D&D 5E 5th Edition has broken Bounded Accuracy

[KarinsDad]

Two-weapon fighting, sure, but single-weapon with no shield? I'm not sure if that would fall under a classic choice. I can't think of a single armored hero from the last thirty years who routinely goes into combat against armed opponents while leaving one hand empty, unless they're using that other hand to cast spells.

Or to brawl. Knock a foe prone. Grapple him. You now have advantage until he escapes and he has disadvantage. Granted, this does not work against huge foes unless the melee PC is increased in size some way. For example, Enlarge/Reduce not only ups a PC's size to Large, it also increases weapon damage by 1D4 and gives him advantage on Strength checks which makes it easier to knock foes prone and to grapple foes in the first place. The Grappler feat makes this much better against larger foes because they no longer auto escape. And moving grappled foes automatically is a tactic that is probably missed at most tables.

 

[brehobit]

-5 for an extra weapon die. That suddenly makes greataxes awesome again, and -5 to hit for +6.5 damage on average is not a huge DPR boost, but it's certainly worth taking once your accuracy gets high enough that you are consistently hitting anyway.

I like this. I'd say for double the weapon dice (so 4d6 with a two-handed sword). That's at most +7, a bit better if crits double it again. Might help some champion corner-case out too much, but frankly "makes champion too good" is something I'm willing to risk.

Drops the damage enough. Maybe too much at lower level?

The other option of once/round could also work

 

[Celtavian]

The Swashbuckler Rogue can cover a Musketeer very well.

They've stated a general reluctance to do more classes. Mearls has said he is mulling an Artificer, and we might see a Psion. Doubtful we will ser many more.

It works really well for Pathfinder. The new classes added some needed newness to the game. Then again they didn't add them until many years into the base game. Right now WotC isn't releasing much. I imagine we won't see anything like new classes for ages. The Magus was also a much loved class, though the 5E multiclass rules are much more friendly than 3E.

 

[Parmandur]

It works really well for Pathfinder. The new classes added some needed newness to the game. Then again they didn't add them until many years into the base game. Right now WotC isn't releasing much. I imagine we won't see anything like new classes for ages. The Magus was also a much loved class, though the 5E multiclass rules are much more friendly than 3E.

Yeah, who knows what will happen in three years. And, really, class vs. subclass is kind of a fuzzy distinction, and they have been throwing new subclasses around left and right.

 

[DaveDash]

Edit: This post originally claimed Crossbow Expert had been nerfed to effectively disallow dual hand crossbows... but after re-reading the Sage Advice column in question, I realized that Crossbow Expert was powered-up rather than nerfed. You can no longer dual-wield hand crossbows, but you can use the same hand crossbow for the bonus action attack, so you still get the full range of attacks and you only need one hand crossbow, which means if you have a magic crossbow you can use it for every attack.

Dang.

It has clarified though that you can't use a shield and a hand crossbow, which is a good thing. I'd say it's gone sideways rather than been boosted.

I also think you can only use the bonus action for one extra attack. I'm not sure if you're saying that or not.in your post.

 

[Psikerlord#]

Therein lies the question though-- if those feats are indeed "very broken" to a certain subset of players (that subset which are playing in the late 3rd / 4th tier and who are focusing their party around giving the GWM/SS feat holder the best chance for success)... is that very broken *enough* to warrant actually changing the game in its entirety through errata?

My guess is the answer from WotC's p.o.v. will be "No". Reason being... the "fix" to a numerical issue that only a certain segment of the players was finding will end up being more of an issue to a greater number of people. The solution being worse than the problem-- the old "Weapon Focus Feat" conundrum. Wherein WotC decision's to try and fix a slight damage imbalance in the 4E math resulted in the creation of a fix that ended up pissing more people off and causing more conflict that the original issue itself did. And I would suspect that any official change to GWM/SS runs the same risk to the rest of the D&D population.

The fact that the game itself tells you to make any changes you need to it for your own best experience is really all that they need to do to "fix" this problem. Any DM and table who finds themselves having these GWM/SS issues can make their own ruling to counteract the issue, rather than WotC needing to write down an "official" change that affects everybody.

I agree there will be no errata. Feats are optional after all, so as you suggest, a table can easily bypass the issue but not allowing those 2 feats, or amending them slightly (as we have done - we swapped the -5/+10 for +1 str or dex). Still, in my view, that mechanic is one of the rare 5e mistakes. If people really want such an option, it seems to me it would have been better as a "called shot" rule that any PC can attempt as an action, similar to shove etc. At least then everyone can potentially do more damage from time to time and avoids the "striker" problem.

 

[Psikerlord#]

I always found the replacement of the -5/+10 aspects with a +1 to a stat to be a little boring. Would placing a restriction that the -5/+10 attack could only be used once per turn (like the rogue's sneak attack) be an effective house rule? I've never seen these feats used so I'd appreciate input from those that have. From what I've read in this and other threads the extra damage is not bad at low levels and only gets out of hand when you start piling on multiple attacks, so from a theoretical perspective it seems fair.

I think that would help, but even better might be a completely different substituted ability like ... I don't know... a quickdraw ability that gives adv on your first attack action if you win initiative. It's just the +1 stat is the easiest way "balance" wise, since there are examples of such feats already.

 

[Psikerlord#]

So, I don't allow feats. Don't like them. This thread makes me glad for that decision.

I don't allow MCing but do allow feats. I wonder sometimes however if I got it backwards. Feats give some cool customization choices. But so does MCing.

 

[Psikerlord#]

I agree DPR is very well balanced without feats.

I also agree with this.

 

[Psikerlord#]

It's still pretty lame for players who want to play a TWF or a single-weapon user without a shield not to have some means to boost damage to equivalent levels. Those are also classic fictional weapon choices, it would be nice if they were on par with two-handed weapon use and archery. Bounded Accuracy also eliminates the ability of feats to provide a substantial defensive advantage, while making a substantial damage advantage far more valuable. The two-weapon fighter feat provides a +1 AC. That bonus becomes a moot point at later levels. The Duellist feat only works against one melee attack per round and takes up one's prescious reaction, which is not valued very highly for a variety of reasons. I think the best option is add similar feats to every fighting offensive fighting style. That would balance them amongst each other.

I think the -5/+10, if you're going to use it at all, ought to be a "called shot" action that anyone can attempt similar to shove.