D&D 5E Making weapon choice matter

[Raith5]

So I come back to the question of: what is the goal in "making weapon choice matter"?

For me this kind of kind of thought is primarily about making the fighter (and other martial characters) more tactically interesting. I am not particularly interested in realism. I would rather link to to a class ability than a property of weapons. I just think that fighting styles for fighters and maneuvers should be more linked to weapons. In the right hands, a war hammers should push the target back 5 or 10 feet, swords should be able to parry, two handed weapons cleave, etc

 

[FieserMoep]

Thing is: Maneuvers are NOT linked to weapons but the class. So it is even better - every weapon works just fine with them.
So when you change the weapons, do you also intend to overhaul the fighter?
With battle master he has plenty of tactical opportunity and once you got the magic weapon X you most likely ignore all the other weapons anyway unless they are magic too.
Then on top of that you have your Feats, think of them what you want but they do a decent job to flesh out the build for at least polearms, shields, great weapons and crossbows and bows.

 

[Ath-kethin]

I've actually been kicking around the idea of making weapon choice matter less. My thought is to use a class's Hit Die as it's damage die, regardless of the weapon used. That way, a person whose entire life involves the use and mastery of weapons (say, a fighter) will always deal more damage than some who learns a handful of basic self-defense techniques (say, a wizard). And that way you can have a fighter who only uses daggers (which is a cool visual) and they're still more effective than a wizard who for whatever reason uses a longsword.

I'm still working out the details (weapon special properties and how they'd apply, for example) but I like the general idea.

 

[ART!]

I've actually been kicking around the idea of making weapon choice matter less. My thought is to use a class's Hit Die as it's damage die, regardless of the weapon used. That way, a person whose entire life involves the use and mastery of weapons (say, a fighter) will always deal more damage than some who learns a handful of basic self-defense techniques (say, a wizard). And that way you can have a fighter who only uses daggers (which is a cool visual) and they're still more effective than a wizard who for whatever reason uses a longsword.

I'm still working out the details (weapon special properties and how they'd apply, for example) but I like the general idea.

I'm super intrigued by this, so I'd love to see what you come up with. I don't know 5E deeply enough to know if this would unbalance things, though.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-J320A using EN World mobile app

 

[FieserMoep]

How do you intend to balance this agains a monk for example. Is a bare fist fighter not Allied then or are improvised weapons always worse. What does the monk get in return? Also keep in mind that you may delay the developement of a class in a severe way if you link it to level anyway formartial classes are supossed to get their d12 early. Do all the weaüons get stuff like finesse or reach?

 

[pming]

Hiya!

I suggest using something similar to the Master Box Set 4 for BECMI. It introduced "Weapon Mastery". Each weapon in the game was given an entry. There were 5 ranks of Weapon Mastery ("WM"), plus the default 'unskilled': Unskilled, Basic, Skilled, Expert, Master, Grand Master. Fighters, Magic-Users, Clerics and Thieves each start with 2 weapons that they can use at Basic. Demi-humans (Elves, Dwarves and Halflings) know how to use all of their races weapons at Basic.

Anyway, as you advance in level, you have every 4th level (4th, 8th, 12th, 16th, etc) to get a new WM. You would need to find someone who can train you in that particular weapon, and they have to be at least as good as you (preferably MUCH better), you pay them money, you train for a number of weeks, and, based on your mastery level to theirs, you have a set chance to see if you 'got it'. Failure and you can do it again, but at half the cost, iirc, and with a bonus to your chance.

So, what do WM's do for you? Simply put, each weapon has a LOT more statistics. Of course the damage done with the weapon increases, as well as the to-hit roll. You also can try and "intimidate/demoralize" intelligent opponents if you are REALLY good (e.g., you kill a hardened criminal with a metal tea cup...then you put a tin can opener down on a rock and look at the other thugs...). Each weapon also has some special 'move' you can use it for: Daggers get double damage on a natural high-roll (20, down to 17-20 at Grand Master), some can Stun, some can Deflect blows that would have hit otherwise, etc. Additionally each weapon has a modifier to YOUR AC when people and/or creatures are fighting against you. Some weapons aren't good for this...like a 2-handed sword, but others are great...like a Staff or Net.

No matter how you slice it, WM rules from BECMI do add a lot of flavour to individual weapons and to how they are seen/portrayed in the campaign world.

