D&D 5E Revised Crossbow Expert and Sharpshooter - now with Homebrewery attachment

[Thurmas]

Excuse me for pointing this out, but you now apply two independent restrictions, only one of which is really necessary.

Meaning that 1) if you only get the bonus action hand crossbow attack when you wield a melee weapon in your main hand... you don't need to restrict the disadvantage-negation to only the bonus action attack...

...and 2) if you restrict the disadvantage-negation to only the bonus action attack, you don't need to specify that the bonus action attack is triggered by melee weapons only.

This is because if you use a ranged weapon in the first scenario, you don't get the bonus action attack. (This makes the feat work just like RAW from a bow-user's perspective)

And if you use the second scenario, a character is forced to do main-hand attacks with a melee weapon to avoid disadvantage in melee. (This means a ranged character remains vulnerable to melee - or rather, that she needs to switch to a melee main-hand weapon in melee. This might not sound like a big deal, but it does mean you no longer can combine CE with either Archery FS or SS feat when you can't avoid melee, a sizable penalty at least for power gamers)

Obviously I prefer wording 2

Maybe its just that point in the workday, but I'm not sure I follow you completely. To start, it is my intention to accomplish a couple of things by wording CE the way I worded it.

1. Give crossbows the full use of the attack action, but not bonus attack. This helps avoid overuse of the sharpshooter damage bonus.
2. Allow the Melee weapon + hand crossbow combo to work every turn, while preventing a hand crossbow attack action + hand crossbow bonus attack to happen.
3. Keep ranged weapons disadvantaged in melee, hence applying the removal of disadvantage to only the hand crossbow bonus attack, symbolizing being able to get the shot off handily since they are engaged with you melee weapon.

Sharpshooter has the goals of:
1. Increasing you ability to fire at long distance.
2. When firing at normal distance, increasing your lethality through removal of cover and a damage increase.
3. Do those two things while staying disadvantaged vs melee.

I'm still approaching this as trying to reduce the lethality of of SS/CE vs GWM, without reducing SS to once per turn. I really, really don't like that manner of handling it.

The melee character is still at the ranged characters mercy at range, although not as much. Once the melee closes to melee range though, it shifts to favor the melee character, through the combination of the ranged character having disadvantage on attacks, melee getting occasional bonus attacks and AOO if the ranged tries to flee. In fact, I would add one more line to SS for this now that I think about it. Not allowing the extra damage to occur if you have disadvantage on the attack, i.e. in melee.

Sharpshooter:
You ignore half and three quarters cover on ranged attacks made within your weapon's normal range.
Attacking at long range does not impose disadvantage on your attacks.
When you make a ranged attack with a weapon you are proficient with and you don't have disadvantage, you may add your proficiency bonus to the damage roll if the target is within your weapon's normal range.

So, I think in the end, I like all the penalties you pointed out. I think it worked out exactly as I intended. I can't see a way to word it differently and gain the same effect.

 

[CapnZapp]

Maybe its just that point in the workday, but I'm not sure I follow you completely. To start, it is my intention to accomplish a couple of things by wording CE the way I worded it.

1. Give crossbows the full use of the attack action, but not bonus attack. This helps avoid overuse of the sharpshooter damage bonus.
2. Allow the Melee weapon + hand crossbow combo to work every turn, while preventing a hand crossbow attack action + hand crossbow bonus attack to happen.
3. Keep ranged weapons disadvantaged in melee, hence applying the removal of disadvantage to only the hand crossbow bonus attack, symbolizing being able to get the shot off handily since they are engaged with you melee weapon.

Sharpshooter has the goals of:
1. Increasing you ability to fire at long distance.
2. When firing at normal distance, increasing your lethality through removal of cover and a damage increase.
3. Do those two things while staying disadvantaged vs melee.

I'm still approaching this as trying to reduce the lethality of of SS/CE vs GWM, without reducing SS to once per turn. I really, really don't like that manner of handling it.

The melee character is still at the ranged characters mercy at range, although not as much. Once the melee closes to melee range though, it shifts to favor the melee character, through the combination of the ranged character having disadvantage on attacks, melee getting occasional bonus attacks and AOO if the ranged tries to flee. In fact, I would add one more line to SS for this now that I think about it. Not allowing the extra damage to occur if you have disadvantage on the attack, i.e. in melee.

