Oofta
Legend
Funny thing is that when you look at the whole picture, meaning not just DPR but survivability, GWM is not that great. I wrote a simulator a while back where I simulated cage fights against various foes matching fighters up to appropriate CR monsters and seeing how long they'd survive. Up to level 5 dual weapons won, from 5-10 duelist style with shield master won if the fighter is allowed to do the shield bash before other attacks (otherwise it was dual weapon). Even without the shield bash, the sword and board fighter was still the winner of the fight more often than GWM.That's the crazy part.
The problem wasn't that GWM and SS deal big damage. It was the TWF, Unarmed Strikes, Sword and Board, and Finesse fighting didn't have damage feats as well. And sucked.
People overestimate GWM's effectiveness in combat if the fighter wants to actually live or not drain the cleric's healing to keep them up. The disclaimer is that the gap wasn't really all that huge, a few percentage points at most and not something people would actually notice in play. Suffice to say, I don't think GWM is all that.
As always, this was still white room analysis so take it with a grain of salt.