D&D 5E Replacing Damage-On-A-Miss

[Falling Icicle]

What about instead of damage-on-a-miss, there was damage-on-a-near-miss? For example:

Great Weapon Fighting: While wielding a two-handed melee weapon, if you miss your attack roll by 5 or less, you deal damage to the target equal to your Strength modifier (minimum 1).

This would keep the spirit of DoaM while still making it possible to miss a target entirely.

 

[dd.stevenson]

I would like to see something that allows another cleave-like attack: like, say, if you miss you can make another attack against another adjacent enemy.

 

[Jester David]

There's no shortage of fun mechanics you could add onto GWF.

A cleave ability would work and fits the idea of a giant sword.
Rerolling "1"s on a hit would be nice without increasing maximum damage.
The ability to lunge forward and increase your range for one attack.

 

[Minigiant]

How about this.

If you make a disengage action, you may make a single attack with a weapon weilded in two handed. This weapon must hay the two handed or versatile property.

AKA Backing up and poking with Zangief

 

[Ichneumon]

I remember many complaints about the 4e cleave at-will, because the extra damage bypasses AC and hence you could kill Asmodeus by surrounding him by first level fighters cleaving rats from sacks.

The "cleaving rats from sacks" trick was vetoed very early on, and there's a rule in the 4e DMG that says the cleave must be triggered by a strike on a viable opponent.

Asmodeus suffering some auto-damage is less important than Asmodeus having options to counter it.

 

[JamesonCourage]

I kind of like any remaining damage being applied to a creature adjacent to you, as long as your attack would hit their AC. It's like a cleave. So, if you're fighting kobolds (say, 5 HP each), and you hit for 18 damage, you could kill one (5 HP), cleave-kill another (10 HP), cleave-kill a third (15 HP), and wound a fourth (3 HP). It'd make high level 2H Fighters devastating against minions, and still useful against bigger foes (no wasted damage). Lots of room there, I think.

It'd also mean that he'd want to target low-AC foes more often (for the cleave to auto-hit the lower ACs). Not sure if that's necessarily good or bad, but I like how it feels. The guy with the giant maul or sword or axe is better at hitting large amounts of lesser people (though he ain't bad against the big guy with minions, either).

 

[GSHamster]

Maybe I missed something in 5E's development, but what was wrong with having 2H weapons just deal more damage than 1H weapons?

I mean, it seems to be taken as an axiom in this discussion that 1H+shield is better than 2H. Where is this coming from?

 

[Thyrwyn]

Advantage on the Damage dice gets very wonky when you combine it with the Great Weapon Master Feat (take -5 to hit, add weapon damage and STR bonus again). But the re-roll 1's or 2's mechanic clearly makes weapons with multiple damage dice superior to those with only one:

d10 (re-roll 1's or 2's) does an average of 6 damage (3-10 from the first roll, 1-10 from the second, if necessary);
2d6 (re-roll 1's or 2's) does an average of 8 damage (6-12 from the first roll, 2-12 from the second, if necessary.

The d10 gains only .5 damage, the 2d6 gain 1.5 damage.

Whereas with advantage, the d10 averages ~8, and the 2d6 average ~9, for gains of ~2.5 and ~2 respectively. I think. . . .

So I think I prefer advantage on damage. . .

 

[Ruzak]

Advantage on your damage roll, if you hit.

This is what I came up with for my system, so I am a big fan.

On another note, Cybit has hinted he likes whatever has replaced this in the latest closed play test.

 

[EnglishLanguage]

Best solution: Leave Damage on a miss in, add an alternate GWF option for people who don't like DoaM.