Sharpshooter:
You ignore half and three quarters cover on ranged attacks made within your weapon's normal range.
Attacking at long range does not impose disadvantage on your attacks.
When you make a ranged attack with a weapon you are proficient with and you don't have disadvantage, you may add your proficiency bonus to the damage roll if the target is within your weapon's normal range.

So, I think in the end, I like all the penalties you pointed out. I think it worked out exactly as I intended. I can't see a way to word it differently and gain the same effect.

I was merely pointing out that you probably don't need both restrictions, since any power gamer is sufficiently corralled into desired behavior just by one

You don't need to focus on theoretical behavior, only power behavior. If there's a scenario I don't like, before I disallow it, I go "but it is abusive?". If not, I see no harm in allowing it. Only minmax scenarios need to be curtailed, IMHO.

Meaning that if you go by my scenario 2, you accomplish the critical change - no longer is Crossbow Experts immune to melee. Or rather: a regular CE might just switch to a rapier, and feel he's lost nothing - and that's fine. It's only the powergaming CR SS Archery build we're concerned about, and this build does lose the advantages of SS and Archery when doing that (switching to a rapier, that is). To me, this is the sufficient change compared to the RAW feat.

The other restriction you're working with, only giving out the bonus action attack when using a melee weapon for your regular attack action, also does its job, in that it avoids the fully minmaxed scenario allowed by the RAW feat. It has its advantages and disadvantages - it does allow the "Legolas build" (where you use a bow and arrow unhindered by melee). Whether that's an advantage or a disadvantage I leave up to the reader to judge! A power gamer, however, is looking for ways to enable his bonus action attack, and since you no longer can do that for a pure ranged build, that is probably a sufficient restriction by itself.

In summary, either restriction does the job of blunting the power build. Thus I'm not sure both are needed. Using both only restricts builds that already from the start aren't minmaxing in nature, and I see little reason to rein in builds unless they do overwhelming damage.

I'm strictly a crunch over fluff numbers balance guy in that regard. If you have other reasons for your restrictions, feel free to ignore me

---

As for Sharpshooter, I haven't followed along. Let me just assure you that you will only be using -5/+10 when you have advantage. That's perhaps the mechanism's only advantage, that it is self-regulating in that it is only useful in optimal conditions. (That it is too useful in optima conditions is another matter)

 

[clearstream]

Sharpshooter:
You ignore half and three quarters cover on ranged attacks made within your weapon's normal range.
Attacking at long range does not impose disadvantage on your attacks.
When you make a ranged attack with a weapon you are proficient with and you don't have disadvantage, you may add your proficiency bonus to the damage roll if the target is within your weapon's normal range.

This version allows a Longbow Archer to deal 41 per turn at 11th level. About equal to a Champion with Greataxe GWM/GWF or a few points less than a Battlemaster with Greatsword GWM/GWF.

The normal range this is doing it within is 150'.

 

[Thurmas]

This version allows a Longbow Archer to deal 41 per turn at 11th level. About equal to a Champion with Greataxe GWM/GWF or a few points less than a Battlemaster with Greatsword GWM/GWF.

The normal range this is doing it within is 150'.

Yep! Probably true. Better than 600' feet though, right?

And once something closes to within melee range, the long bow is going to be doing significantly less with no damage bonus and disadvantage. Better kill it before it gets to you.

 

[clearstream]

Do you consider GWM as a must have feature to balance melee vs ranged and melee vs full caster?

No I don't. I believe that a Fighter focused on maximum damage with a two-handed melee weapon (sacrificing defense to wield it), should inform our picture. If that doesn't deal maximum damage in melee (before magic) then there's something wrong. Not all campaign worlds have to work that way, but I believe it is consistent with most heroic fantasy to assert that melee weapons do the most weapon damage in melee. GWM isn't a must have feature in the sense of characters being forced to take it, but rather in the sense of defining the edge of system balance in that respect. Melee needs other advantages, too: raw damage alone doesn't cut it.

Looking at damage versus HP, I believe that about 45 damage/turn average weapon damage at 11th level is strong, but not OP. It doesn't distort scenarios around it. More could be distorting. GWM therefore gives us a tool - a standard - by which we can measure other things. Does this ranged weapon let me do the same damage as a huge hairy barbarian totally focused on maximum damage toe-to-toe with a massive axe in two hands? It's not very heroic fantasy if it does.

