D&D 5E Helping melee combat to be more competitive to ranged.

[Hjorimir]

Try stone giants. Step out from full cover, hurl rocks, step back into full cover. Smushy-smush! Set up in such a way that to deny them full cover puts one in melee engagement range. Smacky-smack.

You don't have to deny them their scouts or stealth. It is, what it is. No shenanigans necessary. PC archers can ready to attack when the giants step out, but that is a single attack vs their 4d10+STR.

Just one example. How about seasonal windstorms? How about early morning fog? The dark of night probably happens daily and that should limit everybody to 60 feet of range and lots of monsters are nocturnal.

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[Prism]

Alternatively, you could hold a short sword (or any other one-handed weapon) in one hand and use that for your Attack action and then fire your hand crossbow with the other hand during the bonus action. In this case, assuming you are still had the short sword in your hand, the hand crossbow would already have to be loaded as you have no free hand to get ammunition.

This is would be pretty cool. Since you can ignore disadvantage for being within 5 feet of a hostile creature, you can shoot that bad guy in the face after stabbing him or even stab the bad guy and shoot some other baddie across the room - all with no disadvantage!

I'm not certain how easy it would be to carry multiple loaded hand crossbows around, but you could fire one in the first round, drop it, draw another, shoot it, drop it, etc. And in that case you'd not need an extra hand (at least in combat) to load the hand crossbow as you had already done it before hand.

That's what I believe the original author hand in mind. Its certainly what I first thought of when I read the feat and only by reading this forum did I release that's not how everyone interpreted it. As [MENTION=12731]CapnZapp[/MENTION] says though it makes this part of the feat suck. You can typically get only a single extra attack each combat. Saying that, I have no problem with lowering the power of this otherwise overpowered feat.

The rules reason you could use is the inclusion of the words 'loaded hand crossbow'. Why say that rather than just 'hand crossbow' if its simple to load the crossbow during the bonus attack? Could it be because the crossbow must be preloaded to trigger the bonus attack? I am aware I seem to be in the minority reading it like this but the outcome is that in our group nobody has yet taken the feat except a rogue (who uses it as an emergency miss option) and ranged fighters aren't the default damage dealers

 

[CapnZapp]

Not really the case in 5E. ACs are very close in this game. You can make a heavy armor archer with good hit points. Ranged attackers don't have to be soft targets in 5E.

This is true. The notion of "soft archers" simply isn't valid in these rules.

The most you could say is that a fighter can specialize into being extra hard and tanky, and by not doing that you'll obviously be less hard.

But sinc you can still rock AC 18-20 I wouldn't call that soft. You'll have no fewer hit points either (in fact, since you can dump Strength more than the melee fighter will want to dump Dex, you can probably afford a higher Con and hence more hp)

A fighter with Crossbow Expert and Sharpshooter is just as tanky and hard as a regular fighter. Except his effective "reach" is 120 feet. In no way is he disadvantaged or inconvenienced by being melee, neither regarding his "softness" nor his ability to continue fire (both at his own melee opponents, and at other foes).

Simply look at him as if he had a 120 ft long shortsword. What I mean by that is - a shortsword he can swing at the orc next to him, or the orc a hundred yards away, with equal ease.

Actually strike that - consider him to be equal to having two shortswords (since Crossbow Expert effectively gives you dualwielding).

In fact, since you have the same crazybroken advantage a greatweapon master gets, it's more than shortswords.

The advantage over melee builds is staggering. (Mostly because the number of "wasted" attacks when you can't reach a new foe after downing the first one drops to a near-zero number. But also - obviously - because you have range (doh) and can start firing before melee).

 

[Rhenny]

Try stone giants. Step out from full cover, hurl rocks, step back into full cover. Smushy-smush! Set up in such a way that to deny them full cover puts one in melee engagement range. Smacky-smack.

You don't have to deny them their scouts or stealth. It is, what it is. No shenanigans necessary. PC archers can ready to attack when the giants step out, but that is a single attack vs their 4d10+STR.

Just one example. How about seasonal windstorms? How about early morning fog? The dark of night probably happens daily and that should limit everybody to 60 feet of range and lots of monsters are nocturnal.

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This reminds me of a game I played in for Hoard of the Dragon Queen where we all had to run from a Hill Giant (I think we were only 3rd level). The giant picked up rocks and threw them at us. Luckily, he targeted our Eldritch Knight, who had to put up two consecutive shield spells to save his bacon as we ran back to our caravan and got reinforcements.

***

Other thoughts for DMs to make ranged attacks less effective:

Use fog spells and darkness to block sight, wall of wind, other spells that make missile fire more difficult. Even one spell caster with a group of foes can be used to provide the anti-ranged attack spells.

Have foes use cover.

