Dual-weapon fighting is extremely lackluster

[triqui]

Yes, I pointed at doubling your chances to inflict non-damage riders as the reason to use dueal wielding. Mowing down minions would be a good one too if you expect to fight 1d6, 3hp hit die critters forever. Once you gets past them dual wielding is a liability, damage wise.

It also depends if you keep doing 1d6+3 forever . Actually, 1d6+3 is quite low, even for a 1st level char, as a human fighter has 18 str by default.

As long as Mooks keep being oneshoted (does not really matter if it's 3hp vs 3 dmg or 15 hp vs 15 dmg), DW works nice for mowing down them. And it's a very nice source of riders, as you suggested.

And I'd like to point that if Crit becomes better (through riders, extra damage, or higher crit threat range), DW becomes better too.

 

[Chris_Nightwing]

Ah yes, I did in fact forget to halve. If you've a 50% chance to hit then on average TWF does 3 (0.5*3+0.25*6), S&B does 3.25 (0.5*7.5) and 2H does 4.25 (0.5*9.5), yes?

I suppose that is low. Even when you get +1 to AC back. Someone should work out whether advantage changes these numbers. I'd rather TWF avoid two attack rolls altogether, personally.

 

[I'm A Banana]

It's weird. Its advantage is very situational. To compare it to other LV1 feats:

Acolytes & Dabblers get free magic.
Guardians get to impose disadvantage
Healers get the only thing in the game that can let you spend hit dice.
Jacks-of-all-Trades get skill training
Lurkers get advantage for being hidden
Necromancers get advantage for having killed before.

It's about in line with that, I think. Nothing the others can do at 1st level quite rivals the possibility of double damage.

I think 5e in general so far is very averse to damage spikes like that. Personally, I'd prefer if they kind of get over it, blow up HP a bit, give everyone something that can potentially double damage at first level, and have TWF-ers have that has theirs.

Sort of:

TWF-ers or fast ranged attackers make two attacks (2d8 melee, 2d6 ranged)
Two-handed fighters or heavy ranged attackers make an attack that deals double damage (1d8*2 or 1d6*2)
Shield-wielders can drop damage by half (1d8 damage, 1d8 negated)
Finesse fighters deal double damage with Advantage
Spellcasters...have friggin' magic laser beans that deal extra damage (Burning Hands might deal 1d8 damage, but it can usually hit 2 creatures at once; Cure Light Wounds can heal 1d8 damage while the Cleric wails on an enemy with their 1d8 warhammer).

I'm in favor of more awesome in my D&D, though. I'm also on record as saying max-damage crits are boring as plain toast, too.

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

Watch out for the halfling rogue dual-wielding shortswords with his d8 die bump (admittedly, not much from the d8, but every little bit helps ...).

 

[KidSnide]

Two Weapon Fighting (and a similar benefit from Archery Mastery) are both good for rogues, because in some cases they can allow the character two chances to attack with advantage, and two chances to proc Sneak Attack. While sneak attack can only be used once a round, this makes it less likely you'll blow those sneak attack dice. If the half-damage effect would also half sneak attack damage, though, this isn't so good.

The same analysis applies to the fighter's CS dice in a Deadly Strike.

The rules language for Deadly Strike makes it sound like it is extra damage on the attack (and would be halved), while the language for Sneak Attack makes it sound like it is a separate source of damage (and wouldn't be halved). But I can't imagine the designers intend those two abilities to work differently, so it's unclear exactly how it will work out.

Either way, the combination of being able to divide damage among multiple targets and increasing the chance of at least one hit, makes this seem like a perfectly reasonable feat.

-KS

 

[GX.Sigma]

So how are we assuming CS and SA damage works with Twf? Applied to both attacks and halved, applied to one attack and halved, or applied to one attack with full effect?

The first and third option would each have advantages, while the second would clearly suck. My current guess is applied to one attack at full effect. (But of course a fighter with 2+ CS dice could split the bonus damage.)

