D&D 5E Helping melee combat to be more competitive to ranged.

Ashkelon · Jan 5, 2017

Corwin said:
Are you sure that's accurate? Or do you *actually* mean, "It is mathematical fact that a singular, specific ranged damage build can potentially deal more damage than most melee damage builds in 5e, when certain circumstances are set by the DM to ensure it happens."?

It is mathematically accurate. A handcrossbow archer deals about 20-30% more damage than a greatsword warrior. Since the hand crossbow archer suffers no penalties for cover or fighting in within 5 feet of his enemies, he can fight just as effectively against enemies who pop up unexpectedly in melee range as the greatsword fighter.

Wow, I didn't know there was a feat that removed ammo expenditure. Which one? I need to let our archer's player know. He also will want to know how you managed to reliably get OAs for your ranged characters. He'd like to be able to threaten those as well. He's going to be so jazzed to know you've found ways to get around those problems. Thanks in advance!

If you need to threaten OAs as a ranged fighter, simply fight in melee range. Use the same tactics a greatsword fighter would use. If you draw a dagger or rapier at the end of every turn, then drop it at the start of the following turn, you threaten OAs just fine. You also happen to be capable of fighting at ranged combat for any situation in which doing so is tactically advantageous. We have gone over this multiple times in the thread though.

You are joking if you think you can evaluate people you know nothing about. Is looking foolish a debate tactic?

You are the one who brought up their class and fear choices as if they proved a point. I am simply explaining to you that the level of optimization being talked about in this thread is far beyond the examples you have given. It merely serves to show you why you may not believe there to be an issue because your players have never chosen the most egregious combinations of abilities.

Also, again, you hope to speak to the superiority of "ranged builds". But that's misleading. You should instead strive for accuracy. How about, "that one, particular ranged build that is never achieved by accident?" Try that.

When talking about optimization, you talk about the most powerful examples. You don't say hey the system is just fine because an average unoptimized in knowledgeable player won't be able to push the. Iundaries of the system math. Instead you must inspect the elements that stress the systems capabilities. That is because in an ideal world, the various options would be of a roughly similar power level and no single option should be dramatically more powerful than the others.

I would rather the D&D games function in such a way that using a longbow was a decent choice for ranged weapon when compared to all the other options, instead of dealing significantly less damage.

Your numbers are still cute at best. Phantoms at least.

You haven't even given numbers. Much less analysis. If you are going to contribute to this thread, please back up your talk with numerical evidence.

Are you channeling Brittany Spears right now? Because, oops, you did it again. "Just as well as," has been repeatedly proven to be a lie. I know you know why it's not true. So why keep saying it? At this point I'm starting to think there is an agenda behind all this disingenuousness.

I have proven time and again that the greatsword fighter cannot compete in melee against the crossbow fighter. The crossbow fighter is at most down 1 AC and a feat. For that, it gains roughly 20-30% more damage per round, +5 to Dex saves, +5 to initiative, and the ability to fight at range when needed.

Other melee fighter builds can do quite well, but none of them are damage oriented builds. Those builds tend to focus on melee control utilizing sentinel and polearm master, or grappling.

FormerlyHemlock · Jan 5, 2017

Ashkelon said:
I have proven time and again that the greatsword fighter cannot compete in melee against the crossbow fighter. The crossbow fighter is at most down 1 AC and a feat. For that, it gains roughly 20-30% more damage per round, +5 to Dex saves, +5 to initiative, and the ability to fight at range when needed.

Other melee fighter builds can do quite well, but none of them are damage oriented builds. Those builds tend to focus on melee control utilizing sentinel and polearm master, or grappling.

At the risk of beating a dead horse:

A greatsword fighter has grappling built in (Athletics +11). A crossbow fighter does not.

