Enhancement Issues [Archive] - Giant in the Playground Forums

Baptor

2014-11-22, 11:19 PM

No, I am not talking about those terrible spam emails everyone gets.

I am talking about the enhancement bonuses in weapons and armor in 5e.

OK. So according to WotC, D&D 5e is a game designed around an assumption of no magic items. That is, the monsters and challenges were designed assuming the players had no magical enhancements of any kind, thus inferring that any monster deemed a challenge for level 15 characters is a fair challenge even if those level 15's have no items at all.

Furthermore, and perhaps more importantly, 5e is lauded for its Bounded Accuracy, which constricts both bonuses to hit and AC to a very short range ensuring that no one gets left behind in either department. This Bounded Accuracy is something calculated based on the first assumption that there are no magic items involved.

As a DM, that leaves me scratching my head over enhancement bonuses, particularly those to hit. If the game is supposedly balanced on a BA system that does not take magic items into effect, then would not giving a player a +2 sword necessarily unbalance that system?

Forgive me and maybe I am missing something but how can +2 swords be balanced in a game where the already balanced BA system does not include them?

My players, who care a lot about a fair and balanced game are likewise concerned about this. They know that if they get a +2 sword that makes the fights too easy the fights will get harder resulting in a runaway arms race like the one we saw in 3.5. Neither my players or me desire this at all.

We've considered banning to hit bonuses and Armor enhancements, leaving the rest intact, but I don't like fixing things which aren't broken, so I am reaching out to the Playground.

Some of you are frighteningly good at D&D math and statistics. Is there any way you can show me that handing out +2 weapons or +3 weapons won't unbalance the game?

For example, can one fighter find a +3 longsword and another have a mundane longsword and it not make that much of a difference? That's what WotC seems to be saying about this edition but I just don't buy it at all. From where I'm sitting, even a +1 bonus is a huge deal in this edition, and enhancement bonuses are either going to make the game easy mode or force the DM to ramp up the monster's difficulty resulting in the necessity of items we saw in 3.5

Please prove me wrong, if that is possible.

RealCheese

2014-11-22, 11:28 PM

Baptor

2014-11-22, 11:44 PM

That's sort of my point, I guess.

Let's assume we have a party of two martial characters (mcA and mcB) who are both melee based.

If mcA has a +2 sword he is significantly better than mcA without one. To keep things fair and balanced, mcB should get a +2 sword too.

If all martial characters have +2 hit, then the fights will get too easy (assuming we use the same monsters as before). So the monsters must be made more powerful by virtue of +2 AC in order to keep the fight balanced.

This means that now all balanced fights are at +2 of the expected norms. This means that said players must have the +2 or the game becomes unbalanced. Therefore the magic items, which are supposed to be unnecessary, suddenly become necessary.

Therefore, is it not easier to just not have +2 swords at all? This way everything in the books stays balanced.

It seems to me that if you want a balanced game you must have a game which assumes magic enhancements are part of normal rewards and sets the challenges to match this reality OR have a game which assumes no enhancements and sets the challenges to match this reality.

If you have the former without items, the characters are too weak and get mowed down. If you have the later and include items, the players are way too powerful.

Maybe the point of D&D is to have unbalanced games? Otherwise I just don't get it trying to have both ways in this edition.

RealCheese

2014-11-22, 11:54 PM

Eslin

2014-11-22, 11:56 PM

Yes, enhancement bonuses make no sense for bounded accuracy in this edition. If you want to fix it, make the weapons act like stat items do now - gauntlets of ogre strength set your strength to 19, so have a magic longsword set your attack and damage bonus to 4 rather than your strength/dexterity modifier. It turns magical weapons into a must have boost for the already powerful into a crutch for those who aren't.

huttj509

2014-11-22, 11:57 PM

Maybe the point of D&D is to have unbalanced games? Otherwise I just don't get it trying to have both ways in this edition.

The point is to be flexible. As GM, you determine, ultimately, what sort of game you're going for.

If a +2 sword would unbalance your game, don't give a +2 sword.

If someone else's game would be helped by giving a +2 sword (either by easier defeating challenges, so feeling more badass, or letting the character take on tougher challenges, to feel more badass), that GM can give a +2 sword.

You know your game. GM Alice knows her game. WotC is trying to give both of you the tools to help run your individual games.

Eslin

2014-11-22, 11:59 PM

The point is to be flexible. As GM, you determine, ultimately, what sort of game you're going for.

If a +2 sword would unbalance your game, don't give a +2 sword.

If someone else's game would be helped by giving a +2 sword (either by easier defeating challenges, so feeling more badass, or letting the character take on tougher challenges, to feel more badass), that GM can give a +2 sword.

You know your game. GM Alice knows her game. WotC is trying to give both of you the tools to help run your individual games.

The problem with that is that a +2 sword benefits a fighter a lot more than it does a rogue, and that leads to a logical balance issue. If they're equal when they both have +2 swords, it means that without them the rogue was better than the fighter. If they're equal when they don't have magic weapons, once they fighter gets them he'll be better.

silveralen

2014-11-23, 12:33 AM

Eslin

2014-11-23, 12:45 AM

Correct me if I'm wrong, but haven't I seen you take the stance that the variety of magical items ensures each class ends up getting something as valuable for themselves as any other? Maybe the short sword of backstabbing (I'm pretty sure this was a thing at some point) or something similar for rogue.

This is assuming that a +1 is less valuable for rogue. The damage boost helps less due to getting a single attack, but the improved chance to hit ensures fewer zero damage rounds which could be a big deal.

Not to mention, if we assume the base classes are balanced with each other, feats are an even more glaring problem. How much better is the beserker extra bonus action attack if things like polearm and great weapon master aren't in game?

The berserker bonus action becomes much better, but the subclass itself still sucks unless they have a caster babysitting them, exhaustion sucks ass.

And yes, that is my stance - more will than is, but I'm pretty sure each class will benefit in their own way - for rogues, the thief is better with activated items than anyone else and the assassin's guaranteed critical means they'll get the best use out of one shot damaging items. I got distracted and forgot to finish my point, which was that since magical weapon damage is one of the fighter's best areas (that +2 with bonus 2d6 damage greatsword we saw will do its best damage on a fighter for instance) if they were changed for bounded accuracy fighters would need something else in compensation.

Baptor

2014-11-23, 12:49 AM

Long story short, I do not think that you are walking into any unseen pit traps by house-ruling enhancement bonuses out. Weapons will be magic to overcome immunities and possibly have interesting secondary effects and that is all. Armors will just have interesting effects and wondrous items will continue to be wondrous.

That is very reassuring. Thank you, that's pretty much the direction we were thinking of going with weapons/armor in our games. :smallsmile:

Yes, enhancement bonuses make no sense for bounded accuracy in this edition. If you want to fix it, make the weapons act like stat items do now - gauntlets of ogre strength set your strength to 19, so have a magic longsword set your attack and damage bonus to 4 rather than your strength/dexterity modifier. It turns magical weapons into a must have boost for the already powerful into a crutch for those who aren't.

Thank you for affirming my suspicions! I like your idea too, I will think on that. :smallbiggrin:

The problem with that is that a +2 sword benefits a fighter a lot more than it does a rogue, and that leads to a logical balance issue. If they're equal when they both have +2 swords, it means that without them the rogue was better than the fighter. If they're equal when they don't have magic weapons, once they fighter gets them he'll be better.

I'll never tell another DM how to run their game, but I also agree with this assessment. Feel free to include enhancements if you want, but realize that its not "six one, half dozen the other" here. If you start handing out +x weapons and +x armors to players, it will tip the math one way or another and leave you with an unbalanced game, since by default the game was designed without those items in mind. If that's your bag, then cool beans. :smallwink:

Pex

2014-11-23, 12:49 AM

The party will have magic items. The +#'s are lower and rarer than in previous editions, but they do exist and the party will have them. What's different is that a character is not going to need any one particular item or set of items to be effective against opponents of appropriate CR. That lack of necessity is not the same thing has not having any magic item ever.

silveralen

2014-11-23, 12:51 AM

The berserker bonus action becomes much better, but the subclass itself still sucks unless they have a caster babysitting them, exhaustion sucks ass.

