D&D 5E 5e Fighters, two-weapon fighting and extra attacks

[GafferGamgee]

Hello, I am new to 5e and I have been playing D&D5e since July. (note: I am really not that new to D&D... played it as a teenager.)

I created a fighter to begin with, to get into an Adventurers League game quickly. Things have gone well. I chose to take the two-weapon fighting style. This is a style choice for any Fighter. This allows you add your ability (STR or DEX) modifier to the damage of the off-hand attack. Otherwise, you may fight with two weapons, Secondly, I chose the dual-wielder feat to be able to use two larger one-handed weapons at the same time.

Two-weapon fighting is open to all characters. The PHB page 195, says "you can use a bonus action to attack with another light melee weapon." There is no added damage modifier to the off-hand attack. This section does not say anything about being penalized to hit with the off-hand weapon. Thankfully, then, the attack rolls have the same exact rules.

At low levels (below level 5) my fighter could do either do two attack rolls, -or- one attack roll for dominant hand plus a bonus action, such as second wind. Here is how I think action surge works. (Correct me if I am wrong.) If I action-surged, then my fighter could do three attack rolls, that is, two rolls as normal, plus the third attack roll by my dominant-hand weapon.

Now, above level 5, things get more confusing. The extra attack feature (described in the PHB page 72) says "you can attack twice, instead of once, whenever you take the attack action on your turn. " So, does my fighter roll 4 times, that is, two rolls for each hand? Does my fighter roll 3 times, that is, twice for my dominant hand, and once for my off-hand?

Second question. Does action surge give my fighter two more attacks above the normal? (normal being defined as whatever the correct number is. See the last paragraph.)

Next. I have chosen Battlemaster as my archetype. Now, Battlemaster allows for 16 specialty moves. (Each fighter has to pick 3 specialty moves at low levels.) How do the two-weapon fighting feature and extra attack features affect the specialty moves? (Persons who could comprehensively answer this question are officially super-smart.)

Next question. Can I use a dash to move 60 ft (2*30ft) and then use an action surge to do an attack (or two)? Can I dash and do a second wind?

 

[Leatherhead]

At level 5, when you use Action Surge, you can attack up to 5 times: 4 times with your main-hand weapon (two full attack actions) and one Bonus Action Attack with your off-hand weapon.
At level 5, when you don't use Action Surge, you can attack up to 3 times: 2 times with your main-hand, and once with your off-hand from the Bonus Action Attack

You only get one Bonus Action per turn, even if you use Action Surge.

Every Battlemaster Maneuver has a specific time when you can use it. For many of the powers, this happens when you hit with a Weapon Attack. Which means you can do it for both your normal Attacks, or Bonus Action Attacks.

If you are going nova at level 5, using longswords, 16 STR, and using Menacing Attack (for example):

You have 5 attacks, 4 main-hand, one off-hand. Every attack that lands deals 1d8(weapon)+1d8(Superiority dice, up to 4 times)+3(str).

Can I use a dash to move 60 ft (2*30ft) and then use an action surge to do an attack (or two)?

Yes. You can also use your Bonus Action to do whatever else, including Attacking with your off-hand.

Can I dash and do a second wind?

Yes. Second Wind uses the Bonus Action, not a normal Action. You can use Second Wind with everything except your off-hand Attack.

 

[Xeviat]

From 1st to 4th, you get to attack once with either as an action and once with your off-hand as a bonus action. From 5th to 10th, you can attack twice with either as an action and once with your off-hand as a bonus action.

Action Surge doesn't give you another bonus action, so you only get to attack once (twice, thrice, ... quadrice?) with an action surge.

Battle master special attacks have many "on hit" no action abilities. A few are reactions. A few are bonus actions, and one or two are actions. The "on hit" ones meld with TWFing the best; your individual attacks are weaker, so reactions are less useful, and you don't want to lose your bonus action.

You can dash and move to move 60 ft and then action surge for one attack or a second wind, as both are actions.

 

[pdegan2814]

Hello, I am new to 5e and I have been playing D&D5e since July. (note: I am really not that new to D&D... played it as a teenager.)

I created a fighter to begin with, to get into an Adventurers League game quickly. Things have gone well. I chose to take the two-weapon fighting style. This is a style choice for any Fighter. This allows you add your ability (STR or DEX) modifier to the damage of the off-hand attack. Otherwise, you may fight with two weapons, Secondly, I chose the dual-wielder feat to be able to use two larger one-handed weapons at the same time.

