Delayed Blast Fireball — modeled at its base damage (12d6, plus normal upcast scaling), without the escalation bonus, as a one-time burst.
Wall of Ice — only the damage from placing the wall through a creature is counted, as a one-time burst. Damage from creatures moving through a broken section isn't modeled.
Elminster's Effulgent Spheres — cast with your action, then a guaranteed bonus-action 3d6 attack on each round. Your best non-concentration burst spells will fill the remaining 3 rounds. Enabling this spell can lower DPR.
Syluné's Viper — cast with your bonus action, then a Venomous Bite that uses your action in each round. Primarily a control spell — using it will lower DPR.
No-roll area spells (e.g. Cloud of Daggers) use their listed damage with no hit-chance reduction.
Guiding Bolt — the rider that gives the next attack roll against the target Advantage is assumed to be used by an ally, so it adds nothing to your own damage.

Class-specific assumptions

Fighter

Action Surge fires on 2 of the day's 12 rounds at levels 2–16, and 4 of 12 at level 17+.
Battle Master maneuvers: Precision Attack, Trip Attack, and Riposte are modeled with their real mechanics (a d20-based hit-conversion, an advantage window, and a reaction attack, respectively). Every other maneuver falls back to a flat damage-die credit on the first hit each turn. The die pool is spent evenly across the day (before and after the short rest), not saved for one big round. Relentless (level 15) is modeled as a free die on the second hit each turn, not tied to which maneuver is used that turn.

Barbarian

Brutal Strike is scored against the advantaged Reckless attack it replaces, not added on top of it.
Berserker Retaliation fires every other round on average.

Rogue

Sneak Attack lands once every round.
Soulknife — Homing Strikes (L9): your Psionic Energy Dice (2× proficiency bonus per day, plus one on a short rest) are assumed spent to turn a Psychic Blade miss into a hit whenever one is available; a die that fails to convert is kept. A converted main-hand hit still carries Sneak Attack. With the Combat Prowess boon, that boon converts the best miss each turn and Homing only picks up a leftover off-hand miss. Off by default — enable it in Combat Strategy.
Soulknife — Rend Mind (L17): modeled as one round of Advantage against the target on a failed Wisdom save, in two of the three daily combats (one free use plus one three-die refresh). The repeating save is treated as a single round rather than a full-minute stun. On a build already chaining Vex Advantage between its two blades, the extra Advantage is worth very little. Off by default.
Cunning Strike options (Poison, Trip, Withdraw, and subclass additions such as the Assassin's Envenom Weapons) are not modeled for V1 — the calculator always spends Sneak Attack dice on damage rather than trading some away for a rider. A few of these trades are a small net DPR gain and are planned for a later update.
Arcane Trickster / Eldritch Knight leveled spell casts (nova or concentration) are credited on top of a full weapon round rather than replacing part of it for that cast's action — a small overcount (roughly 3 casts/day spread across 12 rounds). A full fix is tracked as part of a larger round-by-round accounting rework.
Arcane Trickster's Magical Ambush (L9) — attacking a creature that can't see you imposes Disadvantage on its save against that same attack's spell — is not modeled. Niche.
Scion of the Three's Myrkul option grants the Chill Touch cantrip; the calculator doesn't offer Rogues a Wizard cantrip outside their own Sneak Attack framework, so this isn't selectable. Scion is Forgotten Realms Hall of Fame content, not core 2024 PHB.

Ranger

Colossus Slayer's condition (the target isn't at full HP) is always assumed true.
Horde Breaker (the Hunter's Prey alternative to Colossus Slayer) uses the same 25%-of-rounds "second target in reach" assumption as Cleave.
Gloom Stalker's Sudden Strike uses the same 25%-of-rounds "second target in reach" assumption as Cleave, and is further limited by your Dreadful Strike uses per long rest (it rides one of them) and by landing a hit that turn.
Fey Wanderer's Dreadful Strikes is counted on a single target only.
Beast Master's pet Charge bonus (+1d6) triggers once per combat on a single attack.
Druidic Warrior's bonus Druid cantrip (e.g. Starry Wisp) is not modeled — the calculator assumes the weapon attack it would otherwise give up, which is correct from level 5 on but slightly undercounts a pre-5 or no-weapon turn.
Beast Master's Primal Companion is modeled as Beast of the Land only; Beast of the Sea and Beast of the Sky are not offered.
Favored Enemy's free Hunter's Mark casts (2 at Ranger 1–5, rising to 3 at level 6) are not budgeted — the calculator always credits a Hunter's Mark recast without spending a leveled slot. This only affects a Ranger below level 6 recasting Hunter's Mark more than twice in a day, below the levels this calculator checks.

Paladin

Divine Smite is budgeted for 12 rounds per day, dropping to 9 with a concentration buff, Holy Nimbus, or self-cast Haste, and to 6 with Haste and Divine Favor together.
Great Weapon Master's Hew is not counted for Paladins; their bonus action is reserved for Divine Smite as it generates more DPR.
Holy Weapon is replaced by Divine Favor below Paladin level 17.
Soul of Vengeance and Glorious Defense fire once per combat.
Elder Champion (Oath of the Ancients, level 20) is not modeled — enemies within 10 feet having disadvantage on saves against your spells and Channel Divinity, and your save-based smites (Staggering, Searing) landing more often as a result, isn't counted. Niche (level 20, Ancients only).
Avenging Angel (Oath of Vengeance, level 20) is not modeled — the Frightful Aura granting you advantage on attacks against frightened creatures isn't counted. Niche (level 20, Vengeance only).
Staggering Smite's advantage rider is credited for the triggering turn only; RAW extends it until the end of your next turn. Minor undercount, not worth the added complexity for a 4th-level slot.

Monk

When features compete for focus points, Hand of Harm and Elemental Burst are paid for first, and Stunning Strike takes what's left.
Quivering Palm is used twice per combat, and its setup hit is assumed to land (about 98% across a turn of strikes).
Elemental Epitome — Destructive Stride replaces Flurry of Blows and is a damage loss compared to keeping Flurry. Off by default.
Deflect Attacks / Deflect Energy. The redirect — spend a focus point when you reduce an attack to 0 damage to force a Dexterity save for two Martial Arts dice + your Dexterity modifier — is not modeled. The calculator doesn't track incoming damage, so it can't tell whether a deflection actually reduces an attack to 0, which is what triggers the redirect. That is a narrower condition than reactive spells such as Armor of Agathys or Hellish Rebuke, which only require that you were hit.

Druid

Moon Druid: in any combat where you cast an Action-cost concentration spell, that combat loses one round of Beast-form attacks.

Warlock

Hurl Through Hell defaults to 1 use per combat. A higher-use option is available but costs pact slots that other spells would use.
Reactive spells (Armor of Agathys, Hellish Rebuke) assume one hit per combat, 3 per day, and spend one pact slot per trigger.
Pact of the Blade with two weapons: only the main hand is treated as the bonded pact weapon, so Life Drinker, Eldritch Smite, and Undead's Dreaded Necrosis ride the main-hand attacks and a Polearm Master butt-strike, not the off-hand swing.

Multiclass

Rage forbids casting and concentration. On a Barbarian-plus-caster build, switching Raging on models the entire day as weapon damage only. Switch it off to compare the casting side. The tool treats these as two separate builds rather than mixing them round by round.