What makes Great Weapon Master and Sharpshooter so good?

[Caliban]

I am legitimately not trying to start any sort of flame war, but these two feats seem hyped way beyond anything I have seen at the table.

+10 damage is good, probably around doubling your damage on a hit (for argument's sake I am assuming 12 or 11 damage on a hit normally), but it comes with a 25% drop in accuracy. The math definitely works out as a net gain, if I hit 3/4 as often but do twice the damage it is definitely a win, but it hardly seems overwhelming.

When I see someone running it at the table it feels very swingy. They are less reliable than other fighter types but they have impressive numbers when they hit. They feel almost like a barbarian in a box but it is not amazing, especially since we play at low enough levels that it works out that anyone who isn't a variant human basically gave up the +2 increase on their primary stat to take it.

At my home game table it is another matter, we use flanking rules and I can count on one hand the number of times a PC has attacked without advantage. In cases like that the penalty is hardly noticeable.

Is everyone always attacking with advantage, or am I missing some other game changing aspect?

Big numbers = big fun

These feats give you big damage numbers. Therefore they are more fun than any other feat.

 

[BookBarbarian]

I personally find the other two abilities to be more problematic than the -5/+10, but to each their own.

I think this is true. Big damage just doesn't really screw up the game for me, especially at high level.

Even at lower level a single Sleep spell seemed to have more impact on putting down a baddies than GWM or SS.

 

[guachi]

Great Weapon Mastery, in a vacuum, is only a moderately powerful feat. Against creatures that have high HP and low AC, it's amazing, but otherwise you risk missing, which overall lowers your dpr.

It's an amazing feat against high AC low HP foes, too. Facing a hobgoblin as a level 2 variant human barbarian with GWM? Well, I guess I don't use the -5/+10 part but I will Reckless Attack to boost my hit chance from 40% to 64%. If you are raging and wielding a two-handed sword you'll one-shot kill the hobgoblin 72% of the time you hit. Hey, look! Free bonus action attack! Multiply your hit chance by your kill chance and you'll get an extra attack 46% of the time (and, therefore, boost your damage 46%). Though, your damage boost would be a little higher than 46% fighting an infinite amount of hobgoblins as any hobgoblin you didn't kill on the first hit you'd automatically kill on the second.

It's not like hobgoblins are rare creatures to fight. And a 46% damage boost not even using the part of the feat people find most objectionable is quite nice, don't you think?

Fighting a goblin the raging Barbarian will always kill if he hits as a goblin has 7 HP and that's the minimum damage our Barbarian can do. So he gets an extra attack as often as he hits, which in this case is just shy of 80%. An 80% damage boost is crazy.

A low level fighter/barbarian/Paladin with GWM steamrolls opponents at low level and you'd never have to use the -5/+10 portion. Heck, a battlemaster or Paladin can always add on extra damage just to ensure he gets enough damage to kill his opponent and get an extra attack.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

It is generally good in fights you would win anyway. So it speeds up the game. A blessing for the DM.

 

[CapnZapp]

It is generally good in fights you would win anyway. So it speeds up the game. A blessing for the DM.

The issue is intra-party balance.

Nobody has suggested it's a problem for DMs.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

The issue is intra-party balance.

Nobody has suggested it's a problem for DMs.

If everyone uses their buffs on the person with that feat, everyone contributes equally. I'd also claim that a wizard with fireball or a good hold person will easily contribute in as many fights as the gwm fighter. What is the problem with one person being good at what he does? And to shamelessly quote myself: it is only outpacing everything else in trivial fights. If you can do a gwm nova with all buffs activated there were also other methods of winning the fight.... and if there should be a fight were that was the only solution or you were lucky hitting more than you should it was a feat worth taking.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

If everyone uses their buffs on the person with that feat, everyone contributes equally. I'd also claim that a wizard with fireball or a good hold person will easily contribute in as many fights as the gwm fighter. What is the problem with one person being good at what he does?

The problem is when two characters ostensibly have the same niche, with the exception that one is better. Two damage-dealing fighters, where one has this feat and the other tries dual-wielding, is very much a case of one being strictly superior to the other.

And to shamelessly quote myself: it is only outpacing everything else in trivial fights.

It also outpaces everything else in difficult fights against monsters that have HP and damage-output, but low AC; which, because of bounded accuracy, is not uncommon beyond level 8 or so.

 

[pming]

Hiya!

I am legitimately not trying to start any sort of flame war, but these two feats seem hyped way beyond anything I have seen at the table.

+10 damage is good, probably around doubling your damage on a hit (for argument's sake I am assuming 12 or 11 damage on a hit normally), but it comes with a 25% drop in accuracy. The math definitely works out as a net gain, if I hit 3/4 as often but do twice the damage it is definitely a win, but it hardly seems overwhelming.

Full Disclosure: I don't allow Feats in my game (nor Multiclassing), and we play with PHB, DMG, MM. That's it.

Right. Two things I've harped on about "Feats", but these two and a few others in particular. Many don't agree with me, but that's par for the course really.

Number One: It's fine and dandy if the players roll 3d6, in order, and keep what you get (hard-core old school). As better and better odds rolling dice go, it gets worse and worse. Heaven help you if your DM uses point buy or some other "choose your stats" method. Why? Someone rolls and gets a 15 for Str, but only a 9 for Dex and a 12 for Con. Having GWM IS going to feel like a trade off. But if that player rolled well, or it's point buy/set group...now the player has high Str, Dex AND Con (e.g., all the important melee combat stats; and "high" I mean no less than 12, with 16, 18 or even 20 being likely for one of them). Next we assume the same sort of "PC Build" focusing for others in the group. We now have Wizards, Clerics, etc that have the same sort of "build focus". After an hour or two of play everyone is 2nd level, but the end of the second session everyone is probably 3rd. Assuming no "Alternate Human Option" was available at level 1, is is now that the PC's get their "Feats".

