Am I reading something wrong or is Tempest fighter just better?

[Lord Sessadore]

...

To find out lets examine five cases, a tempest fighter with two shortswords, a one handed fighter with a longsword and shield, a one handed fighter with a battleaxe and shield, a two handed fighter with a greatsword and a two handed fighter with a maul. Lets assume they're all wearing the best armor that takes advantage of their class features, and have the same abilitys scores (18 Str), lets further assume that they're all 1st level and are attacking the same first level soldier (AC 17). With these assumptions the defining elements are the proficiency bonus and base damage of their weapons, lets look at each case:

<snip>

Hmmm I guess you're right with PHB only weapons, the tempest fighter is balenced. I think other AV weapons might be a problem as well, not just the double weapons. Specifically anything with the defensive property since it allows the tempest fighter to match the AC of the sword and board fighter and the damage of the greatweapon fighter (this could be mitigated if the bonus from the defensive weapon property was rephrased as a shield bonus rather than an unnamed bonus).

Edit: As a point of reference here's what an Urgosh temest fighter would look like in the above comparison:

AC 18
Proficinecy bonus: +2
Total attack bonus: +7
Damage: Range 7-18, Average 12.5
Chance to hit the example soldier: 60%
Expected damage output: 7.5

Something you missed: Scale (+7 AC) plus a heavy shield (+2 AC and Ref) gives the sword-and-board and axe-and-board fighters an AC of 19, as well as a Reflex defense +2 higher than the others. That puts them ahead as a pure defender, both because their AC is ahead (albiet only by 1 point), but neither TWD or the Defensive weapon property grants a bonus to Reflex.

However, to properly compare the expected damage of a double-weapon tempest fighter to the other kinds of fighters, remember that all double weapons require a feat. So instead of comparing the Double Axe** user to normal martial weapons, you need to compare it to superior weapons (and since we're using double weapons, I'm going to use other weapons from AV too). Giving you something more like this (each fighter spends 1 feat on a Weapon Proficiency):

Tempest fighter with two Katar*
AC: 17
Proficiency bonus: +3
Total attack bonus: +8
Damage: Range 7-12, Average 9.5
Chance to hit the example soldier: 60% hit + 5% crit
Expected Damage output: 5.7 + 0.775 = 6.475

Fighter with Shield and Bastard Sword
AC: 19
Proficiency bonus: +3
Total attack bonus: +8
Damage: Range 5-14, Average 9.5
Chance to hit the example soldier: 60% hit + 5% crit
Expected damage output: 5.7 + 0.7 = 6.4

Fighter with Waraxe and Shield
AC: 19
Proficiency bonus: +2
Total attack bonus: +7
Damage: Range 5-16 Average 10.5
Chance to hit the example soldier: 55% + 5% crit
Expected damage output: 5.775 + 0.8 = 6.575

Fighter with Fullblade
AC: 17
Proficiency bonus: +3
Total attack bonus: +8
Damage: Range 5-16, Average 10.5
Chance to hit the example soldier: 60% hit + 5% crit
Expected damage output: 6.3 + 1.125 = 7.425

Fighter with Mordenkrad (superior 2h hammer)
AC: 17
Proficiency bonus: +2
Total attack bonus: +7
Damage: Range 8-16, Average 12
Chance to hit the example soldier: 55% hit + 5% crit
Expected damage output: 6.6 + 0.8 = 7.4

Fighter with Execution Axe
AC: 17
Proficiency bonus: +2
Total attack bonus: +7
Damage: Range 7-16, Average 11.5
Chance to hit example soldier: 55% hit + 5% crit
Expected damage output: 6.325 + 1.175 = 7.5

Tempest fighter with Double Axe (off-hand side)**
AC 18
Proficiency bonus: +2
Total attack bonus: +7
Damage: Range 7-16, Average 11.5
Chance to hit the example soldier: 55% hit + 5% crit
Expected damage output: 6.325 + 0.8 = 7.125

*Katar was the best I could find as an upgrade to short swords. The kukri in AV is still 1d6 and brutal 1, but only +2 prof, so I felt katar was a better comparison. In any case, I don't think the tempest fighter has good options for superior, off-hand weapons - same expected damage as normal fighter with a bastard sword, just slightly higher crits.
**Read WotC_Logan's post just before I posted, so I switched the ugrosh to a double axe, using the off-hand side (since that is now the highest damage off-hand weapon).

So, with Wotc_Logan's recent clarification as to the intent of double weapons, we see that using a double weapon puts the tempest fighter using a double weapon somewhere between a normal sword-and-board fighter and a normal 2h fighter. I think that's fair, don't you?

 

[Lord Sessadore]

Also, addressing Morgan_Scott's concern about the defensive weapon property: yes, it does allow tempest fighters to match a sword-and-board fighter's AC, but not his Reflex, and it will cost the tempest fighter two feats. By spending two feats, the sword-and-board fighter can similarly increase his AC and damage - take a superior weapon himself, putting his damage above the tempest fighter (as I showed above - if the Tempest fighter took a Defensive weapon his damage output could be lower yet), take Plate Proficiency for another point of AC.

