Would removing Superior Weapons open the game up more?

[Nyronus]

That's 1 damage per W, which is going to equal or beat the effectiveness of other damage-boosting feats for most weapon-using classes. Not that anyone is going to take, say, superior weapon prof and not also take weapon focus (or whatever).

You have to do at least 4[W] damage for that to be better than just Focus.

The only class that can do that at-will is the Ranger, who gets more from taking focus anyway (6 damage vs 4). The one to two damage you'll lose when you use a daily or Encounter power will not be missed. The extra damage, and more importantly, accuracy, from things like Permafrost, Lyrandar-Windrider, and Prime Puniser will be, and are competing for that same feat slot.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

OTOH maxing damage is a game of inches...

Anyway, yeah, in general I would go back to something like the original PHB1 design where simple are weapons almost anyone with ANY training at all can use, military weapons are all the rest which any significantly experienced warrior can pick up and use, and 'superior' weapons are just oddball things that are interesting and you can pick up for some flavor and maybe a VERY slight advantage, if any. Thus all the weird non-PoL ethnic weapons would be superior, but not actually any/much better than military weapons, just slightly different. This would all of course assume we were also in a sane spot WRT to feats and just burning one for flavor's sake was once again sensible. Not going to happen in 4e, but one of these days...

 

[SabreCat]

in general I would go back to something like the original PHB1 design where simple are weapons almost anyone with ANY training at all can use, military weapons are all the rest which any significantly experienced warrior can pick up and use, and 'superior' weapons are just oddball things that are interesting and you can pick up for some flavor and maybe a VERY slight advantage, if any.

Wasn't there an edition that called these Exotic weapon proficiencies instead of Superior? Sounds like a throwback to that.

 

[mneme]

@Nyronus At Epic, sure. Except that you only need to be doing 3W to beat Focus at epic -- equalling focus means you beat it with your spike damage. And actually, chargers can trivially hit 3W at will via Surprising Charge.

But really, your model is flawed. Most Paragon and Epic power-using characters will, with real monsters, only very rarely use at will attacks. In Heroic, SWT is simply superior to Focus (but you might be able to find 6-7 feats that are better than either). By Paragon, though, you can expect to be doing 2W or better for most of a fight unless you're using a class whose encounters only do 1W. And by Epic, again, you can expect to be doing 3W or better for most of a fight unless your encounters and dailies only do 2W or worse. So except for very long fights -- long enough that they're painful to play and don't occur that often in real games -- SWT is just better than weapon focus at all tiers of play for most characters.

Now, whether Weapon Focus is worthwhile -- or whether you're damage centric enough that you want both (Avengers, for instance) is another question.

 

[Spatula]

You have to do at least 4[W] damage for that to be better than just Focus.

Ah, I see. You're assuming epic level. Well, sure, but most weapon-users will (a) have more than a few 4W attacks at those levels, and (b) will have so many feats that the opportunity cost of taking one feat vs the other is basically nil. Where the choice matters most is in the heroic tier when feats are scarce, and in that case the superior weapon is at least as good as weapon focus.

More generally, the character would have to be doing 1W / tier in order for a superior weapon to equal weapon focus, and any attacks that are more than that are to the superior weapon's benefit. And aside from the handful of low-W classes, if you are a weapon user, you will have such attacks.

 

[Destil]

Instead of Superior Weapons, I'd include feats that allowed you to increase one of your weapons damage by one die size, or that added a property like High Crit or Brutal 1. So you wouldn't be wielding a better weapon, you'd be learning how to use your weapon better. To keep things balanced, there'd be a limit on how many of these "specialization" feats you'd be able to add.

I actually started working on a system to do this, but I haven't had a lot of time to dedicate to it. I dislike the way superiors force everything else out.

That said, I think my next campaign won't allow superior weapons or implements that are just 'bigger and better.' Double weapons, weird things (like a good two-handed thrower) and other things that are mechanically flexible without being more powerful fine, but an out and out better weapon is... well, out.

 

[keterys]

The people who have superior weapons... will also get weapon focus. And it's a solid decision to get both.

If we assume you deal 1W in heroic, 2W in paragon, 3W in epic... then superior weapon is better than weapon focus in every case, because it's at least equivalent and better for crits. A _lot_ better in the case of a fullblade. Certainly at heroic it's better for everyone.

