D&D (2024) Rogue Weapon mastery and Pact weapons

[Charlaquin]

Good points, but I figure if WotC is going to break 5.5, then the players might as well break it too.

I don’t know what this means

 

[pukunui]

nvm

 

[ECMO3]

Good points, but I figure if WotC is going to break 5.5, then the players might as well break it too.

@ECMO3, if "ask your DM" isn't good enough, try this: Would the other players say your build isn't fair? Will true-agonizing-sneak-attack be the only action you take in combat?

Well my DM in 2 of the 3 games I am a player in will probably ask me how it should be, in the 3rd game the DM will let me do whatever I want, in the 4th game I am playing I am the DM.

Is it fair? Well true-strike AB is less damage than EB/AB at most levels, less damage than a POB Warlock with extra attack invocations and less damage than most extra-attack options from other classes at most levels. The only thing it is objectively better than is when multiclassed with Rogue and comparing to a single class Rogue making a sneak attack from range. In that respect I think it is as fair as allowing Paladins, Wizards and Warlocks to play at the same table with Rogues when the former can do substantially more damage.

This use of the rules does not level the playing field in terms of damage and is not much of an advantage for anything other than a ranged Rogue. With a 20 casting stat and a 2-level Warlock dip, depending on level, you are talking about 1-12 damage more than a single class Rogue would do on a ranged sneak attack .... and less damage at most levels than a melee/dual wielding single-classed Rogue would do.

 

[GMMichael]

I don’t know what this means

I was referring to the interesting results of the 2024 changes discussed in this thread:

D&D (2024) - D&D 2024 Rules Oddities (Kibbles’ Collected Complaints)

Kibbles Tasty posted this over on Reddit but I thought it'd be great to have a copy over here on EN World. These are all their words and comments, not mine: Some of these are balancing issues. Some of these mistakes in the rules. Some of these exploits or loopholes. Some of these are just...

www.enworld.org

Why can't players come up with their own "oddities?"

Well my DM in 2 of the 3 games I am a player in will probably ask me how it should be, in the 3rd game the DM will let me do whatever I want, in the 4th game I am playing I am the DM.

Is it fair? Well true-strike AB is less damage than EB/AB at most levels, less damage than a POB Warlock with extra attack invocations and less damage than most extra-attack options from other classes at most levels. The only thing it is objectively better than is when multiclassed with Rogue and comparing to a single class Rogue making a sneak attack from range. In that respect I think it is as fair as allowing Paladins, Wizards and Warlocks to play at the same table with Rogues when the former can do substantially more damage.

This use of the rules does not level the playing field in terms of damage and is not much of an advantage for anything other than a ranged Rogue. With a 20 casting stat and a 2-level Warlock dip, depending on level, you are talking about 1-12 damage more than a single class Rogue would do on a ranged sneak attack .... and less damage at most levels than a melee/dual wielding single-classed Rogue would do.

That sounds like a green light to me!

 

[Charlaquin]

I was referring to the interesting results of the 2024 changes discussed in this thread:

D&D (2024) - D&D 2024 Rules Oddities (Kibbles’ Collected Complaints)

Kibbles Tasty posted this over on Reddit but I thought it'd be great to have a copy over here on EN World. These are all their words and comments, not mine: Some of these are balancing issues. Some of these mistakes in the rules. Some of these exploits or loopholes. Some of these are just...

www.enworld.org

Why can't players come up with their own "oddities?"

I don’t know how to explain that looking for exploits in the rules as written and changing the rules from how they were written to make them more exploitable are meaningfully different things… It seems entirely self-evident to me.

 

[Ashrym]

We already had this discussion with green-flame blade. Sage advice stated sneak attack does work with spells like that iirc.

 

[Charlaquin]

We already had this discussion with green-flame blade. Sage advice stated sneak attack does work with spells like that iirc.

That's a completely different interaction. Sneak Attack deals extra damage when you hit with an attack, and the effect of green flame blade includes making an attack. Agonizing Blast adds your spellcasting ability modifier to the damage you deal with a cantrip that deals damage. The question is not if True Strike counts as an attack (it absolutely does), it's if True Strike deals damage. And I think the text is pretty clear on the matter - it does not. It allows you to make an attack, and it modifies the properties of that attack (including what damage it deals). But the source of the damage is still clearly the attack, not the cantrip.

