Paul Farquhar
Legend
If you actually use encumbrance, no one would have a strength of 8.
My first Homebrew attempt to fix the elven dex fighter/rapier and bow all too frequent build in my campaign: I need some advice!
I have and did, and I regretted it regularly.
My character could barely carry their gear, let alone any loot.
Last edited:
Inchoroi
Adventurer
I dunno.
Does DEX take too big a piece of the pie? Sure.
Do I think it really needs to be fixed? No, not really. I've never seen it in any of my campaigns become an issue, except once, when 5e first came out. It was a DEX battlemaster fighter with a bow, but she had the Sharpshooter feat, and we all watched in annoyance as she did so much more damage than all the rest of us.
Does DEX take too big a piece of the pie? Sure.
Do I think it really needs to be fixed? No, not really. I've never seen it in any of my campaigns become an issue, except once, when 5e first came out. It was a DEX battlemaster fighter with a bow, but she had the Sharpshooter feat, and we all watched in annoyance as she did so much more damage than all the rest of us.
The Crimson Binome
Hero
What it's really saying is that light-weight boxers aren't as competitive against heavy-weight boxers, and I'm really okay with that message. All else being equal, the bigger boxer should win, because size is a very important factor in boxing. That's why boxers are organized into weight categories.
If you want light armor to be real armor, like a gambeson, then you could also just give them a +2 AC bonus when not wearing armor. That's not a super important part of the concept.
The Crimson Binome
Hero
Were they viable in 3E? You could still hit, if you took a feat for it, but you wouldn't deal enough damage to matter, since you didn't have Sneak Attack. I distinctly remember seeing a lot of level 10 characters that dealt 1d6+2 damage with a rapier, next to the other level 10 fighters that did 2d6+10 with a greatsword (before Power Attack).
The Man in Black always struck me as more of a pure rogue, or possibly fighter/rogue multi-class.
Cap'n Kobold
Hero
I think some of the conflict that you might be having is that you're conflating skill (5e proficiency bonus) with Dex, and bulk with 5e Strength.
Dexterity is grace, balance, reflexes. All useful in a fight, but generally defensively for avoiding attacks and preventing yourself be placed in a vulnerable position. Strength is athleticism and the ability to generate force. Also good in a fight due to granting speed and control of your weapon, as well as your body.
Both Conan and Bruce Lee are examples of characters with both high Str and high Dex.
To me, D&D monks are the mystics (or cheaters). They use magic to enhance their capabilities, removing the need for mundane training or an athletic physique.
Conan is the Fighter or Barbarian, using armour, weapons and martial arts.
Aaand the Mountain is a lumbering stereotype, not only literally musclebound, but also given an oversize weapon to accentuate how slow and clumsy he is.
ClaytonCross
Kinder reader Inflection wanted
So I actually sword fight every weekend with real metal swords (that have dull edges) for fun. Dexterity, balance, reflexes are offense as mush at they are defense. Balance = form and form generates power, sure strength does too but someone who lifts weights but has no form can have less power with sword strikes than someone who has the balance and dexterity to move quickly into good form under their opponent reducing the effectiveness of strength. Reflexes can be used to dodge but they a can also be used to make the right counter attack for strike an opening without hesitation granting more effective attacks while being able to block.
I know IRL is a horrible place of example for games, but we are talking about my perspective which is colored by my experience. My experience says with a light back balanced bladed weapon where edge alignment is important, we get fighters that try and force the battle with strength and they typically lose badly. When you put them in plate that changes. A strong man in plate is a terror.. but I will get to that in response to your next statement.
So the thing with the Mountain is that is stereotype is widely effective. Even the over sized weapon is and advantage not a disadvantage. The "movie magic" is that when The Mountain fights that stick guy he fights like an idiot suddenly. I have used a synthetic executioner sword and it was quickly ban because they are insanely hard to block and because even in armor I was hurting my fellow fighters. It was basically deemed cheating and too dangerous to train with. Why? Over size swords are way heavier and more forward balanced, they are basically sword shaped clubs. They are more similar to heavy baseball bats than longswords. Which actually makes them perfect for strong man weapons like Conan and the Mountain. Being a sword in stead of a heavy club is just aesthetics. The problem I have is when they make them slow and stupid. You don't chop the ground with them like they did in the fight because the heavy blade stopping in a down position is slower count to pickup than a grace, balance, reflex weapon like a standard longsword appropriate the wielder. To avoid that you don't swing striate down you make arch's to the sides. You can strike over head to low but you do it from right to left or left to right and pull the hilt to the waste in order to shorten the long blade in front of you so that a your faster, balanced, fighters trying to use reflex to strike at you open back are out of measure because they are at the point of your much longer sword which is too heavy to parry with a "finesse weapon".