This is distinct from perfect realism. I'm not arguing that it is impossible for real ranged weapons to be as or more killy then real melee weapons.

 

[clearstream]

Yep! Probably true. Better than 600' feet though, right?

And once something closes to within melee range, the long bow is going to be doing significantly less with no damage bonus and disadvantage. Better kill it before it gets to you.

What are your assumptions about starting encounter distances, and distribution? DMs shield gives 20-400' outdoors (likely 70-220'). My experience indoors is 5-300' (likely 30-120). Call it 75' on average.

Archer usually has better initiative than creature. Creature suitable for 11th level has 100 HP and AC 17, distance is 35'

Loose arrows, kite back to 65', ~41 damage
Dash to 5'
Loose arrows, stow bow, kite back to 35', ~82 damage
Dash to 0'
Draw longsword, attack, ~113 damage

It's true I "unfairly" chose 35' to illustrate that in every circumstance where range is not 30' or less, ranged is getting in 80+ before melee begins. Our melee fighter in that scenario takes two attacks before defeating the creature, suffering about 52 damage in total while archer is unscathed.

 

[Thurmas]

What are your assumptions about starting encounter distances, and distribution? DMs shield gives 20-400' outdoors (likely 70-220'). My experience indoors is 5-300' (likely 30-120). Call it 75' on average.

Archer usually has better initiative than creature. Creature suitable for 11th level has 100 HP and AC 17, distance is 35'

Loose arrows, kite back to 65', ~41 damage
Dash to 5'
Loose arrows, stow bow, kite back to 35', ~82 damage
Dash to 0'
Draw longsword, attack, ~113 damage

It's true I "unfairly" chose 35' to illustrate that in every circumstance where range is not 30' or less, ranged is getting in 80+ before melee begins. Our melee fighter in that scenario takes two attacks before defeating the creature, suffering about 52 damage in total while archer is unscathed.

I guess this is a scenario where I can't look at distance in averages. I have to look at it as more a spread. In some cases, the encounter may take place in a forest, and you have 150' feet between the enemy and the archer. Other times, enemies are turning corners in a twisting cave network, never being further than 25' feet away.

Sure, there will be extremes. Fights from the walls of a castle might allow you that full 600'. In other cases, it happens in an alley, and there is no opportunity to use a bow at all as enemies drop from the rooftops onto you from above.

In any case, you have a spread of scenarios, where sometimes the guy with a longbow is going to shine. Others, he's completely handicapped and is poking things with a dagger while the greataxe barbarian is bathing in the blood of his enemies. Most of the time it should be somewhere in the middle. I think it is important each character gets to shine. If ranged is still completely dominating combat, it might be encounter design that needs a look to balance this out.

I looked at this in two ways. Keep the archer fun, viable and competitive while at the same time giving him strengths and weaknesses compared to melee. Not just make it so he is inherently not as powerful as melee.

 

[clearstream]

I guess this is a scenario where I can't look at distance in averages. I have to look at it as more a spread. In some cases, the encounter may take place in a forest, and you have 150' feet between the enemy and the archer. Other times, enemies are turning corners in a twisting cave network, never being further than 25' feet away.

Sure, there will be extremes. Fights from the walls of a castle might allow you that full 600'. In other cases, it happens in an alley, and there is no opportunity to use a bow at all as enemies drop from the rooftops onto you from above.

In any case, you have a spread of scenarios, where sometimes the guy with a longbow is going to shine. Others, he's completely handicapped and is poking things with a dagger while the greataxe barbarian is bathing in the blood of his enemies. Most of the time it should be somewhere in the middle. I think it is important each character gets to shine. If ranged is still completely dominating combat, it might be encounter design that needs a look to balance this out.

I looked at this in two ways. Keep the archer fun, viable and competitive while at the same time giving him strengths and weaknesses compared to melee. Not just make it so he is inherently not as powerful as melee.

It's kind of moot. Given a fair spread, in almost all cases - by the time the combat reaches toe-to-toe - the archer draws his longsword and finishes off the melee fighter easily.