Applied to one attack at full effect is what I'm going with too. I don't know if that's RAW, but it seems dumb otherwise.

It just depends what "all the damage" means, and if that includes ex post facto damage like CS or SA. It's really a poorly-written feat, and it's just one example of the extreme vagueness of the entire ruleset.

 

[Stalker0]

Right now I see the benefit of TWF as this:

1) Good at mowing through mooks.
2) Good against a target with very high AC.
3) Good if there are extra crit benefits (more chance to crit).
4) Good if applying non-damaging effects.
5) Good against a single target where half damage can take it out (two attacks on the same target).

So I think TWF is good, the question is....good enough for a feat?

 

[Li Shenron]

The benefit is that you are able to kill two goblins in a round, instead of one. When you face 10 goblins and a goblin shaman, being able to cut through the mooks in 5 rounds instead of 10 is a benefit.

...

With this configuration, 1h+shield gives you better armor. 2h gives you better single target damage. And TWF gives you better multiple target damage. I think it's a good solution.

I am quite a lot fine with this.

TWF is a fantasy cliché with very little to do with historical realism, so I'm fine with the fact that a 1st level character is not supposed to get much out of dual-wielding. I am quite sure that this first feat is only the "entry cost" of the style and will be followed with other feats that will make TWF more interesting at higher level.

Dual-wielding (in reality) is damn hard and requires years of training. In fact, it was a non-existent style in regular warfare, and probably studied only by a few elite duelists. I think it is only a good thing if the learning curve in D&D is also steep... I hate seeing low-level characters effectively picking up a style that should be for the experienced heroes, just like I would hate to see a low-level wizard flying and teleporting just because it's a fantasy cliché.

Also, while I think that historically (at least in the western fencing and swordfighting*) the second-hand weapon was used mostly for defense, you cannot seriously believe that a dagger or sword can effectively protect you from projectile weapons like arrows... it's just isn't possible. That general +1 AC would be a very generous gift if it didn't cost a feat. Of course, it's a fantasy game, but my rationale is that there has to be a sort of progression of the fantasy elements, so that deflecting arrows with a dagger becomes possible at mid-levels.

(*Eastern martial arts have some dual-wielding techniques, for instance the use of 2 Sai or 2 esgrima sticks, but always with very light weapons that are usually more meant like an "upgrade" or extension of your unarmed attacks)

There are two approaches for something like this: design feat chains or use level prerequisites. 3ed established a sort of mantra that straigh level should not be used as a prerequisite (why?). I say that straight level works great, because a gaming group can so easily house rule that so that if they want a more superheroes game where 1lv PCs can do all the fancy stuff, they can just remove or lower such prerequisite level, while groups who want the game to stay more grim-n-gritty can increase e.g. all feat prerequisite levels by a fixed amount.

 

[1of3]

So how are we assuming CS and SA damage works with Twf? Applied to both attacks and halved, applied to one attack and halved, or applied to one attack with full effect?

Apparently you do not declare CS until after you hit or miss. Otherwise Glancing Blow wouldn't make sense. So you can apply your CS dice any way you like after you have rolled to hit.

Sneak Attack would probably work the same way.

 

[DEFCON 1]

It's really a poorly-written feat, and it's just one example of the extreme vagueness of the entire ruleset.

To my mind, that's not really unexpected, and in many ways a good thing.

This is one of probably dozens of documents getting bandied about the offices, and they took whatever their line was at the time and mushed all the rules together into one document for release... without much in the way in an editor's pass, most likely. Because really, it's a playtest document. It doesn't need to waste time having every loophole closed, because a huge percentage of these rules are going to be going away in a few weeks anyway.

Plus... the ADVANTAGE of this "extreme vagueness" is that these rules will probably get playtested by people many different ways based upon personal interpretation... and if people then respond to the survey talking about the rules and WHICH WAY they intrepreted them... WotC gets information on several different "rules variations" at once, and can begin narrowing down which ones seemed to work well with those who played it.