Monks might cheat to enhance themselves Naruto style.. sure. I like that idea. That does mean the armor might just be in the way of doing that. Also, it does not deny they are fights who focus on grace, balance, and trained reflex AKA skill. Bruce Lee was not week but it power was form training and approach based on speed, angles of attack, and knowing how to counter attacking the ear while blocking with for arm of the of the same strike. Their is a sword strike master cut called "schielhau" (Means squinting strike in German I am told) which is basically the same thing as Bruce Lee's deflect an strike and punch the ear with one strike, but while holding as sword. I have use it. Its a finesse block and attack where form is more important than strength because its a weak edge strike intended to make the opponent "squint" because you just hit them in the head with your sword. It might not kill them but it hurts and might cause the target to pause which is a timing opening for another strike. Which you will reflexively take advantage of because of muscle memory from training.
ClaytonCross
Kinder reader Inflection wanted
Bad example as boxing doesn't allow kicking, grappling, and arm bars which are basically necessities of weaker opponents against stronger ones (that and getting under a lifting taller larger opponents but while that is in boxing they just us it to punch they don't off balance another boxer grab his leg and force him to the ground), but your saying a Stronger fighter will always win. That is not the case. Sure being strong is an advantage but form reflex training, lines of approach, knowing moves and counters make a huge difference. In MMA and wrestling style strength still matters but its not an end all be all or you would know who is going to win every fight at weigh in.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CI4L0qNMshM
Their are times with the weaker smaller fighter wins. Sure David vs Goliath was ranged vs melee but "Dexterity" matters as does "constitution" because winning a fight is about finding advantages and exploiting them. If you want to say strength is the "greatest advantage" I will not argue against that however if you want to say strength is the only thing that should matter... I find that too far. I don't always want to be Conan, sometimes I want to be Jet Lee. Would Conan beat Jet Lee in fist fight? I would lean to Arnold Schwarzenegger sure put a greatsword in Arnolds hands and a lighter Katana, Longsword, or Chinese Jian... I really think Arnold Should run because Jet Lee has spent a large part of his life learning to be skilled with fists and swords but Arnold has focused on strength. Put Arnold I full plate and Jet Lee should maybe run. If strength is under rated in D&D its from the perspective that Plate Armor is scale very week compared to real world fights where a skill swordsman against a random large strong person will find his sword going dull and "week spots" are still covered in chain mail or very small.
If you want to promote strength by nerfing Dex, let heavy armor reduce non-magical damage from dex based attacks by AC-10 points of damage. So Ring mail -4, Chain mail -6, Splint mail -7, and Plate -8 minimum 0. Don't ignore that non-strength based fighters exist.
Sure, but I don't see any problem with the Dex + Wisdom for AC method now. It already requires 2 stats instead of just strength so its much harder to increase. Where Strength you just buy better armor or pull it off a dead enemy or the uninjured part sections of several enemies. The truth is Dex is not broken for combat and people picking the Jet Lee style over the Arnold/Conan style is just that a style choice.
cbwjm
Seb-wejem
This is true. I was playing around with character creation on D&D beyond and decided to turn on variant encumbrance for my Strength 8 wizard. After giving him his gear using the starting gear in the PHB, I removed the hemp robe, the torches, and reduced rations from 10 to 5 days. He was still overweight (42lbs, needed 40 or less to be unaffected be weight) and had his speed reduced to 20 feet. If people used the variant encumbrance rules, you would definitely see higher strength scores.. or more pack mules. Problem is, recording and calculating weight is a major pain. Without DNDbeyond or other sheet to autocalculate, I don't think I'd want to bother with it.
ClaytonCross
Kinder reader Inflection wanted
Two weapon fighting with dex in 5e could let you attack 10 times in one round 5 at 1d8+5 and 5 at 1d4+5 (you could nullity all off hand penalties with fighting styles and feats) , but it required dex with a minimum of a light offhand weapon. So you had a lot of longsword + dagger combos because their was no restriction on the main except it was one handed.
Strength may have had 2d6 + 10 but that's pretty much the same as 1d8+5 AND 1d4+5 repeated the same number of times. On top of that as a ranger each hit got bonus damage vs any of my 4 or 5 favored enemies that sailed up to +10. Which changed my damage against... humans, undead, aberrations, and dragons to 1d8+15 ANd 1d4+15 x 5 which made me very respectful for damage. That said, our fighter an Wizard had their tricks too so it felt pretty level not like one of was strictly superior. The mage one when enemies grouped to fire ball spam, but me and the strength based fighter were on par with each other, I believe I was better on extremely week enemies attacking multiple targets the fighter was better for middle strength mentions they would knock down and kill, but bosses were pretty well distributed.
Maybe other have different experiences but the biggest difference was the strength fighter had a higher AC early on and I generally played support damage and sheathed to casters/archers hiding around corners and taking pot shots. Partly because I had some speed bonus though I don't remember from what.
Similar Threads