The Fighter takes GWM. He was at +6/+4 (Str 18, +2 for Prof). So when using GWM he drops to +1 th, but increases to +14 damage. "I only use it for big fights"...great...but at that point the Cleric slaps down a Bless and some other PC provides another bonus To Hit for the Fighter (maybe a bard, or a Druid using Faerry Fire or something). All it takes is a +1 or +2, with the Bless, and...POOF! That -5 To Hit penalty is removed completely...leaving the Fighter with no "real" drawback, and the gigantic bonus of adding +10 to damage.

That's why we found it borked. It was fine if the players didn't do anything to mitigate the -5 to hit; but the second they did...problem.

Number Two: It made PC's and NPC's extremely "same'ey". If you are a fighter, you take one of the "big ones" (GWM, PAM, SS, etc). If you don't, you WILL be at a disadvantage fighting pretty much any NPC fighter-type, because when you get right down to it, a guard being able to one-shot an uppity peasant with a single polearm thrust GREATLY outweighs the risk of trying to hit him two or three times before you get him. As a PC, you go from being able to last a couple rounds vs two Polearm wielding guards, to being skewered at round 1 because you just took +30 points of damage you wouldn't have otherwise taken. So...Feats didn't "expand and customize for interesting and unique PC's and NPC's"; it did the exact opposite. Two fighter's in the same group? If one of them takes GWM/PAM/SS/etc, then the other HAS TO...or he will, in comparison, "suck as a fighter". PC Fighter 1 = "I do +14 damage with my Polearm"...Fighter 2 = "I get +1 To Hit and +1 to Damage with my Polearm" (because F1 was "big damage brute", and F2 was "well-rounded combatant"). In a game where Hit Points from a large pool determines if you are dead or not...anything that boosts your ability to reduce that pool of Hit Points faster will win.

Anyway, that's my argument in a nutshell. Can Feats be used "well" in a campaign? Sure! I have no doubt. But the Players and the DM would have to "mitigate everything so nothing gets too overpowering". And if you get to that point, my question is: Why even use Feats at all then?

I've always thought that Feats were a cool idea...but VERY poorly implemented. They should have been more towards giving the PC's "more impressive...but less numbers". It's really hard to describe, but, for example, I think there should have been one Feat called "Weapon Expert" that gave at most +1th/+2dmg and the PC pics a single weapon. The Feat would mostly allow the user to do things "not normally done"; say, use a long sword as a blunt weapon but keep full damage, the PC would also be able to determine the quality of a long sword and would have a chance to identify a magical long sword, maybe the PC could also try and 'show off' or otherwise intimidate foes by, well, showing off with a cool flourish of swings, jumps, ducks and all that 'movie coolness' type thing. All those more "ephemeral" things that really would show that the PC is an actual expert at Long Swords.

So, uh, yeah. I don't like feats and find them detrimental to the type of campaign I enjoy running (and, apparently, the type of campaign my players enjoy playing).

^_^

Paul L. Ming

 

[UngeheuerLich]

The problem is when two characters ostensibly have the same niche, with the exception that one is better. Two damage-dealing fighters, where one has this feat and the other tries dual-wielding, is very much a case of one being strictly superior to the other.

It also outpaces everything else in difficult fights against monsters that have HP and damage-output, but low AC; which, because of bounded accuracy, is not uncommon beyond level 8 or so.

There are fights where it is like that and there are others. As a DM you should make sure there are both. In high level, it is easier to do a lot of damage, but it is also easier to not get in reach of the gwm fighter and to somehow mitigate the damage. I assume sharpshooter proves more problematic due to that high range. If 2 chars are going for the same niche and one is outpacing the other without having disadvantages somewhere else, one char is just built badly.
Imagine one took gwm and precise strike and the other exactly built fighter took trip attack and +2 dex instead. (Both already had 20 str).
One is looking stupidly at the flying monster. The other one takes out his bow and brings the monster down to earth with a cunning shot.
Now the gwm master fighter whacks on the prone enemy with advantage and -5/+10.
Guess who gets all the credits?
[MENTION=1742]TW[/MENTION]f: that is comparing apples with oranges.
Twf is not a good idea for pure fighters.

 

[Shiroiken]

It's an amazing feat against high AC low HP foes, too. Facing a hobgoblin as a level 2 variant human barbarian with GWM? Well, I guess I don't use the -5/+10 part but I will Reckless Attack to boost my hit chance from 40% to 64%. If you are raging and wielding a two-handed sword you'll one-shot kill the hobgoblin 72% of the time you hit. Hey, look! Free bonus action attack! Multiply your hit chance by your kill chance and you'll get an extra attack 46% of the time (and, therefore, boost your damage 46%). Though, your damage boost would be a little higher than 46% fighting an infinite amount of hobgoblins as any hobgoblin you didn't kill on the first hit you'd automatically kill on the second.

You missed the important part "in a vacuum," which is what the Low AC, High HP was referencing. Without any other aspects (like Reckless Attack) it's only an okay Feat: worth taking for those that use that style of weapon, but might not be worth +1 Str modifier. Many abilities, however, greatly improve the efficiency of GWM, which is part of the reason why many DM's hate it. Pretty much anything that can grant Advantage is huge, since it helps with both the -5/+10 and the Critical Hit Bonus Attack.