If it's the vast majority, then that's close enough to be automatic. There are exceptions (like the rogue daggermaster), but they just prove the rule.
It's not the best first feat, but by paragon level, any [W]-dealers should have made the upgrade.
How ubiquitous is the Superior Weapon feat?
- Thread starter sev
- Start date
It's not the best first feat, but by paragon level, any [W]-dealers should have made the upgrade.
renau1g
First Post
I think it was definitely more of an automatic earlier on the in the life of 4e, but now there's tons and tons of options that tug me away from bastard sword as a fighter. Barbarians and rangers surely want a superior weapon as they're Damage dealers, but my defender doesn't need that extra bit of damage over say Mark of Warding to improve my mark. The enemy taking a -1 additional to hit is a greater threat than a +1-2 damage on the triggered mark
DracoSuave
First Post
Damage doesn't overcome obstacles in skill challenges, it doesn't improve mobility that gets you into better positions to deal damage, and it works on a scale that is non-linear when it comes to attack avoidance.
If an enemy has 72 hit points, for example, raising your damage from 1 to 2 will avoid 36 hits. Which isn't bad. Then from 2 to 3 will mean you avoid 12 more hits. Also not bad...
But you're dealing with different numbers and scale. If you're doing, on average, 12 damage, and you bump it up to thirteen, you go from needing 6 attacks, to 5.whatever. But that gets rounded up to 6 because even 5.001 attacks to defeat something still means one more attack after 5.
So, at a greater level of attack power, you're avoiding lesser and lesser attacks by increasing damage (which increases linearly) or chance to hit. Eventually, to avoid attacks, you have to start making it harder for incoming attacks to come in.
SageofMusic
First Post
Two words: difficult terrain.
AbdulAlhazred
Legend
There are plenty of classes for which its a meaningless option and indeed it isn't the greatest option for any number of weapon using classes either.
STR cleric has basically no reason to want to use a superior (or even military) weapon since Maces have by far the best enchantments for their use. Considering only one-handed options yes they can get a +1 to-hit and about 1 extra damage per W with melee attacks. The extra accuracy is nice but they aren't primarily attacking to do damage and having access to certain weapon enchantments is worth the slight reduction.
There are plenty of other builds that can say the same thing. Polearm based fighter and warden builds using glaives or halberds for instance. Some tempest fighters and a lot of warlords really don't need them either. For a lot of these builds its more the feat you take after you've got everything else more useful.
Looked at analytically a superior weapon isn't even close to being the most optimum feat to pick up for a LOT of fighters until pretty far down the road.
Not a lot. You summed it up well despite your intentions. The odd glaive guy out of the teeming multitude of fullblade and bastard sword and mordenkrad guys. That sort of catty-corner case.
If a player cares about his rider effects to the degree that he thinks he shouldn't care about boosting damage, he's on slippery ground. My bard uses a greatbow, and even with many of his attakcs being implement-based, it's easily one of the best feats I ever invested in.
This isn't the one to dig your heels in on.
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You certainly can't ignore defenses completely. You need a decent chance of getting missed by attacks against AC and you need a modicum of party healing. But beyond that, emphasizing defense over offense is an inefficient strategy. A typical D&D encounter isn't a near-TPK situation, but almost every encounter can degenerate into a slog. Maximize offense and get things on the ground rapido. Superior weapons play a big part in that.
AbdulAlhazred
Legend
Not really at low levels. Run the numbers. Sure there are ARE a very few specific builds where it can make a pretty good difference, but for the vast majority you're talking 3-4 extra damage per encounter during the lower half of heroic tier. Even the top half of heroic tier its only modestly more favorable.
Actually its not 'a few corner cases' where this is true either. Again, run the numbers. A sword and board fighter for instance, very little reason to switch from longsword to bastard sword early on. Weapon Expertise and Weapon Focus, not to mention OA and CC enhancing feats and shield enhancing feats are probably all higher priority.
Polearm fighters, as I mentioned earlier, these are not 'rare builds', they are a whole major subcategory of fighter builds and are quite common. Even Tempest fighters can do fine for a couple levels with military weapons and they're practically the poster child for picking up something superior. Still you can argue that certain mobility feats and such can be just as advantageous.
Honestly, I've seen entire groups with well-built characters where 4 out of 5 had no use for superior weapons. Its quite situational and not as prevalent as you might think. Its possible the group(s) you play in particularly like to play specific builds that benefit a lot from superior weapons, but its just not the case for all groups.
Obryn
Hero
I can see Weapon Expertise, without a doubt, taking priority for many characters. (Or Versatile, yes, Draco.)
But, all things being equal, a weapon-primary heroic-level PC is better off with a Superior Weapon than with Weapon Focus. If you have even one 2[W] power, or if your Superior weapon is more valuable than a +1 to average damage, the math is easy for Superior, IMO. At Paragon, the situation changes if most of your powers are 1[W], and at Epic ... well, you have both by now, more than likely.
-O
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