D&D 5E Should Deadly Strike be a level feature?

[Stalker0]

There is a lot of talk currently around deadly strike.

My take is that deadly strike is basically a way to scale damage for weapon users across levels. Fair enough, and I actually like the new mechanic for it.

But my thought is, why not simply make it a factor of leveling instead of a class ability? Why not simply allow all 10th level characters to do 3W damage, similar to how it works for paragon and epic levels in 4e.

That way you don't have to keep repeating the text for specific classes, it ensures the weapon damage stays consistent with multiclassing, and if a wizard wants to hit a guy with a stick at 20th level he can still do some decent damage, but certainly not in the same ballgame as the martial classes.

thoughts:?

 

[Nemesis Destiny]

Makes sense to me.

 

[the Jester]

Because some classes should get it sooner than others; a fighter's deadly strike should be better, at the same level, than that of a cleric or rogue.

 

[Animal]

I don't like Deadly Strike.
It's not a real class feature. It's just a bonus damage dice you roll because... no reason other than patching cranky mechanics. Really hope it is a placeholder for something actually fun.

 

[Li Shenron]

I am not sure which way of the two would be better.

However, I am quite sure that Deadly Strike would be better renamed and presented as a general ability, whether all classes get it as the same level or at different levels.

The whole idea is simply that you get to roll the base weapon dice multiple times. Why giving it a dorky name?

 

[BobTheNob]

I dont mind deadly strike. We have learned through trial and error over a very long period of time that you can only scale numbers that affect d20 rolls so much before things start breaking down. If anything, this takes what was in 3.x bonus to hit and move a good amount of that into damage growth.

Might I also say, thank you thank you thank you for at last linking it to damage dice of the weapon. Love of hate this ability, at least they got that right.

I suppose that where my position comes from...I like it the way it is as its a nice enough passive representation of ability, therefore Im for class specific. Is in the final and best idea?...wellllll....I dunno. I think it would work and its the "least flawed" approach I have seen from the playtests so far (IMHO).

 

[Szatany]

I don't like Deadly Strike.
It's not a real class feature. It's just a bonus damage dice you roll because... no reason other than patching cranky mechanics. Really hope it is a placeholder for something actually fun.

I kinda agree with you. Bonus damage could be a function of attack bonus. For example, a simple rule that says that everybody gets +2 to damage for each point of attack bonus, or that for each point you beat target's AC you deal +2 or +5 or +X damage, or a rule that everyone can sacrifice any portion of attack bonus and get +5 to damage for each point. Don't know if that would make the game more enjoyable though.

The closes thing to deadly strike I can think of would be: Once per turn, for each point of attack bonus above +1 you have, you can roll an additional damage die when dealing weapon damage.

 

[Chris_Nightwing]

More damage dice should be a function of how well you fight with weapons, which is determined by your weapon attack bonus. Basically you have either a 'good', 'average' or 'non-existent' bonus to weapon attacks as you level, and the dice should follow that, rather than pretending to be a class feature to fill dead levels.

 

[1of3]

I'd go the other way: I'd like to see Skill Die increases and standard feat gains included in the class table. It isn't necessary to repeat the rule every time in full, but a reminder would be most useful.

And it's always useful to have a name for rules.

 

[DEFCON 1]

When 4E created a class advancement format that was exactly the same across all the classes in the game (IE the AEDU format) so that you could have one table that made it simple and easy to understand, we had half the gamer populace criticizing it for being too "cookie-cutter".

Now we have each class gaining abilities individually based upon the needs and numbers of the class itself... and we have people criticizing it for it being "haphazard".

You can't have it both ways.

Speaking personally... there are already plenty of consistencies in the game in terms of how classes gain abilities. For instance... the class levels at which clerics and wizards gain each new spell level, or the level at which all classes gain feats or ability score advances. Needing to have every other function in the game also do that seems to be way too limiting, and forces the design to cohere to standards for no actually useful reason.

What is actually gained by forcing damage dice to increase the same time attack bonus increases? Is it "cleaner"? Perhaps. But if the original way isn't exactly all that "dirty" to begin with... making it cleaner just moves it more towards "antiseptic". Which is what drove many people away from 4E to begin with.