D&D (2024) New One D&D Weapons Table Shows 'Mastery' Traits

The weapons table from the upcoming Unearthed Arcana playtest for One D&D has made its way onto the internet via Indestructoboy on Twitter, and reveals some new mechanics. The mastery traits include Nick, Slow, Puncture, Flex, Cleave, Topple, Graze, and Push. These traits are accessible by the warrior classes.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Some of these mastery options are going to be useless for my groups. Now that we've moved to offhand attacks not requiring your bonus action, no way are we going back, weapon mastery or no.

If every class that should regularly dual wield gets an option to dual wiel with no bonus action, I am ok with it.

Ranger: twf fighting style: you master weapons with the nick property on top.

Rogue: you are master of the dagger.

Wizard dual wielding daggers: sorry, you need to use a bonus action.

Would also help keeping compatibility with the old TWF rule. Probably not the worst idea.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

Flex is magnitudes weaker than everything else, and of course the longsword is stuck with that. So the longsword gets done dirty yet again.

I am not so sure of that. 1d10 damage and a shield will be ok. Bastard sword and dwarven waraxe were liked in 3.5

 

[Baumi]

I hope they recheck the balance of some of the Weapons like the light Hammer vs. Handaxe. But it certainly sound interesting.

 

[Shardstone]

Great ideas, excited for the packet. 1dnd proves so far to be the game for me.

 

[Bluenose]

Renaissance maybe not, but in the middle ages I'm betting there'd be a load more levied peasants carrying spear and shield than there would have been knights or other professional warriors with other weapons. Basic low-cost default weapon loadout through the ages.

Two handed pole arms, not spear and shield.

Loads of spear-and-shield infantry around up to the the 15th century. Less later on, pikes become dominant in infantry fights and against plate-armoured men-at-arms you really needed something with more punch than a single-handed weapon could provide. But D&D doesn't care about the latter and the former is more an issue on the battlefield.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

If so, one consequence of this will be that Rogues will still often do a Fighter dip. That would be a shame.

yeah, if weapon mastery is a level 1-3 fighter feature (or martial or warrior set what ever) I just see that making the dip more likely unless you give them things that scale...

I can't wait for the 'hexblade 13/divine soul sorcerer 3/paladin 2/fighter 2' builds that will pop up so you can cast a ton of spells, and use cha for attacks... (then again the number of Hexblade X/ Cha caster Y are already high)

 

[GMforPowergamers]

Spear and shield still looks rubbish despite being possibly the most commonly used melee fighting style in history. Sadface.

yeah I watch a bunch of historians on youtube and tic tok that also game (TTRPG and/or Videogame) that complain that the most effective and most used combo is so under represented.

 

[Reef]

I really like the idea of these. Adding a little extra oomph for mastery is a great idea, and adding to weapon differentiation is a good thing. Obviously we’ll have to see the full details, but on first glance this idea gets a thumbs up for me.

I’m not too worried about level dips into fighter to get this. Anyone thinking about that was probably already doing so for Action Surge and Fighting Styles. And no one said it had to be a level 1 thing. If they put it at level 3 (with the archetype choice), that would curtail a lot of dipping. They might just allow people to take Mastery in a particular weapon as a feat to avoid that as well.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

I really like the idea of these. Adding a little extra oomph for mastery is a great idea, and adding to weapon differentiation is a good thing. Obviously we’ll have to see the full details, but on first glance this idea gets a thumbs up for me.

yeah I can't wait to see how this goes...

I’m not too worried about level dips into fighter to get this. Anyone thinking about that was probably already doing so for Action Surge and Fighting Styles. And no one said it had to be a level 1 thing. If they put it at level 3 (with the archetype choice), that would curtail a lot of dipping. They might just allow people to take Mastery in a particular weapon as a feat to avoid that as well.

yup... and maybe they even will scale. Something like "At level 3 you access mastery of the weapon, at level 7 and 14 you choose ones to apply to ANY weapon, until level 11 you can only use 1 at a time but at level 11 you can use 2"

 

[Kobold Stew]

It depends on what level the fighter gets the free mastery at, I suppose. I don't think it'd be likely to be in the first couple of levels, which would probably largely eliminate the temptation to dip.

I predict it will be at a low level, though, on par with Expertise: 1 or 2 for sure (3 is the subclass, 4 the feat, 5 the extra attack, and 6 will be too late).