WELL if we're brainstorming, how about this.
TWO-WEAPON FIGHTING
If you have a light weapon in each hand, then any time you attack with one weapon and miss, you can attack with the other weapon. If the second attack misses, you don't get to attack again with the first weapon.
BAM. Simple to implement, useful for rogues (more chances to sneak attack), scales with Extra Attack, etc. (SPOILER: It's pretty much the same as advantage, but better because it stacks with it -- the downside is the smaller damage die.)
Dual-Wielder feat can still do what it does now. Two-Weapon Fighting Style... that, I'm not so sure about.
Yours vs mine.... hmm...
Two-weapon fighting
Fighting with two light weapons you are able to effectively attack and defend in melee switching roles between the two weapons. As a result when you are fighting only one opponent in melee, you gain +2 AC vs Melee attacks only and you make your standard attacks with advantage. When you make a hit you may choose which weapon does the damage"
- Both are pretty simple
- Both have the idea of attacking with both weapons at the same time
- Both make the off-hand weapon actually useful and significant more than just 1 attack (Dagger of Venom and Rapier etc.)
- Both allow the possibly of increasing damage to a point of usefulness by increasing opportunity to hit
- I also can don't see any need to change the two-weapon fighting style or Dual-Wielder feat for either design
So at first glance they are both an improvement over the current version and Mearl's version with that alone, at least in my opinion for what ever that is worth.
- Yours does not recognize the melee deficiency (
which might not be all that important but in actual usage
vs melee opponents is not inferior to a sword and shield.)
- Yours does not recognize the limitations of this style vs multiple opponents. The lower AC could represent the inability to use the shorter weapons as shields to maintain your defense against longer weapons or sword and shield while facing two enemies dividing the weapons so that they are only defense or offense against each opponent.
- Mine requires you to keep track of a second AC for melee which is perhaps something else for players to track. (its not supper hard though and giving disadvantage attackers fighting melee alone would also remove rogues sneak attack... which might not be a bad niche... possibly a better salutation but it may be too strong against things like Great weapon Master because disadvantage is almost a +5AC)
- It does not stack with advantage from other sources (I am not sure this is a bad thing. my design does not give advantage all the time so many times it will still be useful to get it from other sources. The only real problem I see here is that it gives rogue easy access to backstab when fighting alone but I am not really opposed to that either.)
- Perhaps the one true flaw with mine over yours is Rangers. They would only get two attacks with advantage and that means the weak melee "Hunter's mark builds" are not improved by the change where yours would provide up to 4 and would make a difference. I do think this could be help with a ranger specific fix, rule, or spell.
I think they are pretty close but I tend to like mine better because I like the "duelist" niche it creates a little better and I don't under stand the point of "If the second attack misses, you don't get to attack again with the first weapon." unless you just don't like fighters but I WANT fighters to use this just to mix up the Archer, Sword and Shield, Great weapon Master, Polearm Master builds with another viable option and it really makes it too risky for them to want to use. Maybe you get 10 attack maybe you get 2. With mine the still only get 5 attacks but they are more likely to hit with them in melee against one opponent which is controllable.