And yes, that is my stance - more will than is, but I'm pretty sure each class will benefit in their own way - for rogues, the thief is better with activated items than anyone else and the assassin's guaranteed critical means they'll get the best use out of one shot damaging items. I got distracted and forgot to finish my point, which was that since magical weapon damage is one of the fighter's best areas (that +2 with bonus 2d6 damage greatsword we saw will do its best damage on a fighter for instance) if they were changed for bounded accuracy fighters would need something else in compensation.

Yeah, feats have just been bugging me much like magic items seem to be bugging the OP. Having feats be allowed instantly makes fighter better overall by a pretty huge margin, almost invariably more than other classes, especially MAD classes. So... somewhere something is unbalanced, and it bugs me.

Didn't I remember someone saying thief is almost confirmed to get screwed over with the DM guide magic item rules? Not as a point of disagreement (since that would be a good way or handling thief/assassin) but just as another worrisome thought.

JoeJ

2014-11-23, 01:50 AM

With or without magic items, there's no meaningful way to say that one class is "better" than another, without specifying a particular task and set of circumstances. Given the infinite variety of possible adventures and activities, the idea that there can be any kind of mechanical balance between characters is completely absurd.

It doesn't matter whether or not everybody has magic items, much less that they be somehow "equal." The only balance that matters in a role-playing game is giving each player their chance in the spotlight. You should give our rewards that will help each player advance their character in the way they want that character to grow. if that means that the fighter gets a magic sword, the wizard gets a couple of rare spells, and the rogue gains a higher position in the local thieves' guild, great! Each player got something they wanted.

If magic items will make the game more enjoyable for your group, then give them out. If not, don't. You're going to be designing encounters specifically to challenge the characters and entertain the players, so it doesn't really matter whether they have no magic, lots of magic, or anything in between.

silveralen

2014-11-23, 02:11 AM

Unless two players/characters both want to hit things well and one is better at hitting things. Some people value the combat ability of their character quite a bit. Just my two cents.

MaxWilson

2014-11-23, 02:18 AM

One character loaded up with +3 items will perform better than one without. The difference between this version and the former ones is that you are not expected to get magic items. As i see it, a lvl 17 party of 4 characters should, against a single CR17 enemy have about an equal chance of failure or victort.

In my experience, that isn't how 5E is balanced at all. A CR 17 monster is designed to lose consistently to a level 17 party unless they do something horribly wrong. It would be more fair to say that a level 17 party against a CR 17 monster should have to expend some spell slots and limited-use powers.

Your typical Adult Red Dragon is not a match for a level 17 party. That's by design.

To the OP: honestly, I think the game is more fun without magic items, partly for the reasons you relate. However, the ultimate solution to the problem is to take a page from video game design and allow players to self-pace. If one of the fighters finds a +2 magic longsword, maybe he can talk the rest of the party into going down to level 11 of the dungeon even though they are only at level 9. If things turn out badly, they retreat back to level 9 where they are "supposed" to be. Another example of self-pacing is completing optional missions: the king says to get the princess back, and it would be nice to deal with Count Mustache at the same time so he doesn't repeat; dead Mustache is good, alive Mustache is great! A +2 longsword by itself isn't likely to be the difference between minimal success (princess rescued, Mustache gets away) and total success (princess rescued, Mustache kidnapped), but maybe the +2 longsword and some disguise items and a bag of holding might do the trick. Because it's self-paced, the players don't feel like their items are required/worthless due to treadmill: they feel like the magic is letting them succeed at extra things that would otherwise be out of reach, or at least harder.

In quantitative terms, a +2 longsword by itself is something like a +20% boost to a character's damage output, or +5% to the whole party's damage output. So one magic weapon by itself has minimal effect (more against creatures with non-magical-weapon immunity, natch). Handing out magic weapons to everyone has a correspondingly larger effect, and even moreso if you hand out magic armor and shields. I've seen 5E characters at 8th level that perform at 16th level or greater due to (homebrew) magic items. Having experienced it, I would advise against going down that road--at least for me, it's not much fun to have half of what you do be due to extrinsic factors[1].

[1] It is a partial consolation if the magic items have truly epic fluff. We were exploring a ruined archmage's tower, and I picked up a sword that another character had found, and suddenly these words started playing in my PC's head: "I shatter Swords and splinter spears/None stands to Shieldbreaker/My point's the fount of orphans' tears/My edge the widowmaker." I freaked out. Of course this wasn't the real Shieldbreaker (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twelve_Swords_of_Power#Shieldbreaker), that would totally break D&D, but even the secondhand association was pretty awesome. The powers were kind of meh (+4 vorpal two-handed sword which grants MR and some other properties like causing earthquakes and sundering enemy magic items 20% of the time)--and by "meh" I mean "stronger than I really wanted my character to have, and not strong enough to be a plot device like the real Shieldbreaker"--but the poem made up for a lot.

Eslin

2014-11-23, 02:44 AM

Tell me if this is inappropriate to the thread and I'll remove it and probably post elsewhere, but this is my idea for magic weapons:
No magic weapons ever have a flat + to attack, since 5e was balanced without that. Instead they have a variety of possible effects - not all of them will be equal, some magic items are supposed to be worth less or more than others, but this is a short list invented from the top of my head. Which enchantments go on which items is just based on the first item I thought of for the concept. They all require you to be proficient with the weapon and attune to it, so I'm not going to write that in every time, and I'm treating the effects like they're supposed to be a big deal - medium to high level stuff, treasured and useful possessions. I'm using Hazirawn as a contrast, which has +2 to attack and damage, 2d6 extra necrotic damage, 4 spell charges and makes the opponent unable to heal. And Arcane Arcer is deliberate - arc, get it?

Arcane Arcer, light crossbow.
Attacks with the Arcane Arcer deal an extra 1d6 lightning damage. Once per turn as an action the caster can imbue an arrow with an area spell or single target cantrip and fire it. When the arrow is fired, the spell’s area is centered on where the arrow lands even if the spell could normally be centered only on the caster. If a cantrip was used it hits the target if the arrow does and the target has disadvantage on the save if a save is required.

Claws of Light, short sword.
Claws of light deal an extra 2d6 radiant damage, doubling to 4d6 against fiends or undead. As a free action while wielding a claw of light you may have an identical weapon appear in your other hand. This second weapon disappears when it leaves your grip.

Corpsebow, shortbow.
A corpsebow deals an extra 1d6 necrotic damage on hit. In addition, any suitable target slain by the corpsebow shucks its flesh and rises again at the start of your next turn as a zombie or skeleton (your choice). The undead created this way can only be controlled while you are wielding the corpsebow - when the corpsebow leaves your hand, they will stand inert and do nothing except defend themselves when attacked. You may have total CR equal to your proficiency bonus worth of undead at any one time, and they are controlled in the same way as the animate dead spell.

Ghosthand, necklace.
Once attuned to a ghosthand the wearer's unarmed or natural attacks have an extra 5 feet of range and deal bonus damage equal to their wisdom modifier.

Inferno Brand, halberd.
Inferno brand deals an extra 3d6 fire damage on hit.

Jungle's Vengeance, blowgun.
You can make an attack with this weapon as a bonus action. Whenever you make an attack with this weapon, you can choose to add one of these extra affects to it (save DC is 8+proficiency+4):
Inflict a -5 penalty to an attribute of your choice(this does not stack) until the start of your next turn unless they pass a save of the same type of attribute (int save to prevent int loss for example)
Target takes 5d6 poison damage (con save for half)
Target's speed drops to half and they cannot use reactions (wis save for half)

Nightblade, dagger.
Three times per day you can apply a poison to a nightblade as a bonus action. Once per application of poison when you hit a creature you can give that opponent disadvantage on their save against the poison and have the poison deal twice as many dice worth of damage.

Parivir, greatsword.
Attacks with this weapon deal an extra 1d6 lightning damage, as do spells that deal damage you cast while wielding it (spells can only apply the damage once per target). Once per round you may make a melee attack against a target you have just affected with a spell as a free action provided the target is in range.

