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Message: <blockquote data-quote="FormerlyHemlock" data-source="post: 6723548" data-attributes="member: 6787650">I think we should talk more about the GWM fighter vs. the Fire Giant, because that will clarify a number of things including your feeling that defensive fighting doesn't happen "in combat," which I disagree with.I originally gave the example of a GWM-specialized fighter engaging in combat with a Fire Giant. I showed him mentally running through his options: "GWM isn't favorable due to high AC, can't Push or Grapple because the giant is too big--aha! I can Disarm him, which pulls his teeth without impairing my offense, tilting the combat in my favor." It's a tactically favorable option. You can pull the Fire Giant's teeth with one successful attack instead of having to wear him down with fifteen or twenty successful attacks first. He can of course respond by trying to grab his sword back, or grab my sword, or try to hit me with a boulder as an improvised melee weapon, but the mere fact that I have more attacks than he does gives me an advantage in such contests. Plus the fact that there are other PCs who are killing him while he tries to grab his sword back from me--time is on my side.You then commented that the GWM fighter can't retrain GWM before entering combat, and in the post above you reiterate that you believe Disarm is ineffective without "retraining" GWM first, but you haven't actually enumerated any deficiencies. You assert that the 5E fighter is "committed" to GWM because he's GWM specialized, and that "that inflexibility can make a comically bad option mechanically superior," but that clearly doesn't apply in this case--Disarm is actually a better choice than making a simple attack, and the "trivially optimal tactic" of burning down the enemy one at a time turns out not to be optimal at all.Thus my skepticism of the claim that the Fighter is a one-trick pony with no tactical flexibility. Yes, I'm using a DMG option (in fact I use several including Climb Aboard and Overrun), and those variants exist specifically to make tactical combat more sophisticated and interesting--but they don't require the PC Fighter to change his build one iota. In fact, the PC who uses non-attack options most frequently at my table is actually a protection-minded paladin with Str 16 and only +7 to Athletics and two attacks, and yet he is still effective with them. A fighter with Str 20 and 3 attacks would be roughly twice as effective, even if he specialized in GWM instead of Shield Master/Tavern Brawler.Avoiding combat or choosing the time of combat is a thing in my games, but there's also "choosing who engages whom during combat," which is actually a major thing in which the paladin specializes and at which he is quite good (though not as excellent as a specialized fighter would be). The thing that makes combats dicey isn't the attack and damage rolls, it's when the Fire Giant backs off and starts hurling boulders from behind cover, or when the dying Chuuls fail a morale check and go berserk, charging the back line with no regard for getting surrounded and thereby threatening the careless wizard who got within 40' of the front line. (He can't just Disengage because the Chuul has the same movement rate as he does, so either he spends his concentration to Expeditious Retreat, or he Dodges and hopes he doesn't get hit. But fortunately he doesn't have to because the paladin charged in already and Grappled the Chuul from behind. Yay Paladin! Wizard Disengages and retreats while bardlock and shadow monk finish killing Chuul with Paladin's help.)</blockquote>

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