 

[ECMO3]

ck. Agonizing Blast adds your spellcasting ability modifier to the damage you deal with a cantrip that deals damage. The question is not if True Strike counts as an attack (it absolutely does), it's if True Strike deals damage. And I think the text is pretty clear on the matter - it does not. It allows you to make an attack, and it modifies the properties of that attack (including what damage it deals). But the source of the damage is still clearly the attack, not the cantrip.

The Cantrip upgrade specifically includes a damage component. Are you really arguing that the "Cantrip upgrade" is not part of the Cantrip?

Also if you want to get technical on semantics you need to use the actual wording. AB does not say it adds your spellcasting ability modifier to "a cantrip that deals damage"

What agonizing blast says is that "you can add your spellcasting ability modifier to that spell's damage rolls."

"That spell's damage rolls" is not the same thing as "a cantrip that deals damage"

The damage roll from the attack caused by Truestrike and the damage from the "Cantrip upgrade" are both part of the "spell's damage rolls".

 

[GMMichael]

That's a completely different interaction. Sneak Attack deals extra damage when you hit with an attack, and the effect of green flame blade includes making an attack. Agonizing Blast adds your spellcasting ability modifier to the damage you deal with a cantrip that deals damage. The question is not if True Strike counts as an attack (it absolutely does), it's if True Strike deals damage. And I think the text is pretty clear on the matter - it does not. It allows you to make an attack, and it modifies the properties of that attack (including what damage it deals). But the source of the damage is still clearly the attack, not the cantrip.

I'm gonna side with ECMO the third, here. True Strike may not have been a damage-dealing spell in the past, but the version quoted above is one that begins an attack and carries through to the end of that attack by adding extra damage if necessary. The attack is inseparable from the spell, therefore they are one and the same.

If the attack misses, well, it just wasn't a damage-dealing spell. If it hits, it was.

 

[Ashrym]

That's a completely different interaction. Sneak Attack deals extra damage when you hit with an attack, and the effect of green flame blade includes making an attack. Agonizing Blast adds your spellcasting ability modifier to the damage you deal with a cantrip that deals damage. The question is not if True Strike counts as an attack (it absolutely does), it's if True Strike deals damage. And I think the text is pretty clear on the matter - it does not. It allows you to make an attack, and it modifies the properties of that attack (including what damage it deals). But the source of the damage is still clearly the attack, not the cantrip.

I see it as a cantrip that does damage with a weapon attack as part of that damage. Here is the sage advice...

Can you use green-flame blade and booming blade with Extra Attack, opportunity attacks, Sneak Attack, and other weapon attack options?​

Introduced in the Sword Coast Adventurer’s Guide , the green-flame blade and booming blade spells pose a number of questions, because they each do something unusual: require you to make a melee attack with a weapon as part of the spell’s casting.

First, each of these spells involves a normal melee weapon attack, not a spell attack, so you use whatever ability modifier you normally use with the weapon. (A spell tells you if it includes a spell attack, and neither of these spells do.) For example, if you use a longsword with green-flame blade, you use your Strength modifier for the weapon’s attack and damage rolls.

Second, neither green-flame blade nor booming blade works with Extra Attack or any other feature that requires the Attack action. Like other spells, these cantrips require the Cast a Spell action, not the Attack action, and they can’t be used to make an opportunity attack, unless a special feature allows you to do so.

Third, these weapon attacks work with Sneak Attack if they fulfill the normal requirements for that feature. For example, if you have the Sneak Attack feature and cast green-flame blade with a finesse weapon, you can deal Sneak Attack damage to the target of the weapon attack if you have advantage on the attack roll and hit.

Truestrike follows this as well. The character uses the magic action to cast the spell and the weapon attack is made as part of that magic action.

Agonizing blast is applied to a known warlock cantrip that deals damage. Truestrike is a warlock cantrip that deals damage where the weapon attack is considered part of the casting of the spell as illustrated in the sage advice I quoted above.

Maybe someone from WotC will update that clarification. Right now it looks legit to me because truestrike counts as warlock cantrip that deals damage regardless of the fact a weapon attack is part of the casting of the spell is involved in that damage.