BookBarbarian
Expert Long Rester
Barbarian or Monk? Nope.
Will D&D make strength matter again?
Barbarian or Monk? Nope.
Harzel
Adventurer
What feat is that?
cbwjm
Seb-wejem
I think they mean the feat that lets you add your proficiency bonus to AC. Defensive duelist I think it is called.
CapnZapp
Legend
On the other hand, whenever I see threads suggesting use the Encumbrance Rules and track Equipment Weight, I always have the same response:
You do that. Myself, I think equipment and encumbrance are outrageously boring details, and I would much rather fix STR as a dump stat in other ways.
akr71
Hero
I basically gave bows finesse so you can use either Str or Dex with them. I also removed the weapon limitations for Sneak Attack.
Amusingly enough, if you go the route of Str minimums for weapons, Rapier requires greater strength to use effectively than a longsword does.
Interesting 'fix' - I might have to adopt that. Yes, people mistakenly assume a rapier is a light weapon. It is balanced more toward the hilt than a longsword or shortsword to give you better finesse control, but that doesn't make it light! At least with a longsword, you can wield it with two hands, making it feel lighter.
Ratskinner
Adventurer
My players are convinced that STR is the most important combat stat. Throw in some terrain that requires leaping and climbing, and monsters that grapple. They esteem Athletics as the prince of all proficiencies.
That is one of the things that makes me sad about 5e, very few of my characters get to have athletics anymore because they get fewer skills and the backgrounds that give athletics don't usually fit.
CleverNickName
Limit Break Dancing
My players have "proficiency blindness" too. You know, the assumption that if a character doesn't have proficiency in a particular skill, they can't use it at all.
Any character can climb, jump, swim, etc; just throw the d20 and add your modifiers. Sure, someone else might be better (more skilled?) than you, but that doesn't mean you've been hobbled. That proficiency bonus usually only amounts to a 10-30% boost--nice to have, but not an instant win.
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The Crimson Binome
Hero
Background skills are really more like guidelines than codified templates. If your concept is that your Noble is very athletic, for whatever reason, then you can create a custom background by combining the traits of the Noble background with the skills from any other background you feel like.
RAW, you don't even need permission from the DM to do so, which is possibly the most ridiculous RAW in the entire book. As long as your backstory explains why you have a particular skill proficiency, though, then I can't really imagine a DM objecting to it.
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