^_^

Paul L. Ming

 

[Sunseeker]

For me this kind of kind of thought is primarily about making the fighter (and other martial characters) more tactically interesting. I am not particularly interested in realism. I would rather link to to a class ability than a property of weapons. I just think that fighting styles for fighters and maneuvers should be more linked to weapons. In the right hands, a war hammers should push the target back 5 or 10 feet, swords should be able to parry, two handed weapons cleave, etc

And I'm fine with carrot over stick incentives. For example, I remember when in World of Warcraft, in order to be "good" with a weapon you had to use it. Every weapon had a skill and using it on enemies that were a challenge (usually +/-5 your own level) increased this skill. It didn't really add anything to the game, especially when the best weapons to use at any given level (or max level) were essentially "random loot" they could be swords, maces, axes, hammers, all sorts of things depending on what stats they had. It could be incredibly inconvenient to have spent most of the game playing with say, swords and axes, only to find out that you really should have been playing with maces and daggers. (or something to that end).

It was a largely inconvenient system that the devs included for little reason other than to simulate the idea that you had to "train" with your weapon to be any good with it, and by "any good with it" I mean use it at all. The system was eventually removed because they realized that "random loot" plus "weapon training" was pretty annoying.

Frankly, I HATE, with the fiery passion of a thousand suns HATE people who want to punish the fighter by simulating "realism" with some of the most mundane trivialities they can imagine.

I proposed a system in the other thread that rewards choosing a specific weapon, instead of punishes for simply having a class feature fighters have always had. It even gets them past needing to use magic weapons, or at least always having to look for the "better weapon" as they level up.

I think rewarding weapon specialization with interesting features would be a great way to go, instead of simply punishing the fighter for existing in a non-reality-based-system.

 

[Ganymede81]

There should be Reach weapons for each of d4, d6, d8, d10, d12, and 2d6.

Does the Reach property even need to be a thing? Wouldn't extended reach be better left to class features?

 

[Bacon Bits]

I've actually been kicking around the idea of making weapon choice matter less. My thought is to use a class's Hit Die as it's damage die, regardless of the weapon used. That way, a person whose entire life involves the use and mastery of weapons (say, a fighter) will always deal more damage than some who learns a handful of basic self-defense techniques (say, a wizard). And that way you can have a fighter who only uses daggers (which is a cool visual) and they're still more effective than a wizard who for whatever reason uses a longsword.

I'm still working out the details (weapon special properties and how they'd apply, for example) but I like the general idea.

Hm. Should be pretty simple:

Type
Simple -1 die, max die +0
Martial +0 die, max die +2

Mods:
Finesse -1 die, no Versatile, no Two-Handed
Light +0 die, no Versatile, no Two-Handed
Versatile +1 die when used two-handed, no two-handed, no light, no finesse
Two handed +1 die no light, no versatile, no finesse, no thrown
Heavy +1 die, Two-Handed only
Reach -1 die if two-handed or versatile, -2 die if light or finesse
Thrown +0 die no two-handed, range 20/60
Ammunition -1 die, no melee mods (Versatile, Finesse, and Reach), no melee attack, range 80/320 simple or 150/600 martial
Loading +1 die, max die +1, Ammunition only

Max die size 2d6
Min die size 1d4


It'd be interesting if spells could be made to do the same thing, but I think you run into the problem of Clerics and Druids suddenly doing more damage than Wizards. I think Wizards/Sorcs would need more dice inherent in their spells.

 

[GMMichael]

I've actually been kicking around the idea of making weapon choice matter less. My thought is to use a class's Hit Die as it's damage die, regardless of the weapon used.

Did you mean "making weapon choice matter less mechanically?" Because taking away both fluff and rules from weapons pretty much just leaves: is your character armed?

I don't see why weapon choice can't have a significant fluff-to-story impact. Say you have a hand axe, mace, and quarterstaff, all dealing d6 damage. The mace and quarterstaff are completely useless for preparing firewood. The quarterstaff is piss-poor in cramped conditions, however it is a much better candidate for reaching through the mysterious hole than the hand axe or the mace. The mace will beat the other weapons at punishing full-suit armored opponents, although it is the most likely to make you sink if you fall in some deep water. . . do I need to go on?