HeapThaumaturgist
First Post
Actually there's no text that I can see that suggests the Javelin is in any way a two-handed weapon. It doesn't take a full-round-action to throw. That rule is for melee weapons without a range increment listed, such as a greatsword or greataxe.
Without any rules stating otherwise, you can draw and throw javelins with one hand, as far as I know. If you had TWF you could throw them two at a time. You could draw two of them, hold one in each hand, and take a 2-attack Full Attack Action, again, as far as I know, since I don't think there are any rules about passing an item from one hand to the next.
Drawing a javelin is a move action, throwing a standard action. This requires one hand. A greatsword-wielding character can take a hand off his sword (free action), draw a javelin (move action), throw the javelin (standard action), and return his hand to his weapon (free action). Same as drawing/throwing a throwing axe, as far as I can see. He's still melee ready. You just end up with fewer, because they are essentially a heavy ammunition.
My current character uses both javelins and a bow. I rarely use the bow. Have to drop the 2hander, pull the bow, use the bow ... then I can't move if I want to get my 2hander back because it is on the floor.
We have fought a dragon out-doors ... was better to get a Fly spell, but with the dragon's movement rate it came down to a stalemate ... it could fly past and use its breath every few rounds and nobody could catch it or try a flyby attack, but with our protections we took little actual damage from either and did about the same damage to the dragon, if not more. So we were pinging eachother. The dragon could retreat and wait for the buffs to wear off, but we could retreat somewhere the dragon couldn't reach. If the dragon got pinned down, it was going to eat the big melee damage, and every time it came past it was open to spells.
It's one of those oddities of D&D that things tend to narrow down to about <100' battlemaps. One, the game encourages miniature use, and at 5' = 1", it's hard to get much on there. Designers tend to establish encounters that can fit on the more common dining-room table, which is 5'x4' IIRC. That's about 300' x 240' for the biggest combat board your average game group can field, and that's leaving no room for books and sheets and snacks and stuff. "Big" battles seem to be 100'x100' square or less, most common encounters seem to be 25'-60' on a side.
Is that unfairly weighted toward melee combat? Yea, pretty much. Especially unfairly weighted against LARGE RANGE INCREMENTS. 30' increment really seems to be about the cherry increment. Not too short, not uselessly long.
What are the ranged guys doing? Skirmishing around the edges of the melee combat. Most are engaging within 20-30' of the melee. I see 10-to-1 "firing into melee" penalties to "range increment" penalties.
It can be argued that in a fair or perfect world, the guy with the 110' range increment could put the injury on somebody with a melee weapon. Sure. Hypothetically. But the designers don't put those sort of things in their games, nor the GMs. When they show up, it isn't an "average" combat ... that becomes the focus of the combat. The "Sniper" combat or the "Flying Islands" combat. They're set pieces. Like fighting on rope bridges over chasms and lava lakes.
Not that you can't make a very effective ranged combatant character. With feats and spells and abilities, you can be very effective. But it's not, that I've ever seen, "effective because the guy has to run over 300 feet of open ground or air to get at me". It is "effective somewhere outside of the foe's threat range". A bow-based character is just as effective, essentially, 5' outside of the foe's threat range as 105' outside of the foe's threat range. Their only worry is keeping the melee guy off them. If that means the party tank is keeping the monster from him, or that the guy has to cover 300' of open ground, it's essentially the same to the bowman.
More likely, the party is kicking down the "door" of a 25'x25' to 100'x100' room and beating the snot out of a collection of monsters in there. Lots of variations on the theme, but go through a dungeon magazine or review the last half-dozen combats in your home game ... "PCs arrive on 100'x100' or less field, melee ensues." Stuff is thrown in there to make it interesting and different.
--fje
Without any rules stating otherwise, you can draw and throw javelins with one hand, as far as I know. If you had TWF you could throw them two at a time. You could draw two of them, hold one in each hand, and take a 2-attack Full Attack Action, again, as far as I know, since I don't think there are any rules about passing an item from one hand to the next.
Drawing a javelin is a move action, throwing a standard action. This requires one hand. A greatsword-wielding character can take a hand off his sword (free action), draw a javelin (move action), throw the javelin (standard action), and return his hand to his weapon (free action). Same as drawing/throwing a throwing axe, as far as I can see. He's still melee ready. You just end up with fewer, because they are essentially a heavy ammunition.
My current character uses both javelins and a bow. I rarely use the bow. Have to drop the 2hander, pull the bow, use the bow ... then I can't move if I want to get my 2hander back because it is on the floor.
We have fought a dragon out-doors ... was better to get a Fly spell, but with the dragon's movement rate it came down to a stalemate ... it could fly past and use its breath every few rounds and nobody could catch it or try a flyby attack, but with our protections we took little actual damage from either and did about the same damage to the dragon, if not more. So we were pinging eachother. The dragon could retreat and wait for the buffs to wear off, but we could retreat somewhere the dragon couldn't reach. If the dragon got pinned down, it was going to eat the big melee damage, and every time it came past it was open to spells.
It's one of those oddities of D&D that things tend to narrow down to about <100' battlemaps. One, the game encourages miniature use, and at 5' = 1", it's hard to get much on there. Designers tend to establish encounters that can fit on the more common dining-room table, which is 5'x4' IIRC. That's about 300' x 240' for the biggest combat board your average game group can field, and that's leaving no room for books and sheets and snacks and stuff. "Big" battles seem to be 100'x100' square or less, most common encounters seem to be 25'-60' on a side.
Is that unfairly weighted toward melee combat? Yea, pretty much. Especially unfairly weighted against LARGE RANGE INCREMENTS. 30' increment really seems to be about the cherry increment. Not too short, not uselessly long.
What are the ranged guys doing? Skirmishing around the edges of the melee combat. Most are engaging within 20-30' of the melee. I see 10-to-1 "firing into melee" penalties to "range increment" penalties.
It can be argued that in a fair or perfect world, the guy with the 110' range increment could put the injury on somebody with a melee weapon. Sure. Hypothetically. But the designers don't put those sort of things in their games, nor the GMs. When they show up, it isn't an "average" combat ... that becomes the focus of the combat. The "Sniper" combat or the "Flying Islands" combat. They're set pieces. Like fighting on rope bridges over chasms and lava lakes.
Not that you can't make a very effective ranged combatant character. With feats and spells and abilities, you can be very effective. But it's not, that I've ever seen, "effective because the guy has to run over 300 feet of open ground or air to get at me". It is "effective somewhere outside of the foe's threat range". A bow-based character is just as effective, essentially, 5' outside of the foe's threat range as 105' outside of the foe's threat range. Their only worry is keeping the melee guy off them. If that means the party tank is keeping the monster from him, or that the guy has to cover 300' of open ground, it's essentially the same to the bowman.
More likely, the party is kicking down the "door" of a 25'x25' to 100'x100' room and beating the snot out of a collection of monsters in there. Lots of variations on the theme, but go through a dungeon magazine or review the last half-dozen combats in your home game ... "PCs arrive on 100'x100' or less field, melee ensues." Stuff is thrown in there to make it interesting and different.
--fje
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