D&D (2024) 4/26 Playtest: The Fighter

[Neonchameleon]

I disagree. First, Graze does scale as your ability mod goes up. Sure some of them only give an extra attack, but your attack damage goes up with level, and you often get extra riders and things from magic weapons, so again that 1 attack is more powerful than they were before.

Graze scales extremely badly, moving from 3 damage per missed attack at L1 to 5 at L8 and stopping there. It won't take damage riders from your magic weapon and most of your other riders require an attack. And to hit outscales AC in 5e.

You may be thinking of Cleave? Which does take magic weapon damage bonuses and other damage bonuses like your feats and fighting style.

 

[Stalker0]

Graze scales extremely badly, moving from 3 damage per missed attack at L1 to 5 at L8 and stopping there. It won't take damage riders from your magic weapon and most of your other riders require an attack. And to hit outscales AC in 5e.

While true, you have to remember that.... fighter damage doesn't really scale anyway. You get your fighting style and ability mod.....and unless your getting a magic weapon, that's about it. The fighter scales purely on more attacks rather than bigger damage per attack.

Now the barb I could see a bit more, as with advantage on all attacks and a lot of extra damage on crits, barbs are unlikely to feel that bit of miss damage and might prefer cleave over graze.

Now I do think its reasonable to let the bonus from magic weapons also apply to the graze damage, seems perfectly fine to me, but otherwise the damge doesn't scale.....because the attack damage doesn't scale.

 

[Neonchameleon]

While true, you have to remember that.... fighter damage doesn't really scale anyway. You get your fighting style and ability mod.....and unless your getting a magic weapon, that's about it. The fighter scales purely on more attacks rather than bigger damage per attack.

This was more or less true in 5e but is a lot less true in OneD&D in the level 1-10 range where 90% of games are played. In that 1-10 range the fighter almost invariably moves to Str 18 at level 4, 19 at level 5, and 20 at level 8 in addition to gaining damage causing feats at those same points while you didn't get this in 5e unless you gave up feats. You're probably also at a minimum moving from a +0 to a +2 weapon for a further +2. And there are more feats that are worth taking that do damage adds, like Charger or the new GWM.

Now after level 10 I agree they scale based on more attacks but even that's not as extreme. There is not one single fighter class feature in the 5e PHB from levels 12-19 that isn't a duplicate of a previous ability or a choice of ability that wasn't good enough to pick earlier. This was a major problem with the concept of the fighter in classic 5e.

 

[Incenjucar]

Fighters could really use something like the warlock invocations to unlock stronger abilities later on.

 

[Asisreo]

Problem with that is dnd almost always rewards depth over breadth, unless the breadth is for a reallly niche ability that is only needed once in a blue moon, but is great when you need it (which is why Wizard spellbook can be so useful).

The wizard is almost exclusively breadth over depth

 

[GMforPowergamers]

Fighters could really use something like the warlock invocations to unlock stronger abilities later on.

all classes could be rebuilt like the 2014 warlock and be better for it.

 

[mellored]

I would like fighters to have a choice between breadth, depth, and flexibility. Golf bag should be an option, modify should be an option, and focus (push 20'!) should be an option.

Fighters can push 20'. Just hit twice.
Push 40' at higher levels, 80' with action surge.

Or you can prone, cleave, slow, push all in one turn.

More attacks -> more options.

 

[codo]

Graze scales extremely badly, moving from 3 damage per missed attack at L1 to 5 at L8 and stopping there. It won't take damage riders from your magic weapon and most of your other riders require an attack. And to hit outscales AC in 5e.

You may be thinking of Cleave? Which does take magic weapon damage bonuses and other damage bonuses like your feats and fighting style.

Graze scales with more attacks. At level 1 if all attacks miss it does 3 damage. At level 5 if all attacks miss, it does 10 damage. At level 11, if all attacks miss it does 15 damage. At level level 17, if all attacks miss is does 20 damage.

Weapon mastery might not scale on each attack, but it does scale by being applied more than once a turn.

 

[Incenjucar]

Fighters can push 20'. Just hit twice.
Push 40' at higher levels, 80' with action surge.

Or you can prone, cleave, slow, push all in one turn.

More attacks -> more options.

I obviously meant with one hit.

A fighter that can hit 20' in one go can hit four targets and push each of them 20' away.

 

[mellored]

There is not one single fighter class feature in the 5e PHB from levels 12-19 that isn't a duplicate of a previous ability or a choice of ability that wasn't good enough to pick earlier. This was a major problem with the concept of the fighter in classic 5e.

Survivor would disagree.

But it's also just been true for fighter in nearly every edition. They hit with a weapon at level one, and hit with a weapon at level 20.