Chainmail/AD&D 1st Edition Rate of Fire Rules for D&D 5th Edition

[Hriston]

I have just uploaded Chainmail/AD&D First Edition Rate of Fire Rules for D&D Fifth Edition to the downloads area.

Here's my homebrew conversion of the rates of fire given for different ranged attacks in Chainmail and AD&D First Edition. I'm posting it here not so much because I expect anyone to want to use it in their games, but because I'd like any feedback anyone would like to offer regarding how it might interact with any rules I might not have considered.

My goal was to give support to the 1E rates of fire, without making multiple shots per round too overpowered. Only playtesting will tell if I've achieved that goal. I've been using a less formal version in one of my current campaigns, and implementing this document is the next step.

If anyone is interested in allowing these rates to be used in their own games, I would also suggest using an attack adjustment system similar to the one I posted here in the downloads section, especially with regard to heavy crossbows, which would be otherwise nerfed considerably.

You can find the file here in the downloads section. Please use this thread for comments.

 

[Tony Vargas]

One thing to consider is that 1e rounds were a minute long, but 3e-through-5e rounds are only 6 seconds.

You could use weapon RoF as an upper limit on multi-attacking characters, for instance. It'd just force such characters to abandon certain weapons at certain levels, but if that gives you a feel you like, no reason not to.

 

[Hriston]

One thing to consider is that 1e rounds were a minute long, but 3e-through-5e rounds are only 6 seconds.

Of course, I'm well aware that the 1E round and the Chainmail turn both represented a full minute of combat time. During that period, however, only a single melee "attack" was typically resolved for a single character or figure, with the caveat of course that this attack represented the one chance of striking a "telling blow" out of an otherwise unresolved series of parries, thrusts, etc. Nevertheless, the ratio of resolved melee weapon attacks to resolved bow attacks was basically 1:2 for the presumably low level combatants involved. The 'feel' I'm after here is to preserve that ratio, but not as a carte blanche for bowmen to always attack twice per round. The missile fire rules from Chainmail only allow two shots per turn when the archers are stationary. Although AD&D makes no mention, as far as I've found, of any such limitations on the rate of fire for bows, the importation of bow RoF from Chainmail, which constituted the default combat rules for D&D1974, into AD&D indicates that the concepts in Chainmail were not only still relevant, but were very likely still considered the current rules for many players, if not the creator himself.

You could use weapon RoF as an upper limit on multi-attacking characters, for instance. It'd just force such characters to abandon certain weapons at certain levels, but if that gives you a feel you like, no reason not to.

This is actually the opposite of what I'm trying to do. I have no interest in placing an upper limit on extra attacks with certain weapons. My intention is to provide an option for certain weapons to attack more than once as a property of the weapon itself and not dependent on any multi-attack ability of the character. This is in emulation of the situation in 1E where the same character that could make one d20 roll to attack with a sword could make two d20 rolls to attack twice with a bow. The leap I'm making is that the movement restrictions found in Chainmail would still apply.

For exceeding RoF for ranged weapons in 1E, see the weapon specialization rules introduced in the 1E Unearthed Arcana.

 

[Tony Vargas]

Nevertheless, the ratio of resolved melee weapon attacks to resolved bow attacks was basically 1:2 for the presumably low level combatants involved. The 'feel' I'm after here is to preserve that ratio

So you're looking to restore an artifact of the 1e mechanics, rather than model something 1e did that 5e has abandoned. OK.

My intention is to provide an option for certain weapons to attack more than once as a property of the weapon itself and not dependent on any multi-attack ability of the character.

You might bump into some unintended consequences with that. Two I can think of are (1) it cheapens the multi-attacking feature that is the main thing some classes have going from them and (2) bounded accuracy magnifies the impact that higher RoF would have on a combat, because most creatures hit eachother pretty easily.

