D&D 5E What does it mean to you for a character/class to be "good in melee"?

[Ashkelon]

Above, I essentially said that everyone was good in melee, I believe you may have just said that no one is.

I think we have the bases covered. Next question!

Our two posts aren't really conflicting though are they. In 5e, a bladesiger wizard, a valor bard, or a war cleric can all fight in melee and do so at a similar level of capability to the fighter, barbarian, or paladin. They can take hits nearly as well, they can dish out damage, and they can all make similarly powerful opportunity attacks. Sure the dedicated melee classes will be somewhat better, but for levels 1-10 not by a truly significant amount. So by comparison all classes are capable of being "good at melee".

However, "good at melee" in 5e really isn't very good at melee. At least not compared to many other tabletop RPGs out there.

 

[Satyrn]

This was brought up in my thread about Tempest Clerics and I'm just curious what people consider to be "good at melee" or "good in melee"


To me, melee is more than JUST damage per weapon attack. It's being able to take some hits. It's being able to stay down on the front line and still contribute to the party in one way or another.


Thoughts?

For me, being good in melee means being able to take the hits so the rest of the party doesn't have to.

But this doesn't even mean that a high AC is needed

My two weapon fighting gnome battlemaster in breastplate has a fairly low AC (16) but I can stand in there soaking up damage with the Parry maneuver.

 

[Tony Vargas]

Our two posts aren't really conflicting though are they.

I didn't feel like they were, just that they neatly covered the range.
(npi - I mean "ran the gamut of reasonable responses")

In 5e, a bladesiger wizard, a valor bard, or a war cleric can all fight in melee and do so at a similar level of capability to the fighter, barbarian, or paladin. They can take hits nearly as well, they can dish out damage, and they can all make similarly powerful opportunity attacks. Sure the dedicated melee classes will be somewhat better, but for levels 1-10 not by a truly significant amount. So by comparison all classes are capable of being "good at melee".

However, "good at melee" in 5e really isn't very good at melee. At least not compared to many other tabletop RPGs out there.

Nor compared to being good at ranged in 5e, arguably. That might be part of it too. Ranged combat, weapon-with-feat or spellcasting, has it easier than ever, it seems.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Hadn't thought of it that way, but, yeah, in 5e that'd be ideal. (In modern RL, too, thanks to firearms.)

I suppose that, ideally, you also want to be well-defended-from and/or able to degrade the enemy's ranged capability...

Yep, and you ideally want a recon capability too, and some built-in resilience to let you recover from mishaps (healing, Revivify and Greater Restoration), and someone who is excellent at logistics (transportation/supply), and a good negotiator, and a crowd control capability, and...

...and that's why you can't usually have everyone in the party be good at melee and excellent at ranged combat.

 

[Ancalagon]

Yep, and you ideally want a recon capability too, and some built-in resilience to let you recover from mishaps (healing, Revivify and Greater Restoration), and someone who is excellent at logistics (transportation/supply), and a good negotiator, and a crowd control capability, and...

...and that's why you can't usually have everyone in the party be good at melee and excellent at ranged combat.

Well put!

But ideally, if every party member has *some* ranged characteristics, it can be really good, esp if you have a good recon PC to scout ahead. The foes get really injured moving up to the party, and by the time they reach the melee line the melee specialist can drop their bow/crossbow/etc and easily mop them up.

 

[pming]

Hiya!

That's easy...

+3/+3 To Hit/Damage
AC 14

...Yup. That's about it. Everything above that is just gravy.

^_^

Paul L. Ming

 

[Sunseeker]

To generally, be "better than average".

So, "average" in this case is IMO, hitting and taking hits about 50% of the time. (on at-level challenges)

So, better than average should be hitting around 75% of the time and only being hit about 25% of the time.

Now, you can get down in the nitty gritty with how much damage you deal and how much damage you take when you hit or are hit, but that's a distinction between being good at dealing damage vs being good at taking damage, which I think are two subsets of "being good in melee". Some classes can dish it, some classes can take it. Some classes can do a little of both.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Well put!

But ideally, if every party member has *some* ranged characteristics, it can be really good, esp if you have a good recon PC to scout ahead. The foes get really injured moving up to the party, and by the time they reach the melee line the melee specialist can drop their bow/crossbow/etc and easily mop them up.

Yep. And you can disperse the party formation so that even if they do get to melee range, you can just have whoever is occupying them in melee go on defense (Dodge, Blade Ward, whatever) while everyone else hammers the enemy with ranged attacks. It's sort of like playing Keep-Away with the short kids at recess.

(Opposable thumbs FTW!)

 

[Azurewraith]

To me a good in melee character must simply be able to stand there and attack round after round until combats over.

 

[Gardens & Goblins]

About they can dish out around 10-12 average damage per round, with enough defence to last 3-4 rounds, then I'd say they're good at melee. Not great, but enough to hold their own and, together with the rest of the party, take down a number of the bigger beasties in a few rounds.