Have foes drop prone when they know missile fire is incoming, and then get up when melee gets closer.

Take hostages and use them as shields (yikes). In addition to granting -2 for 1/2 cover, I might even make a rule where if a PC/monster did this on purpose, on a miss, he/she could make an opposed strength or dex check to move the grappled creature into harms way (or just hit the creature if the to hit roll was within 2 or 3).

Retreat and force the PCs to give chase into more defensible positions, or right into an ambush.

If a DM makes it harder for missile fire once in a while, that will give melee PCs a chance to shine more often. Again, balance the types of encounters so that missile fire is not always the best form of attack.

 

[Satyrn]

What if your players scout ahead using high stealth and perception with the intent of using ranged attacks to their advantage? Do you prevent them from doing this? And if so, in what percentage of encounters do you disallow this option?

If you were in a dangerous area, you would stick to ravines and other various cover while travelling. Well, you should, anyway. When camping, the same holds. Youll find sheltered spots, with limited directions of approach or good sightlines to foil skulking predators, and cover. So when a scout stealthes on up to them, they should find the foes sheltered from an assault of arrows, except for those times the monsters have gotten lazy, or are illsuited to living in dangerous areas.

If one seeks to play their monsters smart, then this is what should be happening, I'd think.

 

[guachi]

That's what I believe the original author hand in mind. Its certainly what I first thought of when I read the feat and only by reading this forum did I release that's not how everyone interpreted it. As [MENTION=12731]CapnZapp[/MENTION] says though it makes this part of the feat suck. You can typically get only a single extra attack each combat. Saying that, I have no problem with lowering the power of this otherwise overpowered feat.

The rules reason you could use is the inclusion of the words 'loaded hand crossbow'. Why say that rather than just 'hand crossbow' if its simple to load the crossbow during the bonus attack? Could it be because the crossbow must be preloaded to trigger the bonus attack? I am aware I seem to be in the minority reading it like this but the outcome is that in our group nobody has yet taken the feat except a rogue (who uses it as an emergency miss option) and ranged fighters aren't the default damage dealers

It's trivial to load the hand crossbow during the bonus attack if you have a free hand as it's part of the attack. It's not trivial if the hand you'd be loading with has a weapon in it.

And if you insisted that the weapon had to be loaded before the declaration of the bonus attack I, as a player, would say my hand crossbow is always loaded when I start combat and the sequence isn't -draw, load, shoot- but rather -shoot, draw, load- so my weapon is always loaded. I mean, drawing ammunition is part of the attack but there's no indication that the drawing has to be before I shoot rather than after I shoot.

 

[CapnZapp]

In our group we don't allow the extra attack from crossbow expert to come from the same crossbow used for the primary attacks - mainly because that's not what we believe is the intent of the feat (from its wording). Once you remove that ability the dpr drops and the feat becomes harder to justify taking. Without the feat you can't (as easily) use a ranged weapon in melee. I would say this levels the playing field a bit between ranged and melee. For every time a melee fighter can't get into melee, there is a time that the ranged fighter needs to disengage.

The extra bonus action attack coming from the same crossbow is the intent of the feat. The wording is fairly clear on the matter.

Edit: removed quote

Yes, it's fairly clear from reading the text of the Crossbow Expert feat that you can use the bonus action attack with the same hand crossbow you used in your attack action.

The feat is somewhat open-ended with part three of the feat only requiring the use of a one-handed weapon in the Attack action. If they had meant only one-handed melee weapon, they would have said so. But it very specifically only says "one-handed weapon" and they didn't errata it like they did in declaring "unarmed strike" not a weapon.

Alternatively, you could hold a short sword (or any other one-handed weapon) in one hand and use that for your Attack action and then fire your hand crossbow with the other hand during the bonus action. In this case, assuming you are still had the short sword in your hand, the hand crossbow would already have to be loaded as you have no free hand to get ammunition.

This is would be pretty cool. Since you can ignore disadvantage for being within 5 feet of a hostile creature, you can shoot that bad guy in the face after stabbing him or even stab the bad guy and shoot some other baddie across the room - all with no disadvantage!

I'm not certain how easy it would be to carry multiple loaded hand crossbows around, but you could fire one in the first round, drop it, draw another, shoot it, drop it, etc. And in that case you'd not need an extra hand (at least in combat) to load the hand crossbow as you had already done it before hand.

That's what I believe the original author hand in mind. Its certainly what I first thought of when I read the feat and only by reading this forum did I release that's not how everyone interpreted it. As [MENTION=12731]CapnZapp[/MENTION] says though it makes this part of the feat suck. You can typically get only a single extra attack each combat. Saying that, I have no problem with lowering the power of this otherwise overpowered feat.

