D&D 5E Monk Weapon

[Guest 6801328]

Already tested the Kensai the revised one and that slight bump in damage was irrelevant compared to the normal monk it had no effect on the outcome of fights see 15% looks big but it impact on monster going down faster it had zero effect. Once again it had no bearing on the outcome of fights the damage increase was insignificant for the encounters we ran fights did not end any faster.

You tested at the table for a few fights, or you tested in a software simulation for tens of thousands of fights?

If the former then your perception on fight outcome is not reliable.

(This is mostly a commentary on your purported "testing" methodology. I agree that 0.5 dpr is not a big deal. As I noted above, I just want to avoid creating an unnecessary incentive for players who think 0.5 dpr is a big deal.)

re: Kensai
If the forthcoming Kensai is able to wield longswords (or other weapons) that will be a sub-class feature, which means it will be mutually exclusive with the abilities from other sub-classes, and thus have a cost. So it doesn't logically follow that because one sub-class will be able to use longswords it's ok for all sub-classes to use them, just because they are elves.

 

[hejtmane]

You tested at the table for a few fights, or you tested in a software simulation for tens of thousands of fights?

If the former then your perception on fight outcome is not reliable.

(This is mostly a commentary on your purported "testing" methodology. I agree that 0.5 dpr is not a big deal. As I noted above, I just want to avoid creating an unnecessary incentive for players who think 0.5 dpr is a big deal.)

re: Kensai
If the forthcoming Kensai is able to wield longswords (or other weapons) that will be a sub-class feature, which means it will be mutually exclusive with the abilities from other sub-classes, and thus have a cost. So it doesn't logically follow that because one sub-class will be able to use longswords it's ok for all sub-classes to use them, just because they are elves.

Please this is not rocket science math it is pretty straight forward if we do a 1000 swings the total damage would be more period end of story but we do not hit the same monster a 1000 times each monster has a finite # of HP so the net effect is smaller because the total # of swings is smaller to dispatch the monster. The more swings the bigger the difference hence we see this in video games already on the smaller creatures no one notices the small damage difference but when you do the big bag of HP that takes 100's of attacks it matters there is no difference.

 

[Hawk Diesel]

If they still choose long sword it was for the right reason.

Sorry, this might be a bit nitpicky, but this strikes me as assuming there's a right or wrong way to play D&D, and that bothers me a bit. There's nothing wrong with a player wanting to optimize or be good at something with regards to their character. Yes, allowing a monk to use a longsword as a monk weapon will improve their DPR. But as long as everyone is still having fun and the monk is not up-staging anyone, I don't see this as game-breaking.

 

[Coroc]

Nah this counts as an attempt at power gaming without aestethics (No offense intended that is just me ranting on one of my favorite Topics)

Give him a bow, that is Zen archery, give him short swords, that is ninja, or reskin a scimitar / shortsword as a ninja-to, use a sai or two of them, reskin them as shortswords but doing blunt damage.

But why, why does your monk have to wield

a) a medieval 1-1/2 hander (bastard sword) (this is what a longsword is by the numbers and the best historical approach)
b) an arming sword (this is what some Players think a Long sword is, when used in 1 Hand, and would look a bit clumsy on an elf)
c) a rapier like sword with a broader than usual blade so that it still can do reasonable slashing damage (This is what most players think an elven longsword looks like and would be fine for an elven fighter or rogue or even wizard maybe but for a monk? )

Give him 1- 2 sickles reskin them as moonblades to reflect the elven aspect, ahm i am out of ideas now

 

[hejtmane]

Nah this counts as an attempt at power gaming without aestethics (No offense intended that is just me ranting on one of my favorite Topics)

Give him a bow, that is Zen archery, give him short swords, that is ninja, or reskin a scimitar / shortsword as a ninja-to, use a sai or two of them, reskin them as shortswords but doing blunt damage.

But why, why does your monk have to wield

a) a medieval 1-1/2 hander (bastard sword) (this is what a longsword is by the numbers and the best historical approach)
b) an arming sword (this is what some Players think a Long sword is, when used in 1 Hand, and would look a bit clumsy on an elf)
c) a rapier like sword with a broader than usual blade so that it still can do reasonable slashing damage (This is what most players think an elven longsword looks like and would be fine for an elven fighter or rogue or even wizard maybe but for a monk? )

Give him 1- 2 sickles reskin them as moonblades to reflect the elven aspect, ahm i am out of ideas now

He is and elf that is their preferred weapon since what 1e. Last I looked this is a fantasy game not real life unless we have elf's running around. Plus the Chinese have a dao sword that is much like the long sword versitile if you are going Asian flavor. Then again we call sword names they never did and usually there were many different versions of the same named swords. At the end of the day it is a minor buff earlier that will not break the game.

