D&D 5E Passive or Active Fighting Styles?

[delph]

Dueling sounds good, but from raw meaning this word - 1 to 1 fight - I'd add to second part about disadvantage "when you haven't another enemy in 5 feet from you"

 

[DND_Reborn]

Dueling sounds good, but from raw meaning this word - 1 to 1 fight - I'd add to second part about disadvantage "when you haven't another enemy in 5 feet from you"

So you are thinking something along these lines?

"When a melee weapon attack is made against you, you can use your reaction to impose disadvantage on the attack. You must be aware of the attack to use this feature and you cannot have another hostile creature within 5 feet of you."

 

[DND_Reborn]

I can't read it all for now, but these fighting styles aren't from official resources, are they? Look great, but little OP, maybe as higher-level improvement.

Balance is a key point. I want something interesting, fun, etc. but I am not a power gamer (usually LOL) and think most characters are strong enough. But, I wanted to add something that is useful for all the styles but won't break the game. When you have time to check them out, if you see anything that you feel is just "too much", please share!

 

[DND_Reborn]

You absolutely need to have both active and passive characters options in the game. This is paramount, a key feature of 5e that enables different players at the same table, those who want to play a low-complexity game ("add this +1 here when levelling up, and it takes care of itself") and those who want a more tactical edge in having to choose what to use each turn.

There is a difference between complexity and power, however. If you want a more passive system, you can use the base feature for each style. For more complex play, add in the bonus actions and reactions. But, if you add them, by default you add power through those options.

To have a tiered-power systems that is passive and a system with options that without more power, you would have to have two separate systems completely.

So, I am using a "low-power-low-complexity" as the base and adding the action cost options for people who want more active styles with more features.

 

[DND_Reborn]

I have moved the revisions of styles to another thread: 5E - Updating Fighting Styles (Work in Progress)

 

[delph]

So you are thinking something along these lines?

"When a melee weapon attack is made against you, you can use your reaction to impose disadvantage on the attack. You must be aware of the attack to use this feature and you cannot have another hostile creature within 5 feet of you."

yes that's perfect. I'm not good in English and was not able to wrote it as good as you. And sounds me "real" In 1to1 you are able to act much more free than you have to be aware with more hostile creatures.

 

[Esker]

That's as good as a critical. Perhaps you could change the critical instead: "When you score a critical you roll one extra die."

It's about 42% as good as a critical if you're using a d12 weapon. Less if you're using 2d6 since you only get one extra die. But part of the goal was to close the gap between d12 and 2d6 weapons, and provide a style where d12 is actually a bit better.

 

[Quartz]

It's about 42% as good as a critical if you're using a d12 weapon

It's far better than that as it happens far more of the time.

and provide a style where d12 is actually a bit better.

d12 is fine for those who want a swingier result. You're far more likely to roll a 12 on a d12 than on 2d6. Three times more likely without styles.

 

[Li Shenron]

There is a difference between complexity and power, however. If you want a more passive system, you can use the base feature for each style. For more complex play, add in the bonus actions and reactions. But, if you add them, by default you add power through those options.

To have a tiered-power systems that is passive and a system with options that without more power, you would have to have two separate systems completely.

So, I am using a "low-power-low-complexity" as the base and adding the action cost options for people who want more active styles with more features.

That sounds unreasonable to me.

Have low-complexity passive options that are on par in terms of power with high-complexity active options, or slightly weaker to take into account the fact that high-complexity options require skills to be used effectively.

There can also be options in the middle, with both a small passive bonus and a small active feature.

That is how 5e is designed, for fighting styles or feats or subclasses etc., in order to let players with different preferences play together the same game.

 

[Esker]

It's far better than that as it happens far more of the time.

What I mean is that the average benefit is about 42% of the benefit of always getting a crit (well, a bit more than that if you let crit dice trigger it too), assuming you're not rolling any extra dice with your attack (this wouldn't apply to Hunter's Mark dice or Smite dice, or Superiority Dice, or whatever).

But that's factored in to the damage calculations I showed above: it increases your damage per hit by about 2.7 if you're using a 1d12 weapon. Factor in the fact that 1d12 weapons start 0.5 behind 2d6 weapons, plus the +1.33 damage that you get from GWF style using a greatsword as is, and the net boost is about 0.88 points of damage per hit over the previously most damaging option. In the context of a discussion of giving GWF style a boost, I don't think that's an unreasonable size of a boost.