D&D 5E Heavy Armour Master, how does a front liner survive without it?

[Tzarevitch]

Yes if they do bludgeoning piercing or slashing. Not if they do fire, cold, poison, acid, psychic, necromantic, spell, magic, etc...

There are just a lot of creatures that simply don't do non-magic bludgeoning piercing or slashing damage. I am not saying there are not also plenty that do, it's just that as your levels increase, it seems the utility of the feat decreases a lot. You face more challenges that the feat doesn't apply to, and those challenges it does apply to make the -3 damage so minuscule as to not be really all that helpful. The feat is most useful at lower levels, or versus large quantities of lower level (often humanoid weapon-wielding) creatures at higher levels.

If you are facing a horde of kobolds or goblins, it will help a LOT. If you are facing a dragon...it's nearly meaningless. So it's situational. Which is not a bad thing, it's just a thing.

That's a fallacy. The utility is always the same regardless of kobold or dragon so long as the number of attacks is the same. It's always -3.

 

[Piratecat]

That's a fallacy. The utility is always the same regardless of kobold or dragon so long as the number of attacks is the same. It's always -3.

Aren't dragon claws counted as magical, meaning that the feat doesn't apply? I don't have my MM in front of me, so I could be mistaken.

 

[Greg Benage]

Aren't dragon claws counted as magical, meaning that the feat doesn't apply? I don't have my MM in front of me, so I could be mistaken.

Not that I can tell. Other monsters (e.g. Balor) specifically state that their melee weapon attacks count as magic, but there's nothing like that for dragons. Actually, I haven't found any instance where natural weapons count as magic weapons.

 

[DracoSuave]

That's a fallacy. The utility is always the same regardless of kobold or dragon so long as the number of attacks is the same. It's always -3.

If you're getting 30 damage incoming per round, the utility of this feat depends on if that 30 damage is done through 5 attacks compared to one. In the case of the former, you took 15 damage. In the latter, you took 27.

Doesn't seem like the same utility at all.

 

[Mirtek]

It's a great feat, although its effectiveness tails off once foes have weapons that count as magical.

Actually there are not that many. There are more that do normal damage + special damage, but in this case the feat is still working against the normal damage part of the attack.

 

[Mistwell]

That's a fallacy. The utility is always the same regardless of kobold or dragon so long as the number of attacks is the same. It's always -3.

I question your use of the term "fallacy". Everything I said is correct. It's not -3 versus dragon breath. It's not -3 versus a spell the dragon casts. It's not -3 versus many dragon lair attacks. It's not -3 versus frightful presence. Therefore, it's of less utility when you are fighting a dragon. Or any of hundreds of creatures that have magical attacks or any kind of energy attacks. For instance, if you are fighting a Couatl, the feat is useless.

More importantly, if you take 3 damage from a kobold attack and this feat decreases the damage by -3 then you take 0 damage. However, if you take 30 damage from a dragon bite and this feat makes it 27 damage instead, that's a heck of a lot less useful than it was versus the kobold attack. In one, it reduced the damage by 100%, and in the other it reduced the damage by 10%. That means one had more utility than the other, by an objective measurable amount.

 

[Rhenny]

This feat and healer are two that really are more valuable at lower levels. They don't lose their value at higher levels, but they just don't grant as much bang for the buck. Conversely, a feat like toughness or defensive duelist is much better to take at a higher level rather than the lower ones.

I like the variety.

 

[Bayonet]

Currently playing a Battle Master Fighter with the Defense fighting style, and contemplating whether I should take this feat, or take the ability point increase to jack the strength up to 18.

 

[KarinsDad]

At 1st level it is a bit OP, but I dont see this being great at the lvl 8+ but decent, I think at 4th it might be pretty good.

AC rarely increases. To hit increases more often at higher level. This means that the fighter gets hit more often. Monsters also often have more than one attack per round at higher level.

As an example, a 16 Hit Dice Shambling Mound can hit twice per round. It does an average of 13 points of damage. The feat prevents 3/13 or almost 25% of the damage.

This feat does not need to scale. It's already potent, even at high level. It's typically more potent than +2 to CON, it's typically more potent than the Tough feat (usually, Heavy Armor Master does not apply to all damage types).

 

[Tzarevitch]

I question your use of the term "fallacy". Everything I said is correct. It's not -3 versus dragon breath. It's not -3 versus a spell the dragon casts. It's not -3 versus many dragon lair attacks. It's not -3 versus frightful presence. Therefore, it's of less utility when you are fighting a dragon. Or any of hundreds of creatures that have magical attacks or any kind of energy attacks. For instance, if you are fighting a Couatl, the feat is useless.

That's true. It doesn't work against things it doesn't work against, but that doesn't change with level. How often you encounter effects that it doesn't work against depends on the DM.

More importantly, if you take 3 damage from a kobold attack and this feat decreases the damage by -3 then you take 0 damage. However, if you take 30 damage from a dragon bite and this feat makes it 27 damage instead, that's a heck of a lot less useful than it was versus the kobold attack. In one, it reduced the damage by 100%, and in the other it reduced the damage by 10%. That means one had more utility than the other, by an objective measurable amount.

That's where the fallacy is. It is just as effective as before. If it knocked 3 off of 30 or 3 off of 3, it's still 3 less damage in total per hit. It's utility doesn't change. At higher levels it knocks less off of the total of each, but at higher levels you have a bigger hp total to absorb it with and it evens out. I can tell you for a fact having a DR 4 on my paladin in a 4e campaign is every bit as useful at lvl 17 as it was at 4. The only difference is that you don't worry about surviving each individual hit, but every bit you shave off keeps you a little further from death and it adds up in the end.