hawkeyefan
Legend
It isn't also worth noting that in 5e, it is rare for combat to go above 5 rounds with 3 to 5 being the most common. Since the vast majority of combat encounters do not start with enemies already engaged at melee range, the archer who wishes to threaten OAs will not typically need to be armed for melee combat in the first round. Since weapons can simply be picked up after a battle is over, even an archer who is "cheesing" the item interaction rules to draw a weapon every turn to provoke OA, should need no more than 4 melee weapons.
My combats often go longer than 3 to 5 rounds, especially when there is a lot of ranged combat involved. Cover and readied actions tend to come into play a lot in those instances.That tends to slow things down. It's also helped my players not panic if they have to spend a turn just moving into position or taking some other non-attack action (the horror!).
So the ammo factor rarely comes up in my game anyway because of this, but if I had crossbow guys running around shooting like Han Solo with a blaster, I might pay closer attention to ammo, and try and rein in anything that was excessive.
Anyone have any examples of ways they've fixed this problem, or has that taken a backseat to arguing whether there is a problem?
There have been a few solutions proposed. Some folks reduce the effectiveness of ranged-oriented feats. Others have redesigned feats. I suggested the possibility of dropping feats entirely. Any of these could work, depending on the severity of the issue for a specific table.
I also mentioned earlier in the thread that a first step would be for a DM to try and manage the encounter a bit to balance things out. Don't let there be unobstructed views of all enemies at all times, use enemies that also have effective ranged attacks and combine them with other types of enemies.
It all depends on if the table is experiencing these issues, and if so, how much of an issue they are.
Why do people think the archer needs multiple weapons in order to threaten OA's? Last I checked, picking up something up off the ground was covered under the "one free object interaction" and dropping it was a free action. If the archer didn't move after dropping the weapon, it should still be there to pick up.
(Not that it isn't cheese, I just think it's even cheesier than people seem to think it is. )
Now with more cheese than before!
Ugh....all I can say is I'm glad I don't have players that try this kind of crap at my table. It's such an obvious exploit of the rules that I'd dismiss it out of hand...and I usually try not to just dismiss things like that.