Piercing Cold, longbow
Attacks with this weapon deal an extra 1d6 cold damage, remain fully accurate to 300 feet and any attacks that hit continue past the target and hit any creature up to 10 feet behind it. Use the same attack roll for all targets.

Teacher, rapier.
Teacher allows you to learn three battlemaster maneuvers of your choice or replace previously learned maneuvers by practicing with it for eight hours, which you can only use while in possession of the weapon. In combat you gain one d6 superiority die at the start of each of your turns which disappears if it has not been used by the start of your next turn.

The Cannon, heavy crossbow.
The cannon does an extra 2d6 thunder damage on hit. You may choose to sacrifice one extra attack on your attack action - if you do, the next attack not only damages your target but every creature within 10 feet of the target. This can be done up to three times per short rest.

Shinestaff, quarterstaff.
While wielding the shinestaff you may deal an extra 3d6 damage of the same type done by the spell once per round when you deal damage with a spell.

Storm's Fury, javelin.
Storm's fury deals an extra 2d6 lightning damage and when thrown or dropped returns to the wielder's hand as soon as the owner wills it, allowing the wielder to make multiple ranged attacks if they desire.

Wind Flail, flail.
The wielder of a wind flail can make two attacks when using the attack action. This does not stack with extra attack. In addition the wielder gains two extra reactions per round which can only be spent making attacks of opportunity.

Winter's Bite, war pick.
Winter's bite deals an extra 1d6 cold damage on hit and applies the frostbite effect, which lasts until the start of the wielders next turn and reduces speed by 10 feet. The wielder of Winter's Bite can make attacks of opportunity against targets afflicted with frostbite without using up their reaction and deals an extra 4d6 cold damage when they do so. The wielder can only make one attack of opportunity per target in this way per round.

JoeJ

2014-11-23, 03:24 AM

Giant2005

2014-11-23, 03:35 AM

Cool weapons.
I'm not going to comment too heavily on all of those weapons because they are hugely subjective but I will say that although I think some of them are way too powerful to ever be allowed in mortal hands, I think the varied and useful enchantments on them are particularly awesome.
The only one I think that really needs some serious consideration is the Arcane Arcer. There is a reason things like Twinned Spell don't work on spells that only target yourself, it is because those spells don't have saves and they don't even have the "willing" clause. By allowing those to be targeted on anyone, you will break the game. I haven't bothered looking through the spells to find any game destroying examples but I am absolutely sure that there will be plenty of them.

Eslin

2014-11-23, 03:40 AM

I'm not going to comment too heavily on all of those weapons because they are hugely subjective but I will say that although I think some of them are way too powerful to ever be allowed in mortal hands, I think the varied and useful enchantments on them are particularly awesome.
The only one I think that really needs some serious consideration is the Arcane Arcer. There is a reason things like Twinned Spell don't work on spells that only target yourself, it is because those spells don't have saves and they don't even have the "willing" clause. By allowing those to be targeted on anyone, you will break the game. I haven't bothered looking through the spells to find any game destroying examples but I am absolutely sure that there will be plenty of them.

I'll go edit that, for that one I just copied a different ability I was homebrewing. It was intended to be identical to the 3.5 arcane archer ability, though I'll add cantrips for single target fun.

Too powerful for mortal hands wise - which ones? Comparing them to Hazirawn none of them seemed particularly over the top.

Giant2005

2014-11-23, 03:51 AM

I'll go edit that, for that one I just copied a different ability I was homebrewing. It was intended to be identical to the 3.5 arcane archer ability.

Too powerful for mortal hands wise - which ones? Comparing them to Hazirawn none of them seemed particularly over the top.

Parivir is one I am pretty cautious about. That extra damage would get pretty outrageous with something like Scorching Ray and they get a free attack on top of that.
Nightblade is a bit of an issue too, not so much because it is too powerful (Although with the right Poison it absolutely would be too powerful) but because we already have something very similar to it (Dagger of Venom) and the Nightblade renders the canon weapon obsolete.
The last one I'd like to talk about is the Wind Flail. That one kind of sucks - the only class that could get any real use out of the extra attack is the Rogue, yet the weapon isn't finessable which takes the Rogue out of contention. It is a cool weapon with a cool effect but pretty much loses everything cool about it by being a Flail.

Eslin

2014-11-23, 04:01 AM

Parivir is one I am pretty cautious about. That extra damage would get pretty outrageous with something like Scorching Ray and they get a free attack on top of that.
Nightblade is a bit of an issue too, not so much because it is too powerful (Although with the right Poison it absolutely would be too powerful) but because we already have something very similar to it (Dagger of Venom) and the Nightblade renders the canon weapon obsolete.
The last one I'd like to talk about is the Wind Flail. That one kind of sucks - the only class that could get any real use out of the extra attack is the Rogue, yet the weapon isn't finessable which takes the Rogue out of contention. It is a cool weapon with a cool effect but pretty much loses everything cool about it by being a Flail.

Damnit, I'd made sure there was a limiting factor on the other spells to stop scorching ray/eldritch blast, though I'm not worried about the free attack since it requires melee range. Thanks for that one. The flail thing was deliberate, it's more for clerics, over the top multiclassers and casters that want to slum it in melee. Where's the dagger of venom from?

MaxWilson

2014-11-23, 04:06 AM

Another way to look at this:

Poisons are obviously very, very powerful. A plain-vanilla 11th level champion fighter with three attacks (not even using Polearm Master!) can instantly go from DPR 30-ish to DPR 150 simply by spending 2000 gp on a dose of purple worm venom. (Simple != easy, BTW.)

Do all encounters therefore need to be balanced around DPR of 150 per character? No, poison lets you go above and beyond. Poison is how a lone 5th level ranger takes out a Rakshasa. A party of 13th level characters does it the brute-force way, without the poison. Magic items are similar in that they let you punch above your weight class.

Eslin

2014-11-23, 04:10 AM

Giant2005

2014-11-23, 04:31 AM

Where's the dagger of venom from?
Hoard of the Dragon Queen, or more specifically its online supplement.

GoodbyeSoberDay

2014-11-23, 04:40 AM

Ideally the DMG would spell out exactly how treasure changes the power level of the group and how that affects encounter building and such, but I doubt if it has more than a "I cooked up this awesome idea, but didn't flesh it out into actual mechanics, so here's something you might be able to do" type of sidebar.

You don't have to balance encounters to the decimal-point. If meleers have swords with +2 to hit, monsters don't need to instantly have +2 AC. They could instead be more numerous, or have more dangerous offense. For the sword to be special, it should break the math a little bit. Otherwise it's entirely boring and pointless.

Speaking of boring and pointless, it's probably better to stick with items that add, at most, +1 to combat numbers, and then tack on special abilities on top of that. It's much more interesting that way.

MaxWilson

2014-11-23, 05:52 AM

Speaking of boring and pointless, it's probably better to stick with items that add, at most, +1 to combat numbers, and then tack on special abilities on top of that. It's much more interesting that way.

Speaking of which, did anyone ever play the Dark Sun: Shattered Lands video game? There was a weapon in there called El's Drinker. It was only +2, but it cast Vampiric Touch (6d6 HP drain) any time you made a successful attack. It was way more powerful than anything else in the game including +4 weapons.

I don't recommend making anything quite that strong.

Eslin

2014-11-23, 05:59 AM

Speaking of which, did anyone ever play the Dark Sun: Shattered Lands video game? There was a weapon in there called El's Drinker. It was only +2, but it cast Vampiric Touch (6d6 HP drain) any time you made a successful attack. It was way more powerful than anything else in the game including +4 weapons.

I don't recommend making anything quite that strong.

Eh, you usually just have them create temporary hp instead.

Baptor

2014-11-23, 10:19 AM

The claim that magic items aren't essential falls apart pretty fast when you look at the sheer variety of monsters immune or resistant to non magic weapons, and compare the classes that can bypass that resistance naturally (monk, druid, any class that has the spell magic weapon) to those that don't (barbarian, non casting fighter/rogue).

So yes, some level of magic item is needed. Even of the magic item is a +0 sword whose only magic property is giving off torch level light (which is arguably nice as a utility tool for non darkvision races in any case, but that's neither here nor there).