Higher AC (most of the time) and better physical control without MADness are the things you get from melee specialization. They're less broadly useful than ranged specialization; but of course you don't have to choose between them--you can do both! E.g. Paladin/Warlock (if you can wrap your head around the necessary roleplaying contortions, either by playing a Paladin of Ancients/Feylock or by giving in to the Dark Side of Powergaming

) can leave Str at 16 and boost Cha to 20 and be excellent at both melee tanking and ranged attacks, and a fantastic healer besides.

Argyle King · Jan 5, 2017

At one point in time, I believed there was no problem with ranged builds.

During a play through of Curse of Strahd, the newest player in the group was playing an archery style ranger with sharpshooter. When I say she was the newest player, I mean that she had literally purchased a PHB less than a month before we started the adventure, and 5th Edition was her first exposure to D&D.

Without even trying to optimize, she was easily able to outpace what the rest of the party could do. The only party member capable of coming close was the paladin who was dumping spell slots into smite. During a particularly good nova round, the paladin would pull ahead on damage, but his ability to do so required being in danger (melee) more often; was limited by the availability of spell slots, and meant that his initiative was typically much worse.

cmad1977 · Jan 5, 2017

Johnny3D3D said:
At one point in time, I believed there was no problem with ranged builds.

During a play through of Curse of Strahd, the newest player in the group was playing an archery style ranger with sharpshooter. When I say she was the newest player, I mean that she had literally purchased a PHB less than a month before we started the adventure, and 5th Edition was her first exposure to D&D.

Without even trying to optimize, she was easily able to outpace what the rest of the party could do. The only party member capable of coming close was the paladin who was dumping spell slots into smite. During a particularly good nova round, the paladin would pull ahead on damage, but his ability to do so required being in danger (melee) more often; was limited by the availability of spell slots, and meant that his initiative was typically much worse.

So what your saying is that the pure fighter was generally dishing out more damage than the hybrid?

I'm not seeing the 'problem'

Oops. Not a pure fighter. Still not seeing the issue though. How dare the archer do damage!

Were the other players not having fun? Did the paladin not get satisfaction from the smites? Did people complain about how weak and feeble their characters were?

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Corwin · Jan 5, 2017

Ashkelon said:
It is mathematically accurate. A handcrossbow archer deals about 20-30% more damage than a greatsword warrior...

...when the DM ensures it will be so by catering the game, and its scenarios, to the archer. Potentially correct. Though, even *then*, not necessarily at all levels of play.

Ashkelon said:
Since the hand crossbow archer suffers no penalties for cover or fighting in within 5 feet of his enemies, he can fight just as effectively against enemies who pop up unexpectedly in melee range as the greatsword fighter.

You did it again. I bolded the part above that is, once more for the road, untrue. Do we really need to go over it the umpteenth time why you are incorrect in that assessment?

Ashkelon said:
If you need to threaten OAs as a ranged fighter, simply fight in melee range. Use the same tactics a greatsword fighter would use. If you draw a dagger or rapier at the end of every turn, then drop it at the start of the following turn, you threaten OAs just fine.

Even *if* that cheese was accepted at the table, without your fellow players pelting you with their dice, you are still wrong. You think your 1d4+5 is as threatening as 2d6+15 (reroll 1s and 2s, and with Sentinel shutting down their movement - yes, if your archer gets two feats, so does the other guy)? I can give you a hint as how to answer that: Nope. Point GWF.

Ashkelon said:
You also happen to be capable of fighting at ranged combat for any situation in which doing so is tactically advantageous. We have gone over this multiple times in the thread though.

So you are accusing me of ignoring the points made in this discussion prior, while you are ignoring all the points made in this discussion prior?

Ashkelon said:
I have proven time and again that the greatsword fighter cannot compete in melee against the crossbow fighter.

More of the same? This is getting monotonous. You have done no such thing. You have only shown that, under ideal circumstances (under the control of the DM) a hand crossbow fighter can deal more damage than a GWF. This is neither news, nor a problem. Because there are also circumstances when there GWF will deal far, far more than 20% higher damage than that archer. It all balances out (unless your DM is consciously trying to screw over the GWF while trying to make the archer shine).

