D&D (2024) Greatweapon fighting style? Is this another joke? Did everyone at WotC failed elementary school math classes?

[Kinematics]

Fighters of myth and legend have many fighting styles and can adapt on the fly.

Actually, that's a nice basis.

Proposal: Make Great Weapon Fighting about being great with weapons in general, rather than specializing in two-handed weapons. Just make it so that GWF applies to all weapons. Leave the mechanics as they currently are.

Mathematically it's not great, but it shows that you have a minimal level of competence with any weapon, no matter what it is. You'll never completely bomb on the damage front.

Instead of being good for min-maxing, it would be for someone who just doesn't want to feel bad about their damage rolls, which is a decent alternative.

Then come up with something else if you still want a specialization for two-handed weapons.

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

Applying the FS to any weapon with versatile or heavy instead of 2-hands could let it be useful for ranged attackers.

 

[Voadam]

Then come up with something else if you still want a specialization for two-handed weapons.

Preferably something that works well with a great axe.

 

[Mirrorrorrim]

that is part of the problem,
you need to "munckinize" the s#!" out of it to gain any real benefit from it, why Dueling is +2 damage.
Simple. Direct. same for just basic attack or with 3 riders and magic weapons and whatnot.

If someone uses just basic attacks with greataxe, benefits will be minor, for them it's a trap option.

I've run the 2024 rules and some players were quite happy to use their Heroic Inspiration to reroll a 1 or 2 on a damage die to get a higher number, and that has happened a couple times already. It is a different kind of feel-good than adding +2 damage to a rolled 1 or 2 on the die.

Making it a mechanic that happens all the time for great weapons rather than use a resource is going to be fine for many who aren't optimizers. I think uniqueness for a different playstyle is a valid priority to consider.

 

[TiQuinn]

while I am not in the dumb vs. smart camp per say, I would not equate; add some damage to attack and some minor rider to, I will distort the very fabric of reality to how I see fit.

But I don’t think anyone so far has been talking about the fictional power of a wizard versus a fighter; what I’ve seen in the thread is a position that playing a wizard is complex and playing a fighter is not complex, and it’s been unfortunately phrased as smart vs dumb. I’m just saying in my experience, playing a wizard is not appreciably harder for new players than playing some of the martial subclasses. Yes, there are some very basic subclasses for folks who really need a gradual learning curve but that on the whole, putting spellcasters in a box for only advanced players doesn’t hold up to what I’ve seen at the table.

 

[Voadam]

I've run the 2024 rules and some players were quite happy to use their Heroic Inspiration to reroll a 1 or 2 on a damage die to get a higher number, and that has happened a couple times already. It is a different kind of feel-good than adding +2 damage to a rolled 1 or 2 on the die.

Making it a mechanic that happens all the time for great weapons rather than use a resource is going to be fine for many who aren't optimizers. I think uniqueness for a different playstyle is a valid priority to consider.

I can't quite tell your position here.

The new GWM is just adding a +2 or +1 to a rolled 1 or 2 on the dice, right? That is a quite different feel from rerolling a 1 or a 2 on a d12 damage die or a flat +2 all the time.

 

[Ashrym]

GWM feat is not the issue here, it is it's separate issue, if there is any with that feat. I like it more than that swingy -5/+10 mechanic.

depending on dice rolled GWF style gives bonus of:
d4: +0,75
d6: +0,5
d8: +0,375
d10: +0,3
d12: +0,25

if you count 60% hit rate and 5% crit it comes down to:
d4: +0,488
d6: +0,325
d8: +0,244
d10: +0,195
d12: +0,163

Dueling style with 60% hit rate(crit irrelevant here) gives +1,2 damage per attack.
now you can calculate how many of what dice you need to get to be better than Dueling style bonus.
you will be better with only 2d4+1d6 but you will need 8d12 to be better on the other side of dice size.

and I do not know how much do they aim at, but I believe you should do on average +50% more damage with 2Handed melee attacks than with 1Handed melee attacks. GWM feat will help with this goal.

I was using a 65% hit rate in my calculations, but that's beside the point. The lower the hit rate the higher the graze damage over time. That's not the importain point, however. Fighting styles don't operate in a vacuum so comparing them in a vacuum doesn't make sense.

It's not like your fighting style are omitting base weapon damage in the calculations so a fighting style that does a little less damage is okay because the base weapon already does more.

Insisting on comparing the fighting styles while ignoring those other factors then increasing great weapon fighting style incentivizes a combat style that doesn't need it because it's already easy to do a lot of damage. It's also not that hard to come up with extra dice for a better overall damage bonus in the build. Champions crit fish, battle masters use maneuvers, and eldritch knights can use weapon cantrips in the attack sequence.

I would argue that an AC bonus and slightly better base damage bonus needs that slightly better base damage bonus to be relevant.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

I can't quite tell your position here.

The new GWM is just adding a +2 or +1 to a rolled 1 or 2 on the dice, right? That is a quite different feel from rerolling a 1 or a 2 on a d12 damage die or a flat +2 all the time.

That's actually good way to illustrate how terrible it is. If you roll one or two, you get +2 or +1 to damage.
Duelling gets +2 to damage all the time!

 

[Daztur]

That's actually good way to illustrate how terrible it is. If you roll one or two, you get +2 or +1 to damage.
Duelling gets +2 to damage all the time!

I think the original intent in 5e was to intentionally make duelling stronger than many other fighting styles in order to balance out sword and board being otherwise relatively weak. Even with dueling being a strong fighting style in 5e it rarely made sense to take it (except for spear and board paladins and a few other exceptions) as sword and board couldn't compete with GWM or SS even with a strong fighting style.

But now with feats and weapon mastery etc. in 5.5e shifting stuff around this doesn't seem to apply anymore.

 

[mellored]

I think the original intent in 5e was to intentionally make duelling stronger than many other fighting styles in order to balance out sword and board being otherwise relatively weak. Even with dueling being a strong fighting style in 5e it rarely made sense to take it (except for spear and board paladins and a few other exceptions) as sword and board couldn't compete with GWM or SS even with a strong fighting style.

But now with feats and weapon mastery etc. in 5.5e shifting stuff around this doesn't seem to apply anymore.

Great Weapon Master feat still leaves 2-handers as the go to for damage.

Sharpshooter doesn't add damage anymore.