Of course, I am not against magic items in general, just ones that grant enhancement bonuses. My group and I are planning to eliminate the +x's not the item itself. One of them already has a magical greatsword (+0).

Unless two players/characters both want to hit things well and one is better at hitting things. Some people value the combat ability of their character quite a bit. Just my two cents.

This.

In quantitative terms, a +2 longsword by itself is something like a +20% boost to a character's damage output, or +5% to the whole party's damage output. So one magic weapon by itself has minimal effect (more against creatures with non-magical-weapon immunity, natch).

I don't know about you, but to me 20% is a lot.

Tell me if this is inappropriate to the thread and I'll remove it and probably post elsewhere, but this is my idea for magic weapons

This. Currently our ideas for how magic weapons should work looks a lot like this as well. Thanks for the ideas and sorry I didn't quote the whole thing, but I liked it all. :smallsmile:

You don't have to balance encounters to the decimal-point. If meleers have swords with +2 to hit, monsters don't need to instantly have +2 AC.

Well of course it doesn't have to be balanced to the nth degree, but 20% increases are a bit more than decimal points here.

They could instead be more numerous, or have more dangerous offense.

This is exactly the kind of arms race my players and I want to avoid. The constant one-upping we saw in 3.5.

For the sword to be special, it should break the math a little bit. Otherwise it's entirely boring and pointless.

We don't want our math broken. We like our math healthy and intact. :smallwink:

Otherwise it's entirely boring and pointless.

For you and yours, perhaps, and if so that is great. My players and I like good solid clean math for our games and manageable numbers. My players like growing in power, but they prefer that be done through their class and not through a bunch of swag. For us, a balanced game isn't boring but a breath of fresh air.

Speaking of boring and pointless, it's probably better to stick with items that add, at most, +1 to combat numbers, and then tack on special abilities on top of that. It's much more interesting that way.

I agree, just drop the +1 hit and keep the cool stuff. :smallbiggrin:

What's really funny about this last bit is this is almost exactly what Mike Mearls said to me when I brought this issue of enhancements up with him during the Playtest.

I told him what I said here, that enhancement items broke BA which was 5e's claim to fame and that we might be keeping them only as a sacred cow and needed to ditch them.

His response was very similar to this, "Just tack on cool abilities to the +1 weapons!"* It kinda irritated me because it seemed like he completely misunderstood my argument.

YES, I want to add cool abilities to weapons, and yes we should all do this, but we don't have to have enhancement bonuses to do that. You can do what Eslin did and just have weapons with cool powers, period. No game breaking pluses needed.

*paraphrase

Eslin

2014-11-23, 10:43 AM

Side note regarding a +2 weapon - let's assume you've got a level 8 fighter wielding a greatsword, your enemies will have an AC of about 15. You have two hits of 2d6+4 at +7 (7.15) or 2d6+14 at +2 (8.4) per hit. If you get a +2 greatsword you're now doing 9.75 without power attack or 12.65 with it - assuming you're power attacking since it's mathematically superior, it's a boost of 50% rather than 20%.

Even a rogue at that level's going to get a 25% or more damage boost.

MaxWilson

2014-11-23, 12:01 PM

I don't know about you, but to me 20% is a lot.

+5% for the party. The monster will wind up living 5% longer, and you'll take 5% more HP damage before you kill it, and thus have to rest 5% longer. Even +20% isn't a huge deal really: you'll have 4 encounters before popping up a shelter and resting, instead of 5.

Eslin

2014-11-23, 01:05 PM

+5% for the party. The monster will wind up living 5% longer, and you'll take 5% more HP damage before you kill it, and thus have to rest 5% longer. Even +20% isn't a huge deal really: you'll have 4 encounters before popping up a shelter and resting, instead of 5.

He says directly after the post explaining it's higher than 20% for everyone.

And it's not 5% for the party, pretty much the only thing a martial is good at is sustained damage - casters typically don't try to get much sustain because they can use cantrips with no investment and let the martials do their little niche, it's honestly not worth making your sustained damage decent as a caster since you can pull out the spell slots when things get important.

So, assuming a typical fighter/rogue/wizard/cleric party, without magic weapons the party average damage per round is F16.8R13W7.15C9.1 so 36.5% of the party's damage and with magic weapons it's F25.3R16.5W7.15C9.1, the fighter's now doing 43.6% of the party's damage. Overall, party damage has increased by 26% thanks to magic weapons, and if the fighter is the only one with a magic weapon the increase is still 18.5%.

silveralen

2014-11-23, 01:41 PM

I may borrow your next strategy for my campaign, and nab some of those weapons. See how my players like it.

You don't need magic to fight creatures that are resistant to non-magical weapons; just good planning. In fact, even monsters that are completely immune to non-magical damage can still be used against a party with no magical weapons; instead of going toe-to-toe with it, the PCs have to obtain whatever thing-a-macguffin is it's One Weakness.

Or the rest of your party can kill it, as only three classes at most can have this issue, unless the creature happens to be resistant to magic (much less common), and you have no one to cast magic weapon and you don't have a monk or druid.

Without magic weapons three classes basically become dead weight compared to others, simply because they can't contribute normally. That's a problem, because the other classes don't face this issue. Magic items are fully essential to these classes being useful, at least without DM intervention effectively removing a big chunk of the mid-high CR monsters.

So magic weapons are now breaking both the bounded accuracy rules and the you don't have to give magic items for everything to be balanced rules. That's the problem. They have seriously screwed up magic weapons already by including such monster traits and static bonuses already.

JoeJ

2014-11-23, 02:26 PM

Or the rest of your party can kill it, as only three classes at most can have this issue, unless the creature happens to be resistant to magic (much less common), and you have no one to cast magic weapon and you don't have a monk or druid.

Without magic weapons three classes basically become dead weight compared to others, simply because they can't contribute normally. That's a problem, because the other classes don't face this issue. Magic items are fully essential to these classes being useful, at least without DM intervention effectively removing a big chunk of the mid-high CR monsters.

So magic weapons are now breaking both the bounded accuracy rules and the you don't have to give magic items for everything to be balanced rules. That's the problem. They have seriously screwed up magic weapons already by including such monster traits and static bonuses already.

Player characters of any class are not dead weight unless the DM wants them to be. Using a monster that some of the PCs can fight and others can't is generally considered very bad adventure design by the DM.

And it's not a "big chunk" we're talking about; there are very few monsters that are immune to non-magical (including silvered) weapons. Most of those are also immune to a lot of other effects, and have magic resistance and/or legendary resistance, making them a big problem for spellcasters too. So against those, the adventure becomes finding the One Weakness macguffin.

Xetheral

2014-11-23, 06:20 PM

The short version:

Ultimately, the 5e math isn't that different from the 3.5 or 4e math. The game still uses the same d20 and (presumably) expects a similar proportion of rolls to count as "success" at a given task. This means that so long as the number you need to roll is in the 2-19 range, a +1 bonus has a similar effect across all editions. Advantage and disadvantage throw a significant wrench into the analysis, but their (mostly) symmetrical nature reduces their mathematical impact in the general case.

What has changed in this edition is the relationship of the bonuses and the DCs, both of which have compressed into a narrower range. Depending on your group's play style, this may or may not mean that a higher proportion of rolls require a 2-19 to succeed. It does mean that the a higher proportion of monsters are available to the DM without going outside that target number range.

The discussion of the "worth" of a +1 to a character in 5e is a much more complicated topic, and one that heavily depends on one's conception of "value".

silveralen

2014-11-23, 06:57 PM

Player characters of any class are not dead weight unless the DM wants them to be. Using a monster that some of the PCs can fight and others can't is generally considered very bad adventure design by the DM.

And it's not a "big chunk" we're talking about; there are very few monsters that are immune to non-magical (including silvered) weapons. Most of those are also immune to a lot of other effects, and have magic resistance and/or legendary resistance, making them a big problem for spellcasters too. So against those, the adventure becomes finding the One Weakness macguffin.

I'm not talking about immunity, I'm talking about resistance. Which yes, is pretty common, and as CR goes up it gets far more common.

The majority of elementals, celestials, fiends, constructs, and a decent chunk of the monstrosities and aberrations get it for example, as well as shape changers though silver helps.

