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

[Mistwell]

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.

A lot of what I just mentioned is just ordinary fighter, paladin, ranger, and barbarian stuff. These are the classes which frequently add extra attacks and often extra d4s or d6s to damage with a weapon you'd be wielding with two hands. It's not munchkinizing it, I was just going through the various subclasses and realizing almost all of them end up adding extra attacks, extra crits, or extra damage dice in some fashion.

What class gets this and just uses basic attacks? Who is just getting one attack with no extra damage dice with a greataxe? I mean, even that is a +1 damage, but I don't see which sub-class of which class likely to take this and a two-handed weapon doesn't get extra attacks and/or damage dice over time?

[Edit - Oh yeesh, I was really leaving barbarian out of this. Barbarians get all sorts of extra dice on attacks. They get extra attack, advantage on attacks which increases crit frequency, Brutal Strike for extra damage dice, the Berserker gets Frenzy attack is extra d6s equal to your rage damage bonus, retaliation is a reaction attack, and of course they're more likely to use a two handed weapon.]

 

[Horwath]

A lot of what I just mentioned is just ordinary fighter, paladin, ranger, and barbarian stuff. These are the classes which frequently add extra attacks and often extra d4s or d6s to damage with a weapon you'd be wielding with two hands. It's not munchkinizing it, I was just going through the various subclasses and realizing almost all of them end up adding extra attacks, extra crits, or extra damage dice in some fashion.

What class gets this and just uses basic attacks? Who is just getting one attack with no extra damage dice with a greataxe? I mean, even that is a +1 damage, but I don't see which sub-class of which class likely to take this and a two-handed weapon doesn't get extra attacks and/or damage dice over time?

as I mentioned in battlemaster,
you start with 4d8 extra damage,
with style it will give you extra +1,5 damage(not counting crits) for thsoe 4 dice.
style for extra dice and maneuver will give you +4,5 damage and extra versatility for extra maneuver known.
yes you would get +1 damage on your greatsword hit also, but is is worth losing for that extra versatility?

and yes, it maybe repetitive but +X flat bonus like Dueling is better and simpler than any treat X or Y as Z result or re-rolls(please remove ALL reroll mechanics from the game).

+3(or even +4 for Heavy) damage would have done the job much better, simpler and faster.

 

[Mistwell]

as I mentioned in battlemaster,
you start with 4d8 extra damage,
with style it will give you extra +1,5 damage(not counting crits) for thsoe 4 dice.
style for extra dice and maneuver will give you +4,5 damage and extra versatility for extra maneuver known.
yes you would get +1 damage on your greatsword hit also, but is is worth losing for that extra versatility?

and yes, it maybe repetitive but +X flat bonus like Dueling is better and simpler than any treat X or Y as Z result or re-rolls(please remove ALL reroll mechanics from the game).

+3(or even +4 for Heavy) damage would have done the job much better, simpler and faster.

Yes obviously the smaller the die used for the weapon, the more often this fighting style triggers. The bigger the die, the less often it triggers. d4s and d6s will get you the most out of this style. d8s, d10s and d12s the least. A quarterstaff with polearm master, a maul, a greatsword, these are probably the best weapons with it. My guess is a Berskerker Barbarian with a greatsword or maul will probably get the most out of it.

 

[Stalker0]

To this day I've always houseruled it to remove all of the damage offense styles (and archery), and just replaced it with a simple:

Offense: You get +2 damage on attacks.

It works great, you want to use a longsword right now, enjoy a +2. Want to wield that bow, enjoy that +2. Feeling like some TWF action....go +2 you get em

 

[Horwath]

Yes obviously the smaller the die used for the weapon, the more often this fighting style triggers. The bigger the die, the less often it triggers. d4s and d6s will get you the most out of this style. d8s, d10s and d12s the least. A quarterstaff with polearm master, a maul, a greatsword, these are probably the best weapons with it. My guess is a Berskerker Barbarian with a greatsword or maul will probably get the most out of it.

so multiclassing is required for this to work decently?
or the new barbarian gets fighting styles?

yeah, battlemaster getting less and less, relatively, from this FS as maneuver dice improve is funny.

 

[Horwath]

To this day I've always houseruled it to remove all of the damage offense styles (and archery), and just replaced it with a simple:

Offense: You get +2 damage on attacks.

It works great, you want to use a longsword right now, enjoy a +2. Want to wield that bow, enjoy that +2. Feeling like some TWF action....go +2 you get em

I would make it into categories:

pick:
1. One handed melee weapons(and unarmed)
2. 2Handed melee weapons
3. Ranged weapons
4. Spells

when you hit with an attack with weapon from the category deal extra damage equal to your proficiency modifier.

 

[Ashrym]

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.

We don't really need to munchkinize it. The base weapon damage favors the weapon and if we compare a champion using a greatsword with great weapon fighting and great weapon master and graze to a champion using a shield and spear with dueling and polearm master and sap then the great sword is well ahead in minimum, average, and maximum damage. The spear user is more defensive, sure, but that damage gap becomes significant fast.

FYI in case it hasn't come up, GWM gives a damage bonus equal to the character's proficiency bonus now, at least from what I've seen.

The specific fighting style feat doesn't add as much without those bonus dice, but the overall weapon package of benefits adds up, and when more dice do become available in the builds it's gravy.

 

[Horwath]

We don't really need to munchkinize it. The base weapon damage favors the weapon and if we compare a champion using a greatsword with great weapon fighting and great weapon master and graze to a champion using a shield and spear with dueling and polearm master and sap then the great sword is well ahead in minimum, average, and maximum damage. The spear user is more defensive, sure, but that damage gap becomes significant fast.

FYI in case it hasn't come up, GWM gives a damage bonus equal to the character's proficiency bonus now, at least from what I've seen.

The specific fighting style feat doesn't add as much without those bonus dice, but the overall weapon package of benefits adds up, and when more dice do become available in the builds it's gravy.

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.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

To this day I've always houseruled it to remove all of the damage offense styles (and archery), and just replaced it with a simple:

Offense: You get +2 damage on attacks.

It works great, you want to use a longsword right now, enjoy a +2. Want to wield that bow, enjoy that +2. Feeling like some TWF action....go +2 you get em

Yeah, agreed. I dislike how the fighting styles pigeonhole fighters into specific weapons from the get go.

 

[Pauln6]

Yeah, agreed. I dislike how the fighting styles pigeonhole fighters into specific weapons from the get go.

You can retrain them periodically or take the feat that lets you retrain with a brief training montage.