Yeah, this is all a bit white room theory crafting. If we were serious we'd need to establish a whole lot of baselines, like:
- Terrain, this favors barbarian as they have access to survival and on average better stealth. But assuming a fair featureless expanse is in itself not realistic.
- Baseline stats, this favors barbarian as paladin's 2nd best stat goes into Cha.
- Equipment, this favors paladin as they default get chainmail and possibly shield.
- Level, at first level it'll come down to an initiative roll-off as starting hps are so low, and both classes progress a little unevenly giving slight edges at various levels.
- Subclass, berserker is front loaded powerful, if the fight is at level 3, advantage barbarian.
- Initiative, barbarian slight advantage later becomes significant when they get danger sense.
- Spells, one spell that springs to mind is 1st level Sanctuary. This is a fairly reliable way to break rage unless the barbarian has good wisdom. Advantage devotion paladin.
Not even talking about magic items, spells in depth, higher level equipment, allies and role play aspects. It's just too many variables to give a decent answer. I like paladins more, but I'd say barbarian.
I do know that WotC has a master spreadsheet with expected values per level with class features converted into a combat expression, but it's closely guarded. Fans have made various approximations over the years.
Last edited by FreeTheSlaves; 21/02/23 08:25 AM.