Those are some pretty iconic enemies, maybe a DM actually thinks magic weapons are optional and has an undead heavy campaign, those who need magic weapons are basically on minion duty dealing with zombies and skeletons and useless against any of the tougher enemies.

In fact, it's not entirely unlike the problems caused by the old sneak attack rules, where DMs had to be careful not to screw rogue's over via enemy selection choice. Same problem here, if anyone actually takes the entirely false "magic items are optional" line at face value.

JoeJ

2014-11-23, 07:59 PM

I'm not talking about immunity, I'm talking about resistance. Which yes, is pretty common, and as CR goes up it gets far more common.

The majority of elementals, celestials, fiends, constructs, and a decent chunk of the monstrosities and aberrations get it for example, as well as shape changers though silver helps.

Those are some pretty iconic enemies, maybe a DM actually thinks magic weapons are optional and has an undead heavy campaign, those who need magic weapons are basically on minion duty dealing with zombies and skeletons and useless against any of the tougher enemies.

In fact, it's not entirely unlike the problems caused by the old sneak attack rules, where DMs had to be careful not to screw rogue's over via enemy selection choice. Same problem here, if anyone actually takes the entirely false "magic items are optional" line at face value.

You don't need magic items to deal with resistance. Ordinary weapons work fine; you just have to be a bit more persistent. So in that undead campaign, a fighter without any magic is only useless against a demi-lich or a lich, and I wouldn't expect a group of PCs to stand toe-to-toe with them like a video game boss anyway. They should be doing their best to avoid them and just look for the phylactery.

Did you notice that a lot of the monsters that are resistant to normal damage are also resistant to common types of magical attacks? If every martial character has to have a magic weapon, it might well be the casters who are relegated to minion duty.

Knaight

2014-11-23, 08:25 PM

I'm generally of the opinion that enhancement bonuses are really boring and best removed. Replacing them with more notable abilities will generally improve the game, and a generic "magic" tag that makes a weapon deal with magic resistance and comes with some extra durability pretty much covers them.

GoodbyeSoberDay

2014-11-23, 09:45 PM

Of course, I am not against magic items in general, just ones that grant enhancement bonuses. My group and I are planning to eliminate the +x's not the item itself. One of them already has a magical greatsword (+0).I do like the idea of +0 weapons, or even a mundane weapon quality (masterwork+) that makes a weapon count as magical for the purposes of resistance and immunity.

I also like the idea of a magical weapon increasing in awesomeness as the wielder does, kinda like a non-borked version of the 3.5 Ancestral Relic rules. So initially the Paladin's heirloom longsword is +0, but after a few levels it's also Holy, and then adds more radiant damage to each attack, and so on. It works thematically and mechanically.

Well of course it doesn't have to be balanced to the nth degree, but 20% increases are a bit more than decimal points here. I think it can work well as a way to calibrate balance. Is the optimized scorching ray fire sorcerer consistently outdoing the newbie thief? Don't just send fire elementals at the party and piss off the sorcerer. Give the thief a +whatever dagger. In other words, maybe a player needs a 20% bump.
This is exactly the kind of arms race my players and I want to avoid. The constant one-upping we saw in 3.5. I don't see this as one-upping. The FreeMG/FreeMM also tell the DM to send bigger and badder stuff at the PCs when they level up. This practice was, seemingly, calibrated to the decimal point in later 4e runs. When you get more awesome, you can deal with bigger and harder challenges. If we preclude the option of making the math be a meaningless treadmill*, why is it so bad here?

And if you don't want that admittedly gamist approach, then you're probably playing in a sandbox game where the PCs tend to choose their battles. Guess what battles they're more likely to choose if they're more powerful?
We don't want our math broken. We like our math healthy and intact. :smallwink:

For you and yours, perhaps, and if so that is great. My players and I like good solid clean math for our games and manageable numbers. My players like growing in power, but they prefer that be done through their class and not through a bunch of swag.Like I said, 5e allows for some imbalances already. Magic items can help keep it intact. But really, as you implied, it's largely a play-style difference. Some groups want a magic weapon to be special, such that the character who wields it really is demonstrably more powerful. For that to be true, he has to be better at killing enemies** than he was before, and better at killing enemies relative to anyone who isn't wielding a similarly powerful item. If you don't want magic items to have that effect on the game, then indeed the +0 weapon is the best solution.

For us, a balanced game isn't boring but a breath of fresh air.Apologies if I was unclear; I was talking about a +3 sword being boring, not your game. What I meant was that, if there is a +3 sword in the game, the only thing different from it and a +0 sword is that it changes the math. If, effectively, everyone gets a +3 sword and all enemies get commensurate increases in AC and HP, the effect of +3 is utterly meaningless and boring.

A +0 sword that sheds light when orcs are near is neat because it has an interesting qualitative effect; it doesn't change the math, but it's useful to the character nonetheless. It seems like this type of sword is better for your game, because you don't like swag providing most of your effectiveness***.

I think we agree on most points; it's just a play-style difference where I'm more willing to put up with a bit of imbalance in one aspect of the game as long as everyone can still contribute. Maybe the fighter has a +3 sword that makes him the best at chopping things up, but the Bard has a Circlet of Persuasion that makes him awesome at being a face, and the Thief has a Cloak/Boots of Elvenkind that makes him neigh-impossible to detect, and the Wizard has a Staff of Teleportation to allow the party to ambush/retreat more easily. Again, the Fighter - that is, the guy whose main job is to fight - is the best at fighting in this scenario.

Some groups are okay with this, and it's entirely up to the DM if this is the case. The RAW issue is that some groups really like clean balanced math to the point where even a single +1 is bad... but mundanes need magic weapons to properly fight many monsters. In this case a homebrew solution is required, and this is indeed a hole in the rules system. But other groups are okay with a fighter getting a +1; he can have nice things too :)

*What I mean is if the numbers exactly match whatever plusses you get. For instance, 4e had something very similar to bounded accuracy. Everyone's numbers went up by +1 per two levels, but so did all the enemies'/challenges' numbers. The DC to open a friggin' wooden door went up as your numbers went up! It would have been easier and more honest to avoid the +1 per two levels entirely, but then there wouldn't be the illusion of progress... with a Will Save DC 2 to disbelieve. It was like Oblivion all over again.

If enemies get more dangerous in other ways, that's fine. The fact that we can't go kill the big Red Dragon right now, but can later, is part of the game.
**He could also be doing something else that isn't killing enemies at a better clip. It's just the most straightforward example.
***Admittedly the swag effect did go too far in 3e/4e. In the last 3e game I ran I just went with "Inherent" WBL, where everyone was at least a bit magical and had special abilities they could buy as magic items from the book, using effective "GP" = suggested WBL. If a player wanted a more mundane feel, he'd just buy items that modified what he already did and fluff it as him just being a badass.

MaxWilson

2014-11-23, 11:21 PM

You don't need magic items to deal with resistance. Ordinary weapons work fine; you just have to be a bit more persistent. So in that undead campaign, a fighter without any magic is only useless against a demi-lich or a lich, and I wouldn't expect a group of PCs to stand toe-to-toe with them like a video game boss anyway. They should be doing their best to avoid them and just look for the phylactery.

Did you notice that a lot of the monsters that are resistant to normal damage are also resistant to common types of magical attacks? If every martial character has to have a magic weapon, it might well be the casters who are relegated to minion duty.

In this situation, I think the casters are relegated to "use my bonus action to cast Magic Weapon on the fighter's longbow" duty. Teamwork FTW.

I think it can work well as a way to calibrate balance. Is the optimized scorching ray fire sorcerer consistently outdoing the newbie thief? Don't just send fire elementals at the party and ---- off the sorcerer. Give the thief a +whatever dagger. In other words, maybe a player needs a 20% bump. I don't see this as one-upping. The FreeMG/FreeMM also tell the DM to send bigger and badder stuff at the PCs when they level up. This practice was, seemingly, calibrated to the decimal point in later 4e runs. When you get more awesome, you can deal with bigger and harder challenges. If we preclude the option of making the math be a meaningless treadmill*, why is it so bad here?

