D&D General Battlemaster custom maneuvers for Bow wielders.

[street]

Hi. I'm playing a fighter with a battle master subclass. I asked my dm if I could create some homebrew versions of maneuvers myself which included archery and this is what I came up with. Note that the prerequisite for the two maneuvers I came up with requires the sharpshooter feat.

Reckless Endangerment: As a bonus action, expend one superiority to do reckless ranged attacks. Roll the die and subtract the roll with 1/4 of your fighter levels. Your speed is reduced by the number on the remaining roll (min 1) x 5 and enemies attack you recklessly as well (even in range).

Target Practice: As a bonus action you select a target. You spend one superiority die to withhold one whole action or two attacks (1 from the previous action and 1 from the next action, provided you are not hit in between). On your next attack, your bow attack roll increases by the amount rolled on the die divided by 2. You deal 3d12 + 18 damage.

I know these are a tad bit of an overkill. Is there any way to balance these enough to keep the main idea intact?

 

[Clint_L]

Good ideas. I would simplify the first: speed is halved and you have advantage on attacks, while enemies also have advantage on attacks against you. Actually, I'm not 100% sure why your speed is halved, though - isn't the idea that you are running about recklessly exposing your position? It seems to me that trading advantage for advantage is already fairly balanced, especially since you are also spending a superiority die, so I would leave the movement loss out of it. Edit, also, enemies would not be attacking you recklessly, they would just have advantage on their attacks. Reckless has a specific meaning in 5e.

Target practice is a bit confusingly worded; I'm not totally understanding the action economy. That is extremely high damage, especially at low levels (average of 40.5, assuming a dex bonus of +3), so if I was your DM I would have strong concerns about balance.

 

[DeviousQuail]

Reckless Endangerment: You get advantage on ranged attacks against targets within 15 feet of you. You can add your superiority die to the damage of one attack. Then everyone gets advantage on attacks against you until the start of your next turn.

The movement penalty is switched for proximity to targets and I dropped the bonus action portion as that seems excessive.

Target Practice: I'm having a hard time thinking of the appropriate wording, but here goes. You expend a superiority die and sacrifice an attack action lining up your next shot. Your next attack adds your superiority die to the attack roll and damage roll.

 

[Stormonu]

On the Reckless Endangerment, I think I agree with @DeviousQuail, except I'd make it advantage on targets within Short Range.

Target practice: Use a bonus action and expend a superiority die. Add the roll of your superiority die to hit on your next ranged attack. If the attack hits, it is considered a critical hit, and add the superiority die roll to the final damage.

 

[Quickleaf]

Hi. I'm playing a fighter with a battle master subclass. I asked my dm if I could create some homebrew versions of maneuvers myself which included archery and this is what I came up with. Note that the prerequisite for the two maneuvers I came up with requires the sharpshooter feat.

Reckless Endangerment: As a bonus action, expend one superiority to do reckless ranged attacks. Roll the die and subtract the roll with 1/4 of your fighter levels. Your speed is reduced by the number on the remaining roll (min 1) x 5 and enemies attack you recklessly as well (even in range).

Target Practice: As a bonus action you select a target. You spend one superiority die to withhold one whole action or two attacks (1 from the previous action and 1 from the next action, provided you are not hit in between). On your next attack, your bow attack roll increases by the amount rolled on the die divided by 2. You deal 3d12 + 18 damage.

I know these are a tad bit of an overkill. Is there any way to balance these enough to keep the main idea intact?

Glad you're homebrewing some stuff for your archer.

The mechanical idea behind Reckless Endangerment is that you sacrifice speed in order to make it harder for enemies to hit you, right? There's pretty hard narrative dissonance there – I can't move as much, but I'm definitely harder to hit now! Uh...come again? Also, as a GM, I want to encourage movement during combat (static sit-and-slug fights can get dull), so I don't think this is a good implementation. I'd go back to the drawing board about what you're trying to model narratively with this maneuver first, before attempting any mechanics.

Target Practice is broken both in terms of the degree of its effect & the difficulty in tracking at the table. Again, with this one I'd go back to your narrative intent before touching mechanics.

EDIT: Here's an example of one way you might approach "Target Practice"...

Target Practice (revision): You prepare a hair-trigger shot for when your enemies least expect it. When you take the Ready action and have Extra Attack, you may expend a Superiority Die. Either take one attack now and one attack when you take your Readied action, or hold both attacks and take them when you take your Readied action. If you gain a 3rd Extra Attack, you may expend 2 Superiority Dice, and divide the attacks as you desire between acting this turn and reserving them for your Readied action. However, all attacks on your Readied action must share the same trigger.