And, you're still getting both eventually, unless you're one of a select few classes (rogue/thief w/ rapier from background, battle cleric with simple weapon powers) or races (ex: Goliath). And yes, some people don't care about damage, or are already locked into, say, 1-handed heavy blades and don't have good options. Yet.

Now, it's possible that both weapon focus and superior weapons will eventually get power creeped off the scale as more incredible options supplant them... but so far the gouge is arguing it'll go the other way.

 

[Pentius]

Getting back to some conversations from before, I've been playing with the idea of not allowing Superior Weapons (or Imps) in a game. Abdul Alhazred's thoughts coincided with and clarified some things I'd been musing about. This brings me to this point where I'm wondering if no Superior Weapon Feats would have more diverse builds being played. Would builds that use throwing weapons see an increase? Would there be less cheese? Would a much wider variety of feats get used (Rose King's, combat schools, etc.)?

Just an idea I've been tossing around.

I recognize the issue, but I think disallowing Superior Weapons is, at best, a clunky spot fix. If you have the kind of players who are going to go for the weapons that are best mechanically(and nothing against them, I'm one of them), then they are going to do that still. By removing the current top of the list weapons, you only open up the slots for new top of the list weapons to come in. It'll seem more diverse at first, while you're still unused to the new tops of the list being used. There will be a small increase in feat variety, since you've forcibly opened up a single feat slot. I'd expect to see an occasional feat hit the table that hadn't before, but in you could just as easily see it replaced by another math-y feat, like armor proficiency, toughness, weapon focus, etc. I don't think this would have any effect on throwing weapons.

 

[Mengu]

There are three problems with superior weapons and implements.

Combining weapon types or properties is just hazardous for balance. At one point spears were low proficiency and low damage, so the feat support they got, was reasonable. That support turns into power creep with weapons like Gouge that combine spear and axe with big damage, particularly after considering powers, enchantments, feats, and to top it all off, classes who primarily make basic attacks, combined with some of their feat support.

The second problem is proficiency bonus. 1-5 extra damage for 1[W] through 5[W] powers isn't as big a deal as not missing with Storm of Blades, or landing all your Rain of Blows attacks when you're trying to take something out. An invoker wants to eek out every bonus to hit, if he wants to land that Silent Malediction, so as a Human Invoker, I feel just about obligated to start with staff expertise and accurate staff. A reach spear fighter would feel foolish not picking up great spear. I don't see anyone using longspear as their primary weapon, for any length of their career.

The third problem is psychological appeal. Player A warhammer sees player B with Craghammer rerolling his 1's and 2's and every damage roll, and every time player A rolls a 1 or 2, players B says, you could be rerolling that. Peer pressure, player B picks up Craghammer. Hearing "My weapon is bigger than yours" is at times more effective than any mathematical formula.

Should they stay or should they go? I think they should stay. There are too many, what I think are mistakes, with military weapons. A control focused fighter using a polearm is stuck with a +2 proficiency weapon, when his function is highly reliant upon hitting. Superior weapons and implements just make you feel more competent, and competency is good for any character. I do think the combined weapon type issue needs some monitoring, to see where there may be abuse.

Is it good for superior weapons and implements to cost a feat? Well, I have no answer for that currently, until they separate design spaces for feats. For each player group, game, or DM, it will vary. In my paragon game, only 2 players out of 6 use a superior weapon or implement, the rest don't seem interested in bigger damage, or +1 to hit, or other benefits of a superior weapon. So I don't give the feat for free. But if a game I'm running has a bunch of optimizers who all want to pick up a superior weapon or implement, I'd have no qualms about handing it out for free.

 

[TerraDave]

Instead of Superior Weapons, I'd include feats that allowed you to increase one of your weapons damage by one die size, or that added a property like High Crit or Brutal 1. So you wouldn't be wielding a better weapon, you'd be learning how to use your weapon better. To keep things balanced, there'd be a limit on how many of these "specialization" feats you'd be able to add.

My variant on this would be to make it weapon specific. So the bastard sword is just a more exepensive, heavier long sword until you take the feat that makes it brutal 1, gives d10 dmg two handed and lets you pull out and arm your sheild as a minor (or free) action...can easily imagine whip feats (we actually have some!) flail feats...can also do this by group, like the later expertise feats, but maybe not quite so good.