The rules reason you could use is the inclusion of the words 'loaded hand crossbow'. Why say that rather than just 'hand crossbow' if its simple to load the crossbow during the bonus attack? Could it be because the crossbow must be preloaded to trigger the bonus attack? I am aware I seem to be in the minority reading it like this but the outcome is that in our group nobody has yet taken the feat except a rogue (who uses it as an emergency miss option) and ranged fighters aren't the default damage dealers

View attachment 79224

I honestly think that Prism's pictured character here was what the Crossbow Expert designer had in mind.

More specifically: I do not believe the designer intentionally designed the feat to screw over Prism's character here. Remember, the part about weapons with ammunition requiring a hand free is errata (and could well have been written by another designer). I think it is much more likely that this is simply a case of left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing.

Even more specifically: I think it is a definite possibility that the designer took one too many shortcut in his or her attempt to have the feat cover many use cases. There simply are important checks and balances that simply aren't there but would have been if the feat was slightly more complexly worded.

In other words: I am convinced Crossbow Expert, the way it works currently per RAW, is a mistake.

So.

Edit: I mistakenly attributed the now-removed quoute to one poster when it really was from another. My complete apologies.
What I believe is that Guachi did not intend any slight to fall on Prism when he said the feat's meaning was "fairly clear". To me it's fairly clear Prism realizes there is a disconnect between what he (and I) thought the feat enabled, and what the feat (with errata) actually enables.

The problem with Prism's take (let's call it "ruling" or "houserule") is that it isn't enough. You can't as your only measure prohibit the bonus attack to come from the same hand crossbow as the main attacks.

Why? Because using one and the same hand crossbow is the only way to make that bonus attack consistently throughout a fight. Unlike Prism, I don't consider it reasonable to practically limit the feat to one bonus attack per combat - such a feat is simply not worth the cost IMHO.

To fix this mess, you would have to make many changes, and before you do that, you would want to determine what use cases the feat should support, and what benefits you should give to each supported use case. Let me show one approach:

---

We have the posted pictured cool characters above: two one-handed weapons (one melee, one ranged). Use case A.

We have the "a single handcrossbow" case. Use case B.

You have another type of crossbow. Use case C.

You have another type of ranged weapon altogether (a bow). Use case D.

You have two one-handed ranged weapons (two hand crossbows). Use case E.

Use case F would, for completeness' sake, be two one-handed melee weapons, but let's scratch that, because that has nothing to do with this feat ;-)

---

Now, I would want the feat to enable use case A first and foremost. The feat should enable you to use your bonus action to make one ranged shot, in addition to your regular melee attacks. For this to be worth anyone's while, you need to be able to do this every round. For use case A, the bit about not being disadvantaged by melee foes seems perfectly reasonable (since you ARE in melee in the first place).

Use case B. For this scenario this feat is completely inappropriate and completely borks the entire fantasy foundation that D&D is built upon. Yes, really.

Use case C. While I don't personally feel the need, I can't say I'm overly bothered about allowing people to use a light or heavy crossbow to fire just as many times a bow can. So this is alright, I guess. However, this case should probably not allow fire in melee. (But read on...)

Use case D. While I'm not fond of it, I admit that the RAI is probably to allow Legolas style. But since I'm convinced it's overpowered as hell, my concession here and now (for use cases C+D) is that you can stab orcs in the eye with your arrow, but that this counts as a d4 weapon (plus your dexterity). A slight nerf in itself, and you might think "how petty". But a much more important and necessary nerf is that since this stabby-stabby arrow now counts as a melee attack, you can't use it with Sharpshooter!

Use case E. I want it to work. I understand if you don't. Either way, I can't say it is likely a concern for the designer, so I'll leave it be for this post.

---

What do we end up with. Something like this?

CROSSBOW EXPERT
* You ignore the loading quality of crossbows with which you are proficient.
* When you use the Attack action and attack with a onehanded melee weapon, you can use a bonus action to load and attack with a hand crossbow you are holding. Being within 5 feet of a hostile creature doesn’t impose disadvantage on this ranged attack roll.
* You can use arrows and bolts as finesse melee weapons you are proficient with. They use a d4 for damage. They remain ammunition, which means you draw them as part of an attack, and they are expended as usual​

(I meant to underline every change from the PHB feat. At least I hope I did)

The last third bullet part might need polishing. Let me explain and you can perhaps point out any wobbly language: the intent is for you to be able to freely draw each arrow, stab an orc, and the arrow is then used up. For your next attack you draw and use another arrow, etc (instead of a dagger being used and reused over and over).

As you can see, the only scenario where you can shoot freely when you are in melee is that off-hand hand crossbow shot using the bonus action.


To my mind this not only enables Prism's pictured character, it basically brings Crossbow Expert back into the light as a perfectly viable feat.