Minor nitpick: as Eslin pointed out, my off-the-cuff guesstimate of "20%" for a +2 longsword is on the low end of the curve. Unless they're fighting something with AC 12 or lower, a +2 weapon will be closer to a +25% boost, and if GWM is applicable it is closer to 50%. (Unless of course the weapon is smeared with Purple Worm venom, then it's closer to a +12% boost.)

Baptor

2014-11-23, 11:39 PM

So magic weapons are now breaking both the bounded accuracy rules and the you don't have to give magic items for everything to be balanced rules. That's the problem. They have seriously screwed up magic weapons already by including such monster traits and static bonuses already.

Exactly right. They can't say "we designed this game without magic items in mind" and have enemies which practically require magic items to beat. And, as you say, what is even worse is that some classes really don't need those items because magic is built into their class whereas some are without magic at all.

In fact, it's not entirely unlike the problems caused by the old sneak attack rules, where DMs had to be careful not to screw rogue's over via enemy selection choice. Same problem here, if anyone actually takes the entirely false "magic items are optional" line at face value.

This. In 3.5 if your DM said you were playing an undead themed game, you knew rogue was off the table. 5e RAW basically means if a DM says their campaign is low-magic or no magic items then you'd better play something like a monk or eldritch knight if you want to be a martial class or you will be hosed.

What has changed in this edition is the relationship of the bonuses and the DCs, both of which have compressed into a narrower range. Depending on your group's play style, this may or may not mean that a higher proportion of rolls require a 2-19 to succeed. It does mean that the a higher proportion of monsters are available to the DM without going outside that target number range.

The discussion of the "worth" of a +1 to a character in 5e is a much more complicated topic, and one that heavily depends on one's conception of "value".

And that is part of my main point. Due to the narrow range in this edition, the introduction of enhancement bonuses makes it more, not less, game breaking than previous editions. In 3.5, one martial might have a +4 sword and another a +2, and the difference would be minimal because both would have +20 base to hit, so a +2 difference isn't much. Now you are looking at two players who have something like a +11 to hit at max (20 stat, +6 prof), so if one has a +2 advantage, that is a huge difference.

I'm generally of the opinion that enhancement bonuses are really boring and best removed. Replacing them with more notable abilities will generally improve the game, and a generic "magic" tag that makes a weapon deal with magic resistance and comes with some extra durability pretty much covers them.

I couldn't agree with you more.

I do like the idea of +0 weapons, or even a mundane weapon quality (masterwork+) that makes a weapon count as magical for the purposes of resistance and immunity.

I also like the idea of a magical weapon increasing in awesomeness as the wielder does, kinda like a non-borked version of the 3.5 Ancestral Relic rules. So initially the Paladin's heirloom longsword is +0, but after a few levels it's also Holy, and then adds more radiant damage to each attack, and so on. It works thematically and mechanically.

You might like the idea we came up with then. First, we adopted the Elder Scrolls rule that silvered weapons can hit like magical ones. That means that any character can get a weapon capable of hitting ghosts for +100gp price. It's a high enough cost that level 1's and 2's probably can't get but that is easily doable by level 4.

Secondly, most magic weapons we are making up give a bonus to damage equal to the attuned user's proficiency bonus. That means something like a flame tongue is a magic longsword that deals bonus fire damage equal to the user's proficiency bonus (+2 to +6). This makes magic weapons tougher than normal ones and worth getting but not overwhelmingly so. Of course our magic weapons get other, nifty abilities as well. Specifically I am working on one that drains health that is in another thread here.

MaxWilson

2014-11-23, 11:55 PM

Baptor

2014-11-24, 12:29 AM

silveralen

2014-11-24, 12:34 AM

It's funny you should mention ghosts, Baptor. Here's a ghost's resistance list:

Damage resistance: acid, fire, lightning, thunder; bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing from nonmagical weapons.
Damage immunities: cold, necrotic, poison.

Now, going by the apparent theory in this thread that anyone whose regular attack is something the ghost resists is "useless", I guess that means the optimized scorching ray sorcerer and the fighter are both useless, aren't they? Maybe they should do something smarter than the brute force approach of "blast away with our usual attacks ad nauseum."

Remind me why the sorcerer hasn't taken the feat to ignore resistance to his element?

You don't need magic items to deal with resistance. Ordinary weapons work fine; you just have to be a bit more persistent. So in that undead campaign, a fighter without any magic is only useless against a demi-lich or a lich, and I wouldn't expect a group of PCs to stand toe-to-toe with them like a video game boss anyway. They should be doing their best to avoid them and just look for the phylactery.

Did you notice that a lot of the monsters that are resistant to normal damage are also resistant to common types of magical attacks? If every martial character has to have a magic weapon, it might well be the casters who are relegated to minion duty.

Except for the fact that some classes can literally ignore that resistance as a feature of the class. In a campaign without magic weapons, a monk or druid doesn't have to worry about dealing damage like a member of their class with half as many levels (which is exactly what resistance does to fighter or barbarian). How is monk balanced with fighter in that scenario?

As for doing something clever, are you trying to defend fighter on the basis of how much he can do beyond raw damage compared to a full caster or magic using class? Because that's idiotic. Hitting things in the face is literally why you play a fighter, keeping him from doing that (or doing it well) is a waste of a class and a player, you are nothing but dead weight.

No, I noticed elemental resistance, which is an issue if you only use one or two elements but haven't bothered picking up the feat which ignores elemental resistance for an element. That's the difference between a poorly built character and being screwed (possibly unintentionally) by the DM.

JoeJ

2014-11-24, 12:40 AM

Remind me why the sorcerer hasn't taken the feat to ignore resistance to his element?

Probably the same reason the wizard doesn't have Magic Weapon in his spell book.

Except for the fact that some classes can literally ignore that resistance as a feature of the class. In a campaign without magic weapons, a monk or druid doesn't have to worry about dealing damage like a member of their class with half as many levels (which is exactly what resistance does to fighter or barbarian). How is monk balanced with fighter in that scenario?

Half damage =/= half as many levels in your class.

As for doing something clever, are you trying to defend fighter on the basis of how much he can do beyond raw damage compared to a full caster or magic using class? Because that's idiotic. Hitting things in the face is literally why you play a fighter, keeping him from doing that (or doing it well) is a waste of a class and a player, you are nothing but dead weight.

That's absurd. Not everything is supposed to be beatable by standing still and hitting it. That's why characters have a range of abilities and not just a single attack option. If a player character is dead weight in an adventure, it's because of the DM, not because of the system.

silveralen

2014-11-24, 12:46 AM

Probably the same reason the wizard doesn't have Magic Weapon in his spell book.

Because the sorcerer assumed the other party members could pull their own weight and didn't need to be baby sat to do the only thing their class is any good at?

Nah, doesn't really work. The sorcerer probably just overlooked the feat.

JoeJ

2014-11-24, 01:18 AM

silveralen

2014-11-24, 01:32 AM

Half damage =/= half as many levels in your class.

That's absurd. Not everything is supposed to be beatable by standing still and hitting it. That's why characters have a range of abilities and not just a single attack option. If a player character is dead weight in an adventure, it's because of the DM, not because of the system.

For a fighter? It actually is pretty close. In combat, a fighter dealing half damage is only slightly ahead of a fighter of half as many levels.

Okay, not everything should be, but fighter should be good at actually fighting monsters, right?

The only thing that actually makes fighter good at fighting monsters in 5e is hitting hard and hitting often.

If fighter's damage is being reduced to half, while the rest of his party is normal, fighter isn't doing his job property.

Fighter attacks. That's what the class is good at. Other classes are better at skills (rogue, bard, even barbarian has rages). Other classes have spells, or dramatically better spells. So please, explain to me why fighter shouldn't always be exceptional at the one area he is actually good at.

Xetheral

2014-11-24, 01:33 AM

What has changed in this edition is the relationship of the bonuses and the DCs, both of which have compressed into a narrower range. Depending on your group's play style, this may or may not mean that a higher proportion of rolls require a 2-19 to succeed. It does mean that the a higher proportion of monsters are available to the DM without going outside that target number range.

