Making Weapon Finess a Freebie?

[Viktyr Gehrig]

I use Armor as DR and leave Strength as the default to-hit ability-- for the reasons I listed above.

Thinking about it, though, using that rule imposes quite a bit on Dex fighters, so I may make Finesse default for finessable weapons.

 

[reanjr]

Actually, wasn't there an rpg (Rolemaster maybe?) where your to-hit bonus was derived from both Strength and Dexterity (agility in that game, if I remember correctly)?

Given the abstraction of D20, though, D&D uses a similar system for finessed weapons. Dex determines how often you hit, but Str determines how hard. So, in that sense, D&D works like that to a certain extent.

 

[Psimancer]

Actually, wasn't there an rpg (Rolemaster maybe?) where your to-hit bonus was derived from both Strength and Dexterity (agility in that game, if I remember correctly)?

Actually both Rolemaster & Runequest did this... both systems also used percentile dice to resolve actions, but they needed to due to the granularity of the stat modifiers to weapon skills.

Rolemaster, for instance, averaged St, St & Ag or Ag, Ag & St (depending on the weapon type), to get the bonus to hit (Ag = Agility). Runequest did something similar. Both systems were just way too complex, Rolemaster in particular…

Overall, d20 goes an abstract (and to a certain extend, elegant) route over realism, and it works – more-or-less…

 

[Khorod]

I had a thought about this recently.

"At character creation you can declare yourself a Finesse Fighter. This means you must apply your Dextery modifier instead of your Strength modifier, regardless of how they change over time."

"Weapon Finesse is still available, and anyone who takes this feat may choose whether or not to use Dexterity on Finesseable weapons."

This lets the speedy characters really devote themselves to the fighting style that their stats dictate without paying a price, but leaves them as badly off as a character whose strength just got busted on the same weapons.