Ashkelon said:
The crossbow fighter is at most down 1 AC and a feat.

And requires a steady supply of ammo. And cannot threaten OAs. Points GWF.

Ashkelon said:
For that, it gains roughly 20-30% more damage per round,

Sometimes. Othertimes less.

Ashkelon said:
+5 to Dex saves,

What higher save(s) does the GWF have over the archer? You like to cherry-pick. It's not productive.

Ashkelon said:
+5 to initiative,

Which is cyclical. You aren't an assassin or a wizard with a fireball. Going first isn't the end-all-be-all you make it out to be. Lest you forget, I've been playing 5e for years now (as well? - I'm not sure about the extent of your experience playing 5e). I've seen hundreds of fights. An archer going first is nice. Sure it is. It's hardly ever game-changing. Oh, also, sometimes the archer doesn't even go first. Or even before the melee guys. Just thought I'd point that out in case you forgot.

Ashkelon said:
and the ability to fight at range when needed.

Cool. So can the GWF. He can throw a javelin. Or, better yet, pull out a longbow himself, even. Thanks to BA, he doesn't have to have a 20 DEX to be competent with a bow. And he still gets his extra attacks. Oh, and that GWF has better short range with that bow than your hand crossbow guy's max range. So he's doing 100% more damage sometimes! I guess hand crossbow fighters suck because they can't do any damage at all at 150 feet away! Let alone potentially 600 feet away! Unlike the GWF. Points GWF.

Ashkelon said:
Other melee fighter builds can do quite well, but none of them are damage oriented builds. Those builds tend to focus on melee control utilizing sentinel and polearm master, or grappling.

Which to you, at least as it appears, means they failed at D&D for not caring solely about DPR? That says more about you than it does about 5e in general, AFAIC.

CapnZapp · Jan 5, 2017

Hemlock said:
*Hemlock appears in a puff of smoke, in response to @ mention*

Currently there are three ways I can think of to get massive at-will or virtually at-will damage in 5E. (Caveat: I don't consider DPR to be the most important statistic, but it is what you guys are talking about so here we go.) Roughly in order of most to least effective:

1.) Minions can make you do 2x to 100x as much damage as a normal PC. Necromancer skeletons, druids with a bag of rats and Animal Shapes to turn them all into rhinos, druids that Planar Bind a ton of hags and have them all form covens and spam dozens of Lightning Bolts per turn, etc. Can easily do hundreds of points of damage per turn against AC 20 by level 20.

2.) Quickened Agonizing Repelling Eldritch Blast plus appropriate spells can make you do around 1.5x to 3x as much damage as a normal PC. By level 20, can easily do 100+ points of damage per turn against AC 20 if an external ally grants advantage somehow.

3.) GWM or Sharpshooter plus appropriate spells and magic items can make you do around 1.5x to 2x as much damage as a normal PC. By level 20, can easily do 75ish points of damage per turn against AC 20 if a Crossbow Expert Fighter with advantage.

Oh, and of course there's also (4) the "massive magic item" route which I tend to forget about--a 20th level Fighter using a +3 Flametongue longsword and Dueling style (d8+3+2d6 fire+STR+2) can do 85ish damage against AC 20 when he has advantage, and still have his bonus action left over, e.g. for a GWM extra attack (106 damage). I tend to forget about magic items.

In contrast, a 20th level Thief with a nonmagical crossbow would be doing around 41 points of damage under the same conditions (advantage, vs. AC 20), a Dueling style 20th level Fighter would also be doing 40ish points of damage per round, a regular non-tricked-out Warlock just doing Hex + Agonizing Blast would be doing 50 points, a Dragon Sorcerer would be doing 25 points, a non-GWM 20th level Berserker would be doing around 45 points when Frenzying and 30 points when he's not, and a Paladin would do about 30 points with a greatsword or 29 with Dueling style and a longsword.