The discussion of the "worth" of a +1 to a character in 5e is a much more complicated topic, and one that heavily depends on one's conception of "value".
And that is part of my main point. Due to the narrow range in this edition, the introduction of enhancement bonuses makes it more, not less, game breaking than previous editions. In 3.5, one martial might have a +4 sword and another a +2, and the difference would be minimal because both would have +20 base to hit, so a +2 difference isn't much. Now you are looking at two players who have something like a +11 to hit at max (20 stat, +6 prof), so if one has a +2 advantage, that is a huge difference.

I may have poorly phrased what I was trying to say, because there appears to be a disconnect somewhere. In the earlier portion of my post that you quoted part of, I was trying to explain that the difference between a +4 to hit and a +2 to hit has changed very, very little between editions (other than the impact of advantage/disadvantage). It seems you disagree?

I'd argue that the difference between +24 and +22 to hit ACs between 26 and 41 is mathematically identical to the difference between +15 and +13 to hit ACs between 17 and 32.

Baptor

2014-11-24, 01:41 AM

I may have poorly phrased what I was trying to say, because there appears to be a disconnect somewhere. In the earlier portion of my post that you quoted part of, I was trying to explain that the difference between a +4 to hit and a +2 to hit has changed very, very little between editions (other than the impact of advantage/disadvantage). It seems you disagree?

I'd argue that the difference between +24 and +22 to hit ACs between 26 and 41 is mathematically identical to the difference between +15 and +13 to hit ACs between 17 and 32.

Your math may be better than my math, because I did not get past Pre-calculus and even then I had to take it twice. That's one reason I made this thread, if I am wrong I want to know it. :smallfrown:

Let me make sure we are on the same page though. Let's say I have a +20 to hit, and you take away +1, I have +19, which is a 5% decrease in my chance to hit.

But if I have +10 to hit and you take away +1, the loss is 10%, or double. The penalty is far more significant.

Therefore because of 5e's narrower range, any addition or subtraction to hit will be far more significant than in previous editions. The base range to hit for a fighter in 3.5 was 1-20, and in this edition it is 2-6. Any plus or negative in a range of 2-6 has got to have more impact than the same plus or negative in a range of 1-20, especially as we approach 20.

Does that make sense or am I still wrong? :smalleek:

GoodbyeSoberDay

2014-11-24, 01:54 AM

silveralen

2014-11-24, 02:10 AM

Not to be construed as an argument in favor of constantly throwing physical-damage-resistant monsters at the party, but...

- Proficiencies for non-combat situations could be useful.
- Semi-combat situations, like a bar brawl, call for non-weapon methods of incapacitation such as grappling; the fighter should be pretty good at this.
- Action surge can make Fighters superior at using items or manipulating something in the environment.

In order:

1. Fighter isn't bad with skills anymore than another class is, but he isn't good with them. Barbarian, rogue, bard, and ranger have advantages to skills fighter lacks. Characters with large spell lists can also augment skill usage, spells like pass without trace, enhance ability, or even guidance. So, as far as skills go, fighter still isn't standing out. At best he is average, and he could easily be struggling on this front.

2. Again, fighter isn't amazing in such situations. He can use more per turn, but he can't grapple more than two, has no advantage on grappling beyond his ability score and his other option is basically tripping them which is hardly incapacitating. A monk could stun rather than grapple, a barbarian would be better at grappling due to advantage on strength checks, spells obviously do this better, etc.

3. That's one per combat if we are being optimistic until very high levels, while rogue can easily get such a benefit every turn. So even for that one turn he isn't doing something another class couldn't do as well, and with expertise that rogue could easily be doing it better if it involves a skill check as well.

Fighter's only time to shine is in combat, hitting things. That is the only place he is actually exceptional. He isn't godawful elsewhere like he was in 3.x, but he still isn't good elsewhere. So seeing him be screwed over in combat compared to other classes using what one assumes is the default (no magic weapons) amounts to a useless class.

Xetheral

2014-11-24, 02:11 AM

Your math may be better than my math, because I did not get past Pre-calculus and even then I had to take it twice. That's one reason I made this thread, if I am wrong I want to know it. :smallfrown:

Let me make sure we are on the same page though. Let's say I have a +20 to hit, and you take away +1, I have +19, which is a 5% decrease in my chance to hit.

But if I have +10 to hit and you take away +1, the loss is 10%, or double. The penalty is far more significant.

Therefore because of 5e's narrower range, any addition or subtraction to hit will be far more significant than in previous editions. The base range to hit for a fighter in 3.5 was 1-20, and in this edition it is 2-6. Any plus or negative in a range of 2-6 has got to have more impact than the same plus or negative in a range of 1-20, especially as we approach 20.

Does that make sense or am I still wrong? :smalleek:

In one sense, you’re absolutely right. You’ve correctly calculated the proportional decrease in the expected value of rolling a d20 and adding the bonus. Unfortunately, because of how the d20 resolution mechanic works, that proportional decrease ends up being irrelevant.

[Edit: That was poorly worded on my part. Technically what you've correctly calculated is simply the proportional decrease in the bonus itself. Not the expected value of adding it to a d20. My overall point remains identical.]

In other words, if it was a damage roll, where expected value matters, you'd be spot-on. But a hit roll only has two possible outcomes: hit and miss. It doesn't matter by how much you hit or by how much you miss.

Consider: A fighter has a +20 bonus to hit. Against a monster with AC 31, he has a 50% chance to hit. Another fighter has a +10 bonus to hit. Against a monster with AC 21, he also has a 50% chance to hit. In both cases, taking a -1 penalty to the roll decreases their chances to hit by 5 percentage points to 45%.

(As an aside, it is possible that 5e monsters are, as a group, harder or easier for characters to hit than in previous editions. If so, then the mathematical importance of a +1 does indeed change, because it represents a smaller or greater proportional change in hit frequency. However, this depends on DM choice of what monsters to throw against their PCs, and demonstrating an overall between-edition bias one way or the other would be very difficult. Also, in the absence of any data, such a bias could plausibly go either way.)

Would an in-depth post on the mathematical import of a +1 bonus be useful? I've considered writing one, but it would be complicated, fairly technical, and would have to cover a lot of different cases (hit rolls, contests, absolute vs relative changes in probability of success, opportunity costs, rolls with DCs at intervals representing different levels of success, etc.). No promises, but if you would find such an endeavor useful that would increase the odds I actually get around to it. :)

Eslin

2014-11-24, 02:30 AM

JoeJ

2014-11-24, 02:44 AM

For a fighter? It actually is pretty close. In combat, a fighter dealing half damage is only slightly ahead of a fighter of half as many levels.

Except for all the ways that they're not.

Okay, not everything should be, but fighter should be good at actually fighting monsters, right?

Some monsters. They shouldn't be good at fighting monsters that are best fought with magic, or that can only be defeated in some specific non-combat way.

The only thing that actually makes fighter good at fighting monsters in 5e is hitting hard and hitting often.

If fighter's damage is being reduced to half, while the rest of his party is normal, fighter isn't doing his job property.

Then the fighter needs to change tactics, doesn't he? Grapple; push; trip; disarm; distract; block the enemy's movement; use fire; throw acid; throw holy water; use poison; help an ally get advantage. If there's literally nothing useful for one of the PCs to do then the DM screwed up, regardless of which class that character happens to belong to.

Fighter attacks. That's what the class is good at. Other classes are better at skills (rogue, bard, even barbarian has rages). Other classes have spells, or dramatically better spells. So please, explain to me why fighter shouldn't always be exceptional at the one area he is actually good at.

Because always doing the same thing is boring. Because a player character is not just a class. Because it's not very much of a challenge if you can always use your best attack on everything. Because why should anybody always be exceptional in every situation?

There's nothing that says you can't have magic items, or that you shouldn't have magic items. But you don't have to have them for the encounters to be balanced.

silveralen

2014-11-24, 03:05 AM

Some monsters. They shouldn't be good at fighting monsters that are best fought with magic, or that can only be defeated in some specific non-combat way.

Then the fighter needs to change tactics, doesn't he? Grapple; push; trip; disarm; distract; block the enemy's movement; use fire; throw acid; throw holy water; use poison; help an ally get advantage. If there's literally nothing useful for one of the PCs to do then the DM screwed up, regardless of which class that character happens to belong to.