Two-weapon fighting is open to all characters. The PHB page 195, says "you can use a bonus action to attack with another light melee weapon." There is no added damage modifier to the off-hand attack. This section does not say anything about being penalized to hit with the off-hand weapon. Thankfully, then, the attack rolls have the same exact rules.

At low levels (below level 5) my fighter could do either do two attack rolls, -or- one attack roll for dominant hand plus a bonus action, such as second wind. Here is how I think action surge works. (Correct me if I am wrong.) If I action-surged, then my fighter could do three attack rolls, that is, two rolls as normal, plus the third attack roll by my dominant-hand weapon.

Now, above level 5, things get more confusing. The extra attack feature (described in the PHB page 72) says "you can attack twice, instead of once, whenever you take the attack action on your turn. " So, does my fighter roll 4 times, that is, two rolls for each hand? Does my fighter roll 3 times, that is, twice for my dominant hand, and once for my off-hand?

Second question. Does action surge give my fighter two more attacks above the normal? (normal being defined as whatever the correct number is. See the last paragraph.)

Next. I have chosen Battlemaster as my archetype. Now, Battlemaster allows for 16 specialty moves. (Each fighter has to pick 3 specialty moves at low levels.) How do the two-weapon fighting feature and extra attack features affect the specialty moves? (Persons who could comprehensively answer this question are officially super-smart.)

Next question. Can I use a dash to move 60 ft (2*30ft) and then use an action surge to do an attack (or two)? Can I dash and do a second wind?

Your turn in combat consists of three main "phases": your Move, Action & Bonus Action. Your Move can actually be split up during the other phases, meaning if you have multiple attacks you can move, attack, move, attack, provided you don't exceed your total movement rate for the turn. For your Action, you have numerous types of Actions you can choose to take, such as: Hide, Disengage, Dash, Attack, Help, etc. And then for your Bonus Action you can do things like attack with an offhand weapon or do other things that are classified as "bonus actions". The Fighter's "Action Surge" ability simply gives them an extra "Action" phase during that turn(and at Level 17, they can use it twice between rests, but you can't use both of them on a single turn). They can use that Action phase to take any of the Actions they're normally able to take. So if you're having trouble keeping track of things, start by breaking your turn down into those phases. And remember that the "Extra Attack" ability granted to the martial classes like Fighter does not grant you an extra Attack action, it says that when you take the Attack action, you can attack more than once. So, let's look at how this works at the key milestones:

Lvl 1 - 1 attack from Attack action, 1 off-hand attack from Bonus Action
Lvl 2 - 1 attack from Attack action, 1 off-hand attack from Bonus Action, 1 attack from 2nd Attack action w/ Action Surge
Lvl 5 - 2 attacks from Attack action, 1 off-hand attack from Bonus Action, 2 attacks from 2nd Attack action w/ Action Surge
Lvl 11 - 3 attacks from Attack action, 1 off-hand attack from Bonus Action, 3 attacks from 2nd Attack action w/ Action Surge
Lvl 20 - 4 attacks from Attack action, 1 off-hand attack from Bonus Action, 4 attacks from 2nd Attack action w/ Action Surge

And remember, during any of these turns, you can scatter your movement in between each of those attacks, working your way across the battlefield. Just remember that moving past enemies may trigger attacks of opportunity against you. You might be better off standing in one spot and wailing on one guy. Or standing between two guys and slashing back & forth. Leave the hippity-hopping across the battlefield to the Rogue. Also, remember that any of those Attack actions can be substituted for a different action choice. You could Attack, off-hand attack, then Action Surge to Disengage and move away without triggering an attack of opportunity(all the while grumbling about the Rogue being able to Disengage on his Bonus Action every turn, because he's sneaky that way).

As you can see, two-weapon fighting doesn't scale terribly well, but it's still a perfectly valid option. Since you took two-weapon fighting as your style, your off-hand attacks will roll the same as your main hand, so you can probably arrange with the DM to balance your multi-attack rounds more between your two hands if you want. This may become useful down the stretch if you happen to pick up a pair of magic swords with effects that trigger on a hit, you'll want to make sure the off-hand weapon's effect gets plenty of chances to trigger.

