Balancing Two-Weapon fighting

Zarrok

First Post
Would changing Two-Weapon Fighting to this:

Off-hand weapon is light and
Two-Weapon Fighting feat +0 +0

make it more balanced against using a two-handed weapon with power attack?
 

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Would changing Two-Weapon Fighting to this:

Off-hand weapon is light and
Two-Weapon Fighting feat +0 +0

make it more balanced against using a two-handed weapon with power attack?

TWF has problems that are multiple when compared to S&B or THF. If you want to address the problem, you have to answer a couple of questions:

1) How many feats should be required to make it equal to THF in damage?

2) How many feats should be required to make it equal to S&B at defense?

3) In doing either #1 or #2, do you make it open for exploitation?

Right now, I don't know that you can even make it equal to THF unless you have special circumstances e.g. a rogue with lots of sneak attack damage and bonus weapon damage. But that's the problem. If you make it so TWF is just as good as S&B or THF, it's probably going to be overpowered for certain builds. You'd have to do something like nerf Sneak Attack or powers like it. Ask yourself if D&D is more believable where Conan does the most damage or where Cat Woman does the most damage?

That having been said, if I were going to make TWF playable for Rangers, I would give Rangers/Fighters Two-Weapon Defense as part of TWF. I'd also change Weapon Finesse for Rangers/Fighters to apply to all weapons and modify To Hit and Damage bonus regardless of the weapon type.

D&D, for reasons not entirely clear, really screws over Dex based Fighter/Ranger builds. Better armors reduce Dex benefit and there are numerous conditions where you lose your Dex bonus, but almost none where you lose your Strength bonus or Armor bonus

Note that I don't think Non-Fighter classes need these benefits. Rogues already get tons of versatility and abilities. Making them the equal of Fighters for damage is fundamentally flawed since nothing allows Fighters to replace Rogues with regard to skills.
 

What I'm going for is a patch of sorts not absolute balance. Sweeten the pot a little s.t.s.

Dandu is it to little to leave that to another feat?

Arrowhawk surely just the fix above wouldn't make the rogue o.p.?
 

1st: delete improved TWF/greater TWF, you get iterative attacks with off hand automatic.

2nd: oversized TWF gives full str mod for offhand attack along with reducing penalty for 2 medium weapons.

3rd: as standard action you can make both attacks, same with a charge.

4th; haste, rapid shot(in case of throwing TWF builds) give extra attack on both hands.


But with all this, first time you meet a creature with DR 5 not to mention more you're still going to be little incompetent brother to your THW raging barbarian buddy :rant:
 

What I'm going for is a patch of sorts not absolute balance. Sweeten the pot a little s.t.s.

Dandu is it to little to leave that to another feat?

Arrowhawk surely just the fix above wouldn't make the rogue o.p.?

First, there is no such thing as absolute balance. The most one could do is determine average effectiveness i.e. given all the possible combat scenarios, which style is most robust? The problem with D&D is that you absolutely have to determine the extremes. You have to consider what a player who is looking to break the system can do with any changes to the rules. It's far worse to have some huge exploit for TWF than to have it average 1-2 points less per attack in damage. Which do you think is going to cause more problems, TWF not being as good...or you trying to nerf the changes you made to TWF after some Dex power build starts doing ridiculous damage and making the Barbarian or THF feel like he's a Bard?

Would this make a o.p.? I'm not a build guru, but when you see people talking about builds getting 22 dagger attacks with +9d6 damage per round, you realize that the potential is out there.

I don't know what s.t.s is
 

Hmm, just a random thought, but what if you changed TWF so that it's not about damage output, but instead about hitting?

In general terms, you can focus the fighter in one of two areas:
-Damage. High Str + two handed weapon. Trade off is lower AC due to no shield and likely use of Power Attack.
-Tank. High Con + shield for AC. Trade off is damage output, due to using a one-handed weapon.

So let's add a third area: Hitter. High Dex + TWF. Change TWF so that you still only attack with one weapon (your choice which, but usually the primary). The TWF feat gives you bonuses to hit, as the opponent has to avoid both weapons. Additional feats could add Two Weapone Defense, add bonuses to either TWF (Attack) or TWD (AC).

The hitter would be the guy who doesn't do the most damage, but has the best chance of hitting, while also having flexibility to boost his AC when needed.

As I say, just a stray thought...
 

That's the "leave him for last, he's no threat" guy unless he has sneak attack (et al) as mentioned above.

No matter how good a singles hitter you are, you'll never get an intentional walk or get paid the big bucks.

Now, if you could TWF and apply a different ToB maneuver to each weapon as part of a standard action...
 

Perhaps damage output should not be your goal?

Consider vorpal weapons for example. Love the effect or hate the effect, with greater two weapon fighting you'll have little more than a one in three chance to roll a nat 20. Toss in robilar's gambit and combat reflexes and anything that makes a full attack against you increases the odds of lopping their head off significantly.

Further, Vorpal is NOT a death effect.


Then there's disruption, which is effectively the same thing but with undead. Wield a pair of disruption maces against undead and force a roll enough times and you WILL kill that undead because it will roll a nat 1 eventually, an automatic failure.

Being able to completely wreck your foes ability to fight can be a significant boon, especially against big bads and boss types.

These all assume, of course, you actually manage to LAND the blow... but you don't suffer from MAD if you follow this... completely buff the hell out of your dex snag weapon finesse and call it a day. This means you have excellent AC, a killer reflex save, and none too shabby accuracy.

Straight damage won't be where you shine...
 

I've always enjoyed getting Wounding or Greater Wounding on the weapons of a TWF character. Nothing freaks out as much as when they see their Con disappearing with each hit they take.
 

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