Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="James Gasik" data-source="post: 8976924" data-attributes="member: 6877472">The argument is that it's safer to be a ranged damage dealer than a melee damage dealer.  You can easily build a character who can deal nearly as much damage as a melee guy, use Dexterity as your primary ability score instead of Strength (YMMV, but many people see this as an advantage), have close to the same AC and durability as a front liner, but can more easily elude melee attacks, have greater ability to select targets in combat, and be less likely to deal with the consequences of being in melee, such as reaction counterattacks, damaging auras, enemies that harm you for attacking them due to being on fire or covered in acid, deathsplosions (enemies who blow up upon demise), etc., etc..  Depending on monster choices, being a melee character can be quite miserable.  Combat starts, you might have to dash or wait for enemies to close to you, while the archer is picking off whatever target they like.  People like to talk about the Monk's mobility, for example, and how they can rush to the back line, but an archer build can start attacking the back row the instant they see an enemy.Add to that the fact that, due to improper use of soft cover, most archers get a +2 bonus to hit over everyone else, making their attacks much less likely to miss.  Then there are other considerations, like Rogues being able to inflict their full sneak attack damage at range, or Battlemasters dropping Maneuvers on distant foes, keeping them from being able to act effectively.And with Crossbow Expert, you can basically be a switch hitter, since you don't particularly care if someone actually does close with you, since you can still keep pumping out damage without penalty (or alternately, a Rogue can just bonus action Disengage).</blockquote>

Verification