You have to keep the cost of feats in mind all the time, because as common as they are, you don't get infinite feats. Sure, eventually the sword-and-board fighter runs out of defense boosting feats and the tempest fighter catches up (or nearly), but by then the sword-and-boarder is farther ahead in damage, or more flexible, or whatever. Feats aren't free, and that's an important consideration.

EDIT: I have been reminded that getting a defensive weapon only costs a tempest fighter ONE feat - TWD is free for tempest fighters. Everything else still stands, except that I should be talking about one feat instead of two. My bad.

 

[Logan_Bonner]

Thanks for the info Logan.

Can you provide any insight into why the change was made in the final draft? Your example above preserves the older logic of two different weapon with differing properties superglued together. The recent Customer service response that many people have been discussing implied that the double weapon was a single weapon and therefore all proporties applied to all attacks using the weapon. I think the former interpretation provides more clarity and is easier to understand. Can you help us understand the reason for the change?

I can't speak to why the change was made, only to the design intent. And it's a moot point for the final double sword, since both ends deal equal damage, on par with a rapier. I was just using that as an example of the formatting.

 

[Morgan_Scott82]

Hey Sessadore,

You're correct on all counts, I was aware of the feat investment in the double weapon, but since I added the double weapon comparison point as an edit after the fact, I didn't feel like running the numbers on a whole set of superior weapons. My main concern in the last analysis was to compare PHB weapon tempest fighters with other PHB weapon fighters, the urgosh comment was an afterthought. I ignored criticals out of laziness

I'm curious how you arrived at two feats for a tempest fighter to use defensive weapons to match the sword and board fighters AC? The only feat I see him needing is proficiency in the desired defensive weapon. Tempest fighters already get two weapon defense as a bonus feat.

I agree with your assertion that feats have to be taken into consideration and applied equally to both sides of a comparison when relevant, but my last post was more about PHB weapons in feat neutral builds.

 

[Katsue]

The double weapons originally had two different lines of text, like so:

Two-bladed sword    +3    d10    —    40 gp    15 lb.    Heavy blade
      (Off hand)    +3    d6                Light blade    Off-hand

It's best to think of them that way, with each end having different traits.

The Urgrosh is still like that, per the text in the weapon description. The double sword is probably the only really problematic weapon.

 

[Dominion]

The Urgrosh is still like that, per the text in the weapon description. The double sword is probably the only really problematic weapon.

Sadly, no, the Urgrosh's text doesn't clear it up at all. All it specifies is that one end does 1d12 and one does 1d8. The chart entry still implies that both ends are both a spear and an axe, which is the problematic part of the weapon.

Wotc_Logan's errata is good, but does bring up a strange question about the Doubel Sword. Was it intended to be a heavy blade on one end and a light blade on the other, even though both sides do equal damage, and the pictures generally depict the same size blade on both ends? Was that one actually intended to be both a heavy blade and a light blade on both sides?

If it is actually heavy on one end and light on the other, it's a terrible weapon. Rogues can only use half of it, and everyone else will generally want a matched pair of weapons for use with whatever weapon feats they have.

 

[deleteme123456]

Yeah, no way do I want 19 dex or whatever to get light blade mastery! 17 dex for heavy blade mastery is bad enough that most of the time I lean toward double axe... i'll give up the +1 to hit simply because deadly axe is candy and 17 con is nice for its own sake.

I've seen house rules that allow its wielder to choose either a light-blade or heavy-blade version, but not both simultaneously (choice made with the feat).

 

[Bayuer]

On the table on page 10 in AV there is cleary said that first end is a primary weapon and second is off-hand. Both ends don't have off-hand properity.

 

[deleteme123456]

I take that back, I will take 19 dex and high str (for heavy blade mastery) if I'm a stormwarden. Still that's going to hurt your wismod and con, and you probably have to play bugbear.

 

[Guyanthalas]

Sadly, no, the Urgrosh's text doesn't clear it up at all. All it specifies is that one end does 1d12 and one does 1d8. The chart entry still implies that both ends are both a spear and an axe, which is the problematic part of the weapon.

*SNIP*

On the table on page 10 in AV there is cleary said that first end is a primary weapon and second is off-hand. Both ends don't have off-hand properity.

Morgan_Scott and I discussed this extensivly last night. Bayuer is correct, page 10 shines a lot of light on the problem here. The text clearly reads:

...has a heavy axe head at one end (dealing d12 damage) and a sharp spear point at the base of the haft (dealing d8 damage)

Also, the side bar at the bottom details "offhand" much better

The first die given in the damage column of the table for a double weapon is for the primary (or main) end of the weapon; the second damage die is for the secondary (or off-hand) end. ...

If you use the Urgosh as a basline for how to read Double-Weapons (purely assumption based), it woudl appear that the "Lightblade" is the second half of the weapon as the light blade part is listed seperately, and therefor it is also the off-hand weapon. (Morgan_Scott disagrees with my assumption on this, his point being that we have no way to verify that this was the intent).

Quite frankly, I don't understand how something can be both light and heavy as they are clearly contradictory terms.

After I got done writing all of that, I realize that this thread is about tempest fighter and not dual weapons. Screw it, I want my point to be known.