So if you eliminate minions, eliminate at-will cantrips, and eliminate Sharpshooter and GWM, and don't hand out any powerful magic items, you probably would get pretty close to having all PCs do approximately the same damage (30-45 DPR), except of course for spellcasters who would now be on the bottom rung unless expending spell slots.

Thank you for comprehensively summarizing your view, Hemlock.

It is most useful.

Ashkelon · Jan 5, 2017

Corwin: what are the scenarios in which the greatsword fighter deals more damage in melee than the hand crossbow archer? Nobody has shown a single scenario in which this is true but you keep stating it as fact.

Here are a few other facts you seem to have wrong:

Yes the greatsword fighters OA deals more damage than the hand crossbow archers OA. The hand crossbow fighter making an OA with a rapier is roughly 70% as effective as the greatsword OA which is roughly 4 Points of average damage higher. But the hand crossbow archer is dealing 6-8 more average damage per round than the greatsword fighter, every single round. So even in a whacky world in which enemies provoke an OA from the two warriors every single round, the archer still will deal more damage overall.

Furthermore, if both of the fighters are eldritch knights and have the warcaster feat, their OAs will both add a few d8 damage, making the hand crossbow fighter's OAs 80-90% as effective as the greatsword fighters.

If the greatsword fighter uses the sentinel feat, he won't ever want to take the -5 to hit penalty on an OA because then his chance to stop enemy moment drops from about 65% to about 40%. In fact it is almost never a good idea to use the -5/+10 on an OA. This is because the decreased accuracy is more important when you are making only a single attack. Additionally, sentinel is a nonbo with warcaster meaning the two features don't interact.

As for the greatsword fighter using a javelin or a longbow at ranged combat, we have been over this a few times. The javelin allows for a single attack per turn for 1d6+5 damage. With a 12 Dex, the greatsword fighter can make 3 longbow attacks for 1d8+1, that are 4 less accurate than his melee attacks or the javelin attack. The net effect is that the greatsword fighter is roughly 20-25% as effective at ranged combat as he is in melee. Not to mention that the greatsword fighters ranged attacks will suffer from range penalties and cover. Oh, and don't forget about the item interaction rules. If the greatsword fighter wants to actually attack with his javelin, he needs to drop his greatsword which would be foolish if his greatsword was a magic weapon. Since the hand crossbow is a one handed weapon, the hand crossbow fighter doesn't need to drop his weapon to fight with a rapier if melee attacks are necessary.

If you are going to respond, please do so with facts and detailed analysis.

Corwin · Jan 5, 2017

Ashkelon said:
Corwin: what are the scenarios in which the greatsword fighter deals more damage in melee than the hand crossbow archer? Nobody has shown a single scenario in which this is true but you keep stating it as fact.

How about an easy and obvious one? When your 4-bolts-per-turn archer runs out of ammo. The GWF doesn't need ammo to swing his sword.

Ashkelon said:
Here are a few other ["]facts["] you seem to have wrong:

[snipped out all the cherry-picked scenarios and assumptions]

I like how you keep saying that the archer can whip out one of the many melee weapons he needs to carry in battle, for use in threatening OAs (now its a rapier instead of a dagger), just to deal fractional damage compared to the GWF. But when the GWF wielding a longbow or throwing a javelin, on the rare instance he can't engage the enemy in melee, its folly. And you wonder why some of us take exception to your "math."

Another hilarious little Schrodinger's Fighter, white-roomery you just tried to pull. You actually tried to sell us the idea of this hand crossbow archer having elected to take booming blade or green flame blade as one of their few cantrips. Seriously? You just did that? I hope everyone else caught that. Too funny.

Ashkelon said:
If you are going to respond, please do so with ["]facts["] and ["]detailed analysis["].