If you're going for a 1e feel, the former is fine (that's how it was in 1e), but the latter could be a problem. It's already a foible of 5e bounded accuracy that a legion of low-level archers (well, hardly a legion, a few dozen, maybe 100) can shoot a dragon out of the sky - RoF 2 bows would halve the numbers required. FWIW. In 1e, powerful monsters, high-level fighters, and the like would have ACs in excess of what you could get from normal armor and shield - 1, 0, even negative AC - that 0-level archers'd've needed a natural 20 (or even natural 20 + bonuses) to hit. 5e simply doesn't have an equivalent of negative AC, so just about anything can hit just about anything else, even before invoking any natural 20 rule.

 

[MostlyDm]

Slight correction: there are equivalents of negative AC in 5e. Any AC in excess of 20 is effectively negative AC. A fighter in plate with a shield and the defense style has effectively -1 Armor Class by 1e standards.

They may be less common, however. I haven't dug into the high level monsters enough to really know for sure.

 

[Blackwarder]

From glancing at your rules it seems like you just screwed the heavy crossbow users, you might want to raise its damage output.

Warder

 

[Tony Vargas]

Slight correction: there are equivalents of negative AC in 5e. Any AC in excess of 20 is effectively negative AC. A fighter in plate with a shield and the defense style has effectively -1 Armor Class by 1e standards.

Nod. In a sense, a 20 AC in 3e or later is analogous to a 0 in 1e, and it goes up (down) from there. In 3e or 4e, you might have the numeric analogue to -20 AC. Bounded Accuracy, though, means that though they're analogous, they're not equivalent. A 1e kobold needed a natural 20 to hit a 0 or negative AC, a 5e Kobold will tag the analogous 21 an a roll of 17. It's an artifact of Bounded Accuracy and d20 conventions (just about everyone having a bonus) vs 1e attack matrices. And it means that numbers - including increased RoF - tell very heavily.

 

[Hriston]

From glancing at your rules it seems like you just screwed the heavy crossbow users, you might want to raise its damage output.

Warder

I addressed this in my OP but to explain, the idea is that heavy crossbows get a bonus on the attack roll compared to other ranged weapons against most if not all armor types. I'm currently planning a revision of the chart of attack modifiers I posted to make it more user friendly and to account for the difference in how the editions value different types of armor.

 

[aramis erak]

One thing to consider is that 1e rounds were a minute long, but 3e-through-5e rounds are only 6 seconds.

BX, BECMI, and Cyclopedia rounds are 10 sec, not 1 min.

 

[Gillywonka]

Looks good. I like these types of mods. One thing DnD does that i dont really care for, is has a simple combat system (which is fine), and to do anything that would be a normal option in combat, instead of just editing the combat, they make a new class, then worry about balancing this or balancing that (this is the part i dont care for). So you have all these wonderful combat options that most combatants would be able to do, but not in DnD because they're not XYZ class or they dont have ABC feature. Good job anyways.

 

[pemerton]

BX, BECMI, and Cyclopedia rounds are 10 sec, not 1 min.

But those systems don't give missile attacks a boosted attack rate.

 

[Hriston]

I've changed a few things in the document that I'll summarize here.

The introductory text about weapons with the ammunition property has been changed to reference the use of a "sight-picture" for aiming, and the accompanying restriction on movement now only applies to bows and crossbows. I'm considering keeping blowguns on this list as well.

The section on heavy crossbows now refers to the loading property to reflect the intent that Crossbow Expert allows you to load without using an action. The way I had it written before made it so you could never get a RoF of more than 1/2 which didn't properly account for the possibility of specialization that AD&D had post-UA. Thanks to [MENTION=996]Tony Vargas[/MENTION] for jogging my memory about this.

Other changes are basically just formatting. Thanks for all the feedback.

 

[Tony Vargas]

You're very welcome.

Please, let us know how it works out for you in actual play.

 

[Hriston]

But those systems don't give missile attacks a boosted attack rate.

Yeah. Taking a quick look at the Rules Cyclopedia, it looks like the only thing like this that carried over was a 1/2 RoF for heavy crossbows when used by a "low strength" character.