Greataxe, greatsword, and a little math

[Sorcerers Apprentice]

Great, so a dagger should do the same damage as a longsword.

Both a dagger and a sword can easily kill a grown man in a single strike.

 

[houser2112]

Both a dagger and a sword can easily kill a grown man in a single strike.

Yes, but that grown man, if he's not a PC, is a commoner with very few hit points, so the damage differential of the two weapons is less meaningful, if not meaningless.

 

[jaelis]

My solution is modify GWF from reroll 1s and 2s to roll an extra die and drop the lowest. So greataxe becomes best one of 2d12 and greatsword becomes best 2 of 3d6.

This makes the weapon averages 8.48 for greataxe and 8.46 for greatsword. It gives a small boost to GWF and evens out greatsword and greataxe all in one beautiful solution.

Not sure who came up with this idea originally, but I think its really great

That does seem like a nice fix for GWF style. It is a little unsatisfying to me though that it leaves the base weapons unequal. For instance, barbarians would still do better with greatswords since they don't get a fighting style. (Until Brutal Crit kicks in, anyway.)

 

[BookBarbarian]

Both a dagger and a sword can easily kill a grown man in a single strike.

This is less a function of a Dagger doing as much damage as a Greatsword, and more a function of it take's a relativity small amount of damage (in the right spot) to kill a human being.

Still a Greatsword offered tremendous advantage of a Dagger in both range and energy transferred to the target, even through armor. Although less than a Warhammer or poleaxe in the case of the latter.

I for one am glad that the game decides not to go into this level of granularity.

 

[ccs]

Everyone knows that the greataxe has slightly lower average damage than the greatsword. The axe does 6.5 on average, the sword does 7.0. This is not a big deal, but it bothers me more than it probably should.

Of course, when you add in the GWF style, the disparity grows quite a bit. Rerolling 1s and 2s, the axe does 7.33 hp, the sword does 8.33. That's equivalent to a full die step, and seems legitimately significant.

It's 1/2 to 1 point of damage. It's not significant.

I've wondered about ways to fix this. Simplest would be to make the greataxe 2d6, but that is a little boring. I'm probably not the first person to realize that there is another option:
Give the greataxe the property that when you roll max damage, you get to roll again one time and add that to the total. So if you roll a 12, you end up doing 12+1d12.

If you work it out, that gives an average damage of 7.04 hp, almost exactly the same as the greatsword. With GWF it improves to 8.03, not exactly equivalent but much closer.

You're fretting over 1/2 to 1 point of damage.
You fix this not by complicating the rules for the rest of us, or your players, but by realizing you are the problem in this equation.
Take a deep breath & realize that everything you see is not a problem.

I like this, but I have a question: people tend to key in on the max damage, which increases dramatically in my scheme.

As you've only increased things by a point (or less) I don't think our definition of this is the same....

Even though they are mathematically balanced, would this make the greataxe seem too good? When you read it, is your first reaction that you would always pick my greataxe over a greatsword?.

No & no.

It's a mere 1 point of damage. So I'll continue choosing between g.axe/g.sword based on:
1) How do I visualize my character? This is very important. Certainly more-so than a 1 pt of damage increase to one of them will ever be.
2) And now I've found the ideal mini- but it's armed with the wrong weapon. How hard will this be to change? Is it worth considering altering my mental image & equipment of my character? Should I look for a slightly different miniature? (as I'm a very experienced modeler I'll most likely invest the work & end up with a g.axe/g.sword wielding model that I'm happy with.)

 

[Guest 6801328]

So what happens when a Half-orc Barbarian gets a crit and rolls 3d12 and all 3 come up 12's. Does he then roll 3 more 12's?

 

[jaelis]

So what happens when a Half-orc Barbarian gets a crit and rolls 3d12 and all 3 come up 12's. Does he then roll 3 more 12's?

That is the proposal. It would certainly be memorable

Of course the odds of that happening are very low. But my main question is, does the possibility that it could happen overshadow everything else?

 

[FrogReaver]

Maybe we just change greatswords and mauls to do 1d12. Buff great weapon fighting style to apply to a 1-3 instead of 1-2. I think that fixes everything?

 

[jaelis]

Maybe we just change greatswords and mauls to do 1d12. Buff great weapon fighting style to apply to a 1-3 instead of 1-2. I think that fixes everything?

This to me is more logical than making the greataxe 2d6, since it makes the weapon progression simpler. But I think there are people who value the higher reliability of the 2d6 roll, and they might not be happy.

 

[CapnZapp]

Great, so a dagger should do the same damage as a longsword.

Sigh. You clearly don't intend to discuss seriously.