In the same manner you do? Okay. Your hand crossbow archer and a GWF are 500 feet away from the enemy on a grassy plain. The GWF pulls out his longbow and starts shooting. Your hand crossbow fella gets to watch impotently because he has a max of 120 feet of range with his peashooter. The GWF is dealing 100% more damage for many rounds. He wins the comparison. My maths just proved that hand crossbow archers deal the least damage of anyone ever.

CapnZapp · Jan 5, 2017

CapnZapp said:
Thank you for comprehensively summarizing your view, Hemlock.

It is most useful.

I wanted to add one point here. Since others have kept talking this will have to be a new post.

Hemlock's #1 is minions. I have never denied that summoning spells are outright broken (=more effective than most anything else).

Now, this isn't such a big issue in my games, presumably because my players dislike having NPCs do the hard work for them. It probably feels more heroic to kill the monsters yourself.

I am not slagging this playstyle. I am merely explaining why I haven't focused on this kind of build.

Now, that's exactly the same as for those of you that don't have a problem with ranged characters dominating melee ones. We just differ in the number of bullet points our players ignore.

With one very important caveat: if you say "that's not an issue for us". I would never try to argue against a rule change that solves the minions issue. Consider a hypothetical thread called "Helping heroes to be more competitive to minions" or somesuch.

Now, unfortunately that's not enough for a small number of obstructive posters. Not only do they not have the issue with ranged characters in their game, they actively oppose any discussion to fix the issue. They might even deny the impact of feats such as GWM or SS.

This is something else, and a completely uncool stance to take. It is exactly as if I were to go "I don't have an issue with minions. I deny minions can outperform characters. I actively argue against anyone trying to fix their issue, I don't want the game changed for the benefit of these people. There is no issue, you're just playing the game wrong."

CapnZapp · Jan 5, 2017

Hemlock said:
So if you eliminate minions, eliminate at-will cantrips, and eliminate Sharpshooter and GWM, and don't hand out any powerful magic items, you probably would get pretty close to having all PCs do approximately the same damage (30-45 DPR), except of course for spellcasters who would now be on the bottom rung unless expending spell slots.

I should probably add that my goal isnt to make "all PCs do approximately the same damage".

My goals include:
a) enabling all kinds of fighters to be viable: the Zorro, the Drizzt, the Greatmaul, the Knife Thrower and so on. By "viable" I mean that the difference in damage (to the best-in-class option, still for a fighter) can't be x2 or x3.
b) reestablishing melee as supreme over ranged. Ranged still has a role to play of course, but there should be a definite cost to pay if you want your primary mode of combat to be ranged.
c) not dooming Fighters to insignificance by implementing a+b (thanks!)

The solutions I will be exploring at this stage are:
a) removing the -5/+10 mechanism as being identified as the basic building block of all fighter builds with considerably higher DPR
b) changing the basic rule for wpn damage to always be Strength-based, thus creating a cost for the archer (who now needs both Str and Dex). Finesse weapons remain unchanged (they still enable Dex-based damage). Also, remove feats and part of feats that let you ignore cover, distance and being in melee.
c) removing at-will cantrips. Every character with at least one cantrip gets 3 cantrip slots (that recharge every short rest), and if you want to cast more you'll have to spend levelled spell slots. This number increases to 4 at 4th level and to 5 at 10th level. (I'm toying with changing the "Cantrips Known" column of spellcasting classes into "Cantrips Prepared/Memorized" as consolation. That is, you know all cantrips on your list; you just need to select which ones you can cast any given day. But that's off-topic in this context)

This still leaves a few builds identified by Hemlock:
* minions. I will simply leave that to be addressed another day and assume my players won't play Conjurors or Necromancers etc
* magic items. Since the DM is in control over magic item distribution, not a problem. (Or, more accurately, "it's only as big of a problem as the DM allows it to be").
* quickened Eldritch Blast. Partial fix - the sorlock can still do this two or three rounds every short rest.

Best regards,

D&D 5E Helping melee combat to be more competitive to ranged.

Ashkelon

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