D&D (2024) Do you actually like weapon masteries?

[Parmandur]

I am interested to hear you definition of slow. I DM for a group of 5. Average combat encounter is probably less than 5 minutes. Our longest combat session ever in 16 months of playing together is maybe 20-25 minutes. Belabored combat is often related to the DM.

Yeah, my experience is that 5E combat is very easy to get through quickly.

 

[MichaelSomething]

They may look like minor effects but aren't they unlimited in use? Isn't that bonkers? After all the spellcasters exhaust their spells, the Fighters will still be trippin' (or whatever) round after round.

 

[mamba]

They may look like minor effects but aren't they unlimited in use? Isn't that bonkers? After all the spellcasters exhaust their spells, the Fighters will still be trippin' (or whatever) round after round.

no, that is perfectly fine, this is not symmetrical, have you seen the spells a mage can pull off?

 

[mellored]

They may look like minor effects but aren't they unlimited in use? Isn't that bonkers? After all the spellcasters exhaust their spells, the Fighters will still be trippin' (or whatever) round after round.

Beyond the first few levels, most things are dead before wizards run out of spells.
They might run out of high level ones, but they can still throw down grease and be tripping round after round.

 

[TerraDave]

I realized they are doing three overlapping jobs:

-give a power up to fighters (mostly)
-further distinguish weapons from one another
-create a system of martial maneuvers /cantrips

For example, you could just reintroduce weapon specialization and give say a +2 to hit and damage for the champion. This would be very simple, and would actually be a big powerup.

Or, you could have simple weapon properties, like swords get a +2 to hit, and axes get a +2 to damage. This is easy to track and the weapons are now quite different.

But they want to also do the third, which is a lot more ambitious. And give access to a few of these these martial cantrips at a time, at least for fighters while also having that as an option for other classes. Given all three goals, I don't think they are quite there. Maybe it is too much.

 

[Uni-the-Unicorn!]

I'm thoroughly perplexed by the weapon masteries thing. I don't feel like it adds anything of value to the game, other than slowing down combat. It feels like complexity for the sake making the game feel more complex...for the sake of complexity. Sure, it adds more decisions, but not interesting decisions.

And it's also just so arbitrary. Sure, giant hammers might be good for knocking people down, but in most cases the mechanic associated with a given weapon could just as easily apply to almost any other weapon. (And, in fact, they will, since Fighters can arbitrarily assign any mastery to any weapon.)

Do you like it? Why?

Yes I like it. It could be improved though, that is why we playtest and give feedback.

I like that these give little tactical choices. We have enjoyed playing with them.

Now I would like a weapon to have multiple masteries that a warrior can learn one of, unless you are fighter. Fighters would get access to multiple masteries. That way the mastery property is really about how you learn to use the weapon, not just the weapon itself.

 

[codo]

They may look like minor effects but aren't they unlimited in use? Isn't that bonkers? After all the spellcasters exhaust their spells, the Fighters will still be trippin' (or whatever) round after round.

Casters already get unlimited cantrips with all sorts of different effects. Slow, Can't take reactions, Take damage if they move, Disadvantage on their next attack. This is basically just cantrips for warriors.

Also fighters should be better than casters once they have used up all of their spells. That is the point of casters. You get incredible powerful and encounter ending spells (Fireball, fly, Major Image, Leomond's Tiny Hut, Haste, Hypnotic Pattern, Tongues, and those are just a few at 3rd level), but you only get a limited number. Fighters on the other hand just keep chugging along all day hitting things, and a couple of times a day they can hit things even harder.(Action Surge)

 

[overgeeked]

Not really. It’s typical WotC design though. Overcomplicated for minimal reward. Something like a free-form stunt system, akin to DCC RPG’s mighty deeds would be a lot simpler have have way more oomph.

 

[cbwjm]

I like the idea but don't like how they've been implemented. I was hoping that weapons would be differentiated in general but instead it's only for warriors unless you spend a feat, and even then warriors only get mastery with a few specific weapons at time, I'd much rather weapon groups return to 5e so that they have mastery with heavy blades and axes rather than longswords and battleaxes. I hope they make changes to the system.

 

[Horwath]

Longsword still does not have base damage of d10, so Versatile is still priced as equal to Finesse property.
Versatile is garbage tier property, flex mastery is just an insult on top of that.

Vex and Elven accuracy will be a decent combo, well anything will be decent comparing to Versatile+Flex.

Flex is almost as bad as GWF style and that is a nice achievement, with greatsword calculated for GWF style, it is even worse, haha!