Zapp

 

[Yunru]

True. Though keeping track of the changes can be a hassle too. I'm not a big fan of changing or adding rules unless there is some major flaw in the game. I think in this case it's more getting a handle on encounters for the party than an actual problem with the rules themselves. I think we all find ourselves in the OP shoes from time to time, with a party that is tough to manage or finds some loophole/trick that they latch onto.

Man oh man would you hate me. I'm rewriting the entire PHB for my players. From small things like making the Dargonborn's breath weapon only take an attack (like grappling) rather than an action, to huge things like about 5 or so new Domains (and paths for the Clerics of said Domains).

 

[Satyrn]

Man oh man would you hate me. I'm rewriting the entire PHB for my players. From small things like making the Dargonborn's breath weapon only take an attack (like grappling) rather than an action, to huge things like about 5 or so new Domains (and paths for the Clerics of said Domains).

I read manduck as saying what he did from the perspective of him as a DM. He may be completely fine with it as a player.

I am, anyway, even though I can't be bothered with extensive house rules any more when DMing.

 

[Flamestrike]

How often do you do this? How often do you in essence use DM caveat to render their character choices moot and thus disempower the players and the choices they made? What percentage of the time?

Reasonably often.

Of course sometimes I go the other way and set up an encoutner to showcase those same choices (ground based monsters with weak ranged attacks vs flying PCs).

You've gotta mix it up and maken all builds and choices viable.

You dont, and this is why your PCs focus on the single (and repetative) tactics.

Remember its the DMs job to challenge the PCs. Its no different doing this (intentionally designing encounters that circumvent the parties strengths) when designing your encounters than it is 'ramping up the CR'. Youre just making the encounters more difficult (in this case via applying art in design over math).

Please don't forget that your way of defeating a powerful party was to design an environment they couldn't overcome with their own power.

And your way is to 'add more monsters/ ramp up the CR'. Whats the meaningful difference?

The advantage of simply adjusting encounter set up (instead of just making the monsters more powerful/ more of them) is you avoid rocket tag, and ensure there is no 'one true way' to adventure. All builds and tactics are viable, and all builds and tactics have their chance to shine. No player ever gets comfortable.

Then when said party (parties) still crushed your encounters, to tell the people they ran it wrong and explain how you would have ran it.

No; I expect some encounters to be crushed. Its not individual encounters that are the challenge (any more than individual rounds are the challenge); its navigating the entire adventuring day and completing the quest thats the challenge. Encounters and combat rounds are part of the overall challenge of completing the quest.

By mixing up your encounters that adventuring day (a solo creature, a mook heavy encounter, one with intresting terrain, one that hits the PCs where they least expect it, one where they get the drop on the monsters, one with casters, one with high HP, one with high AC, a social encounter etc etc) they all get a chance to shine over the adventuring day.

The reason your PCs use the same tactics over and over again, is due to the way you build, place and structure your encounters. These arent maths considerations, they're DM choices.

Doing the same thing over and over again is boring. Mix up your encounters via design (and not simply maths). Make your players think (including thinking outside the square from time to time).

I do admit it was a cool encounter set up. And the end encounter was a monster. Most of the earlier encounters were easy and did not take the level of resources you claimed.

The early encounters were [medium-hard]. This means the expectation was the PCs should be able to overvome them (defeat them) inside of a few rounds with an approximate 10 percent resource drain.

Remember individual encounter difficulty wasnt the challenge. The challenge was navigating the entire adventuring day with enough gas in the tank to complete the quest.

This factor in turn makes the encounters more difficult, and makes the use of a spell/ action surge/ rage etc more meaningful. The players have no idea how many encounters they need to over come before their next long rest. Accordingly they hold back on using them. This in turn makes the encounters more difficult (they cant afford to nova).

If I was DMing that adventure, I would have been able to use a few other DMing tricks. Not giving my players more than 2-3 seconds to declare actions (or they take the dodge action and their turn ends). Placing minis on the board in an encounter map within 30-60'. Managing the encounter by fudging a few dice rolls up or down. And tons of other things.

Plus the players wouldnt have had the advance knowledge that it was going to be 6-8 encounters, with the encounter stats and set up explained to them beforehand. They would have been going in blind.

If you were running some of our parties and players, you've already stated you would have quit those parties because you don't like min-max players that focus heavy on mechanics and demand the DM play a certain way.

I never said that and thats totally not true.

I have no problem with min-maxing. None at all. I encourage it at my table.

I have a problem with (as you put it) 'CN murder-hobos that have no reason to bite on any DM hook, have no connection to anything in the game world so the DM cant bait them into an adventure'

This isnt the stormwind fallacy, but at my table I expect good rules knowledge, mechanically good characters (min max away) AND well fleshed out characters with alignments, background, flaws and personality.

If you want to play a 2 dimensional murderhobo, do it at another table.