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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Willie the Duck" data-source="post: 8724456" data-attributes="member: 6799660">I mean, if it works. My point about 3.5 was that there were so many options for the good-against/bad-against comparisons (weapons could be magical or not; bludgeoning, piercing, or slashing; regular, silver, cold-iron, adamantine, or outlier/other; lawful, chaotic, good, evil, or potentially more than one), with so many types of weapons needed to cover all potential bases, that oftentimes people simply didn't. Either they sought out/spent the money on the omni-typed option ('sure-striking,' I think it was called); muscled  past the DR with 2-H uber-charging power-attacks; or found a method of attack which didn't interact with this system at all (spell damage, for instance). Mind you, a lot of this is system-specific (3e had DR rather than total-immunity, sure-striking was an option, uber-charging PA is a good option to begin with, non-weapon damage types are a thing), but the generalized point of needing to carefully balance X-required-for-Y effects to see that they actually incentivize the playstyle you were hoping to cultivate applies more universally.I mean, it can/could do that, but I don't know that it did (either with 3e's golf bag, or oD&D/AD&D's Weapon vs. Armor golf bag). It seems to me that at least part of the time, it encouraged people to figure out how to play golf with a pool cue, or to convince the group that they didn't want to play golf in the first place (or however you want to frame groups just ignoring the weapon vs armor tables).Part of this is going to come down to other aspects of the given editions (and the consequences these had on the weapon-choice systems). I think WvsAC was doomed once the overall buyer for oD&D wasn't going to be wargamers. However, variable weapon damage (I'm not going to carry around this military pick to supplement my sword against low-ac enemies if it does 1d6/1d4 instead of 1d8/1d12') and magic items in general (which give pluses to hit at any AC and give damage bonuses) went a long way to finishing them off. For 3e, in addition to the issues I mentioned above , there's also the issue of magic marts (I know, in no way a universal thing). These could mean that, even if you were making the PCs fill a golf bag, most of it (minus the odd +1 axiomatic silver flail they picked up in-dungeon) could still be the same basic weapons type in which they were specialized. I think that's a big thing with 3e -- playing a martial was already enough of a challenge, and the best options were to generally to find a specialized build like 2H-weapon charger, 2-weapon fighting finesse crit-fisher, spiked chain trip-spammer, archer, etc. That really incentivized focus on, if not a specific weapon (excepting the spike chain builds), at least a narrow type (two-handers, dual-weildables, finessable, etc.).I think the games/era where this worked best was 1e (pre UA, and with the apparent common pre-UA situation of the group ignoring weapon proficiencies), and BX/BECMI (pre- or without- BECMI Master Set weapon mastery rules). There was little in the way of PC builds, you weren't going to be str- or dex-focused (all fighters want as good as they can in both), you could switch from weapon-and-shield to bow to 2h melee as a strategy as you found cool weapons of said types, and you didn't have to wait 1-4 levels for a new proficiency when you did find a nice one. There also wasn't (much of any language encouraging the assumption of) magic marts, so you made do with what you found. Beyond that, there were several enemies where having B, P, or S weapon type mattered even without caring about enemy armor type -- skeletons where an arrow did 1 pt., oozes which would just split in half to a sword cut, etc.5e (or a homebrew mod to it, where one adds back in extreme piercing resilience to skeletons, etc.) has some ability to capitalize on the same ideas. Less magic mart language. Sure there are 'builds,' but with the exception of Crossbow Expert and Polearm Master*, you don't really make weapon-specific builds. You do make attribute-specific ones, though, and fighting styles put you in the same 'narrow type' situation as 3e can. Also, like in all the WotC-era versions**, trying to change martial behavior by making them less effective in certain situations can have the potential effect of just encouraging people to play casters.*which, maybe not getting to use the best new magic weapon is part of the opportunity cost for these rather powerful feats**TSR era, even if the balance was imperfect, you still needed both fighters and MUs in the partyIn general, though, I think you are right. 5e is well suited for this kind of modification, and it does address a real issue I've noticed where there isn't any treasure I want to give out (as in, won't destabilize the game) that the PCs will actually look forward to getting.or +0 flaming slingstones (ammunition is great as a treasure find, and slingstones means you aren't just using them with the +3 bow).</blockquote>

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