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[DemoMonkey]

Give the character a longsword as a monk weapon but tell the player that the damage will be always based ONLY on the monk weapon damage table.

Player gets the aesthetics they want, zero mechanical impact over using any other weapon.

 

[Coroc]

[MENTION=6799371]hejtmane[/MENTION] I know that this is handled in that way since 1e. BUT back then a longsword was not versatile, and therefore much easyer to identify as a missnamed rapier / arming sword.

A Dao would be suitable, i agree on that one with you. I even do not care so much wether something does 1d8 or 1d6 it will not break anything ever.

What i do criticize in a very light way, is that i doubt OP choses the longsword because for elves that is a thing, because - if that is a reason - then, for Monk it is realy not a thing ever is a reason as well. That leaves me with the unproven suspicion he does it only for the .5 dpr Advantage, which i would not care so much about than for aesthetic.
Even if you create a fictive non-eastern style but western-style Monk then a Monk surely will not use the same weapon as a Knight, but rather humble things like a quarterstaff or reshaped peasant weapons. Hell, even a naginata, glaive or a flail would suffice. (I use 2 handed flails in my current game which do 2d4 and allow for reach and polearm master).
It is not preparing for the Boss raid in WoW but pen and paper in the end, with every freedom, ok also the freedom to do things differently, but lets say on my table someone wants to play the monk and wants to have a swordkind weapon doing 1d8 as a Monk weapon i would instantly houserule this somehow e.g. dao, ninjato, whatever fits the campaign mood, maybe a langes messer that sounds right to me for western-style Monk.

 

[hejtmane]

@hejtmane I know that this is handled in that way since 1e. BUT back then a longsword was not versatile, and therefore much easyer to identify as a missnamed rapier / arming sword.

A Dao would be suitable, i agree on that one with you. I even do not care so much wether something does 1d8 or 1d6 it will not break anything ever.

What i do criticize in a very light way, is that i doubt OP choses the longsword because for elves that is a thing, because - if that is a reason - then, for Monk it is realy not a thing ever is a reason as well. That leaves me with the unproven suspicion he does it only for the .5 dpr Advantage, which i would not care so much about than for aesthetic.
Even if you create a fictive non-eastern style but western-style Monk then a Monk surely will not use the same weapon as a Knight, but rather humble things like a quarterstaff or reshaped peasant weapons. Hell, even a naginata, glaive or a flail would suffice. (I use 2 handed flails in my current game which do 2d4 and allow for reach and polearm master).
It is not preparing for the Boss raid in WoW but pen and paper in the end, with every freedom, ok also the freedom to do things differently, but lets say on my table someone wants to play the monk and wants to have a swordkind weapon doing 1d8 as a Monk weapon i would instantly houserule this somehow e.g. dao, ninjato, whatever fits the campaign mood, maybe a langes messer that sounds right to me for western-style Monk.

True 1e weapon table was ridcliously large I loved a lot of it but parts of it was a pain (cough cough weapon speed factor) that is my one complaint of 5e is the simplistic weapon table. They did have the bastard sword

 

[Coroc]

[MENTION=6799371]hejtmane[/MENTION] yes i love the weapon table also, although i expand or Limit some things depending on the campaign flavor. It is easy enough to do and part of my DM fun in creating a consistent campaign world.
I only got two things i got Beef with in the 5 e table, one is that a quarterstaff does 1d8 and is usable 1 handed for 1d6 which instantly makes the quarterstaff a far superior weapon than a spear or a Club or a 2 handed Club and thats bs.
My Standard houserule here is 1d6 and usable only twohanded.
And the other thing is the longsword. I rename it bastard sword. A Player wants a 1 handed Version of it : he gets an arming sword. A Player wants an elf specific weapon: he gets either a rapier (1d8) or a moonblade (+1 weapon 1d4+1) but that depends on the type and compareble epoch of the campaign. It may have to do with my inner Picture of how an elf should look like and this is Slim a bit lighter and smaller than an average human, and that shouts rapier but not Long- aka bastardsword.
I agree on you with the stupid speed factors, in a real speed factor system the guy with the long heavy weapon attacks before the guy with the dagger who will attack last, because the tip of a two handed sword swung moves much faster than the tip of a dagger, and the guy wielding the dagger comes into vulnerable reach before he can do naught with his dagger.

 

[Guest 6801328]

Please this is not rocket science math it is pretty straight forward if we do a 1000 swings the total damage would be more period end of story but we do not hit the same monster a 1000 times each monster has a finite # of HP so the net effect is smaller because the total # of swings is smaller to dispatch the monster. The more swings the bigger the difference hence we see this in video games already on the smaller creatures no one notices the small damage difference but when you do the big bag of HP that takes 100's of attacks it matters there is no difference.

Yes, pretty simple math. But you started talking about "testing" and I was skeptical of the methodology you described, not the conclusion.