With regard to the Battlemaster's maneuvers, just pay close attention to what it says the cost of each maneuver is and when you can use it. If it says "when you hit with a weapon attack", that means you use the maneuver when you land the hit, not when you make the attack roll. And it works for any of your weapon attacks. They could be during your Attack action, Bonus Action off-hand attacks, or attacks of opportunity during your reaction. Some maneuvers say they only trigger during a specific phase of a turn, such as when you take an Attack action, or when you are damaged by a melee attack. If the wording for the maneuver doesn't include a restriction, don't assume one. Give it a shot, the worst that can happen is your DM will say "you can't use that now" and you can get them to explain why. Since you want to be using your Bonus Action for your off-hand attacks whenever possible, I would probably give lower priority to maneuvers that require you to use your Bonus Action(like Feinting Attack & Rally). Choices like Distracting Strike, Riposte and Precision Attack might be good ones to start with as they don't rely on your Maneuver Save DC(which won't yet be as high as it will get later as your stats improve), and don't require you to burn a Bonus Action or an attack. Distracting Strike will grant advantage to your party's next shot at that target, Riposte gives you a free attack against anyone who misses you with their attack, and Precision Strike is a straight up to-hit bonus that you can decide to apply before or after seeing what you rolled for the attack(but before learning whether it hit or missed). If you intend to be a tank, taking the brunt of the enemy's assault, Goading Attack is one you'll definitely want at some point, since it causes the enemy to take a penalty unless it attacks you for a around. And when you start getting multiple attacks per turn, look into Trip Attack. If you can knock the guy prone with your first strike, the rest of your attacks that turn will be at advantage, before he even has a chance to get back up. Obviously these maneuvers have other uses depending on how you coordinate with your party(my sneaky archer is likely going to take Goading Attack and Trip Attack pretty early, for example), but those are some basics to start with that don't require too much planning.

Yes, you can absolutely Dash, Action Surge, then Attack. Action Surge simply lets you take a 2nd Action that turn, it doesn't matter what your first Action was, or what your 2nd Action will be. You could even Dash again if you REALLY wanted to cover a lot of ground. And yes, with or without Action Surge, you can Dash and then do Second Wind. Second Wind uses your Bonus Action. So keep in mind if you wanted to use Second Wind on a turn where you took an Attack action, you would have to forego your off-hand attack, since you only get one Bonus Action per turn even with Action Surge. Abilities that are Bonus Actions cannot be done in a regular Action "slot", they can only be done as your Bonus Action.

 

[Xeviat]

I'm seeking to buff twfing for the fighter. Even with up to +3 weapons, twfing falls behind gwfing in damage right at level 5 (due to action surge). Maybe on hit magic weapons boost it enough.

From levels 1 to 4, twfing is damage King.

 

[pdegan2814]

I'm seeking to buff twfing for the fighter. Even with up to +3 weapons, twfing falls behind gwfing in damage right at level 5 (due to action surge). Maybe on hit magic weapons boost it enough.

From levels 1 to 4, twfing is damage King.

This is where I think they dropped the ball on the Dual-Wielder feat, it just doesn't do much. I would've loved to see some kind of option to allow for a dual-weapon strike with both light weapons at the same time(I wouldn't allow it with longsword-sized weapons, probably), maybe allow that as one regular attack per Attack action(the physicality of it seems too awkward for multiple strikes per Attack action). And I would rule that the attack roll would be made using the lower to-hit modifier of the two weapons, just to keep it simple. Perhaps even some variant of the Sharpshooter/GWM trade-off, but less severe. -2 to-hit for +5 damage on the dual-strike attack in addition to each weapon's usual damage rolls, that sort of thing? The full -5/+10 seems a bit much for light weapons, but then again you can get it with a single arrow using Sharpshooter...

 

[Xeviat]

It could have been fixed if gwfing were done differently. 2d6+str is equal to 1d6+str+1d6 after all. I'm not saying we should buff gwfing so we can buff twfing, but duelist does more damage than twfing eventually and it has +2 AC and no feat requirement.

 

[Jefe Bergenstein]

I'm seeking to buff twfing for the fighter. Even with up to +3 weapons, twfing falls behind gwfing in damage right at level 5 (due to action surge). Maybe on hit magic weapons boost it enough.

From levels 1 to 4, twfing is damage King.

Move the additional attack to the attack action if they take the feat or the fighting style. So on an action surge round, you get two extra attacks from TWF. This frees the TWF guy's bonus action as well. I consider it a mandatory fix for melee rangers.

 

[Xeviat]

Good fix. I'll check it out

 

[aramis erak]

It should be noted that Handedness isn't part of the 5E rules. Let's assume Joe Norm'l is a TWF... and uses light hammer and scimitar.

Why does this lack of handedness matter? Put Joe in a fight with 2 skeletons (vulnerable to bludgeoning) and a paper tiger (vulnerable to slashing). If he is engaged with a skeleton, he wants the blunt weapon twice, and the slashing only once. If he's engaged with the paper tiger, he wants to slash twice, and bludgeon once.