 

[Thurmas]

I was merely pointing out that you probably don't need both restrictions, since any power gamer is sufficiently corralled into desired behavior just by one

You don't need to focus on theoretical behavior, only power behavior. If there's a scenario I don't like, before I disallow it, I go "but it is abusive?". If not, I see no harm in allowing it. Only minmax scenarios need to be curtailed, IMHO.

Meaning that if you go by my scenario 2, you accomplish the critical change - no longer is Crossbow Experts immune to melee. Or rather: a regular CE might just switch to a rapier, and feel he's lost nothing - and that's fine. It's only the powergaming CR SS Archery build we're concerned about, and this build does lose the advantages of SS and Archery when doing that (switching to a rapier, that is). To me, this is the sufficient change compared to the RAW feat.

I think I see where you are going, regarding the rapier comment. I think you were agreeing with me and I didn't get that.

The other restriction you're working with, only giving out the bonus action attack when using a melee weapon for your regular attack action, also does its job, in that it avoids the fully minmaxed scenario allowed by the RAW feat. It has its advantages and disadvantages - it does allow the "Legolas build" (where you use a bow and arrow unhindered by melee). Whether that's an advantage or a disadvantage I leave up to the reader to judge! A power gamer, however, is looking for ways to enable his bonus action attack, and since you no longer can do that for a pure ranged build, that is probably a sufficient restriction by itself.

Not sure I follow this though. I think CE and SS the way I have written prevent bows from used in melee unless you're ok with being at disadvantage and losing the bonus to damage. The only scenario you aren't at disadvantage is with a melee weapon/hand crossbow combo.

...and 2) if you restrict the disadvantage-negation to only the bonus action attack, you don't need to specify that the bonus action attack is triggered by melee weapons only.

This is because if you use a ranged weapon in the first scenario, you don't get the bonus action attack. (This makes the feat work just like RAW from a bow-user's perspective)

You do have to specify it, because 1) If its not mentioned, there is no RAW to allow a bonus action hand crossbow attack, and 2) I specifically mentioned melee attack and not just attack or one handed weapon so that you don't get hand crossbow attack + hand crossbow bonus attack each turn.

 

[CapnZapp]

First off, yes, we're in general agreement.

All that's left is for me to try one more time to make my argument "you don't need both restrictions, only one is truly necessary" come across

In other words, what we're talking about is: is it really necessary to enforce both restrictions:
1) you only get the bonus action hand crossbow attack when you wield a melee weapon in your main hand
2) the disadvantage-negation only applies to the bonus action attack, not all attacks

To convince me both are necessary, we must find a build that a) is abusive b) is only reined in by both 1+2 in effect. If there is no such build, I maintain you can and should choose 1 or 2, noth both.

To refresh: the main abuse case is the wholly ranged build that just keeps on shooting hand crossbow bolts even when in melee, totally unhindered. This is the 120 ft two-weapon shortswords build the RAW foolishly allows.

1) is simple. To gain the coveted bonus action extra attack, you simply must be a melee build, such as our desired "scimitar and hand crossbow" girl (pictured in this or another thread). Problem is thus solved, since the value of the feat is then restricted to melee only. If you stay at range, you could just as well use a bow and skip the feat.

With 2) you remain vulnerable to melee if you try the "one hand crossbow" build, since your main attack action attack(s) are at disadvantage. Again: mission accomplished - if you don't switch to "scimitar and hand crossbow", in which case the combo with Sharpshooter/Archery is suitably less useful, do can't escape the melee vulnerability for the minmax build (a crucial change compared to RAW).

With bows, you don't get the bonus action extra attack. That alone is a strike against the feat in the eyes of the power gamer (the only kind of gamer we're concerned about).

No longer is there a way to use a single hand crossbow in the way I described (twin 120 ft shortsword etc). You either become vulnerable to melee, or you switch to scimitar which can't use the expensive SS/Archery combo you've set up.

---

Under no scenario am I talking about removing the bonus attack itself, so when you say "You do have to specify it, because 1) If its not mentioned, there is no RAW to allow a bonus action hand crossbow attack" you've lost me.

As for 2) I don't see a need to restrict that in itself. Only the abusive case, which is the "melee insensitivity" where you can keep using SS/Archery even when surrounded by enemies.

At this point I really have nothing more to add, so please don't feel compelled to reply. Instead I wish you good luck with your houserule