Because always doing the same thing is boring. Because a player character is not just a class. Because it's not very much of a challenge if you can always use your best attack on everything. Because why should anybody always be exceptional in every situation?

There's nothing that says you can't have magic items, or that you shouldn't have magic items. But you don't have to have them for the encounters to be balanced.

So fighter is mainly good at fighting humanoids, animals and giants, maybe dragons if said dragons don't fly or the fighter is an archer. Everything else might be better left to someone else. Oh, and not hoards of said creatures either, that's what casters do. You see how this is really starting to make fighter a bad class? Resistance is far to common to say fighter is even good at killing most things without a magic weapon, and yes resistance is all it takes to prevent him from being anything but mediocre at it.

Thanks for listing off things fighter isn't particularly good at, but rogue or bard or barbarian could do really well! Great to know you constantly force the player to play his class poorly then call it "tactics".

Yet monk always can. This is balanced because....?

Yes. Yes he does. If you have a monk and a fighter in the same party and magic items aren't being dropped the fighter will struggle in comparison, because monk is clearly balanced on the assumption other party members will have magic items, that's why his unarmed strikes are treated as such. The designers lied blatantly about magic items not being needed, it is being accounted for in the basic design of classes like monk ans druid. If your level 10 fighter lacks a magic weapon he will struggle unless the DM tailors encounters to overcome that specific shortcoming, not because he needs a +1 but because he simply needs a weapon that is magic.

To reiterate, the moment creatures got resistance or immunity to non magic weapons and monk/druid recieved a magic ability treating their attacks as magical, magic weapons became needed for game balance.

Xetheral

2014-11-24, 03:07 AM

I disagree quite strongly, since this is the first time it's mattered. 4e had a very explicitly set out item treadmill, everyone had items of the amount of +s relevant to their level, so this discussion never had to take place.

In 3.5, your magical weapon +s rarely made a difference. You could greater magic weapon it to +5 and in any case optimising damage was hardly difficult - ultimately the balance of bonuses to hit was irrelevant, since you often ended up with creatures only hitting each other on 20s or 1s.

I'm speaking purely of the mathematical impact of a +1, which is the part of the original post to which I was directing my reply. Regardless of item availability/expectation, the mathematical impact on a hit roll is quite similar across editions. 4e may well have expected a particular number of bonuses at a given point, but against a given AC the impact of not having one would be identical to lacking a similar bonus in 3.5

As for 3.5, your play experience falls outside the limiting factor I placed on my argument:

[S]o long as the number you need to roll is in the 2-19 range, a +1 bonus has a similar effect across all editions.

(Emphasis in original.) I completely agree that if your game routinely has enemies that fall outside the range of the d20 random number generator (in either direction) then a +1 is significantly less valuable. I also agree that in 5e such a situation is less likely to occur, due to the decreased range of monster statistics. On the other hand, my play experience with 3.5 differs sharply from your own: I very infrequently encountered a situation where either a player or a monster required a 20 to hit, or would hit even on a 2.

I think my assumption that most rolls will fall into range of the d20, in all editions, is a very reasonable one. But the OP is welcome to consider whether that assumption is true in his games when considering how strongly to weigh my arguments.

JoeJ

2014-11-24, 03:11 AM

Stuff

I was only interested in having a discussion, not an argument. We're just going to have to leave it at the fact that we don't agree.

silveralen

2014-11-24, 03:22 AM

I was only interested in having a discussion, not an argument. We're just going to have to leave it at the fact that we don't agree.

It isn't a diferrence of opinion, if you plan to run a table you legitimately need to understand that. The bit about magic items being optional isn't true. It was an off the cuff remark that didn't make it into the final product, the monk (and druid) class and non magic weapon resistance illustrate this, magic weapons are assumed by a certain level. The numerical bonus may not be, but the existence of such a weapon for the martial class is. It is an assumed part of the game, balance issues will occur if you don't provide them.

GoodbyeSoberDay

2014-11-24, 04:26 AM

I think I just have lower expectations for a fighter, coming from 3e.
1. Fighter isn't bad with skills anymore than another class is, but he isn't good with them. Barbarian, rogue, bard, and ranger have advantages to skills fighter lacks. Characters with large spell lists can also augment skill usage, spells like pass without trace, enhance ability, or even guidance. So, as far as skills go, fighter still isn't standing out. At best he is average, and he could easily be struggling on this front.Yeah, I wasn't expecting fighter to shine; I was just saying that sometimes it would be reasonable to expect that you can't use your weapons, and the fighter isn't TERRIBAD at it like in 3e (outside of intimidation shenanigans).
2. Again, fighter isn't amazing in such situations. He can use more per turn, but he can't grapple more than two, has no advantage on grappling beyond his ability score and his other option is basically tripping them which is hardly incapacitating. A monk could stun rather than grapple, a barbarian would be better at grappling due to advantage on strength checks, spells obviously do this better, etc.He has native athletics access (not much by itself I know), more feats, and a good reason to go strength. He's probably not the BEST at grappling but it's just one option, and it's something to do when you probably don't want to be expending limited resources.

3. That's one per combat if we are being optimistic until very high levels, while rogue can easily get such a benefit every turn. So even for that one turn he isn't doing something another class couldn't do as well, and with expertise that rogue could easily be doing it better if it involves a skill check as well.So the Rogue is the best at doing all that stuff, assuming it falls into his cunning action categories. That would still make the Fighter the second best, no?
Fighter's only time to shine is in combat, hitting things. That is the only place he is actually exceptional. He isn't godawful elsewhere like he was in 3.x, but he still isn't good elsewhere. So seeing him be screwed over in combat compared to other classes using what one assumes is the default (no magic weapons) amounts to a useless class.It is true that the fighter only really shines when he's getting his Attack action on. I think that was the miscommunication; you want his niche to be more robust, and I was saying "well at least he can do something when his niche doesn't apply."

Scarily enough, I'm playing a low level fighter in a game right now, making your concerns quite real... but luckily I think we'll end up with magic items.
I completely agree that if your game routinely has enemies that fall outside the range of the d20 random number generator (in either direction) then a +1 is significantly less valuable. I also agree that in 5e such a situation is less likely to occur, due to the decreased range of monster statistics. On the other hand, my play experience with 3.5 differs sharply from your own: I very infrequently encountered a situation where either a player or a monster required a 20 to hit, or would hit even on a 2.

I think my assumption that most rolls will fall into range of the d20, in all editions, is a very reasonable one. But the OP is welcome to consider whether that assumption is true in his games when considering how strongly to weigh my arguments.IME, to-hit scaled faster than AC, especially monster-vs-PC. The main benefit of pumping AC was to reduce the amount a monster could reliably Power Attack you for, oddly enough making AC like a sort of damage reduction...

I agree with your analysis in general. If the RNG is still relevant, the absolute change in effectiveness is the same. The difference comes in available options. Weapon Focus sucked in 3e because you could literally get a feat that gave you up to +5 to hit and damage with any attack, and that was an average feat. Weapon Expertise was considered to be required in 4e, a feat tax, because the feats were so small and situational that a small bonus to hit was far superior.

In other words, the tighter the math gets, the more awesome a +1 starts to look.

Yoroichi

2014-11-24, 04:40 AM

Hello,
I just wanted to add my 2 cents.

I apologise in advance but i didnt read the whole thread, only first page.

5E is not 3E! That leaves us with many DM options. First of all +1 weapons are rare, +2 are VERY rare and +3 are legendary. +3 is as i am aware the maximum bonus a weapon can have.
Second in a fight at lvl 17, your martial characters will die to either charisma or intelligence saves, to hit bonuses will not save them there.

My 8lvl barbarian died in 3 turns due to failing my 3/4 CONSTITUtion saves (with +7 jesus christ). So i think that just the to hit bonuses ( or boni?) are not imbalanced up to +3)
Regarding overcoming of resistance, i think it is calculated that by lvl 17 the characters will have ways of nullifying a creatures resistances.
Regarding extra damage, my barbarian has 14 strength a +2 VERY rare weapon will hit as if i had 18 strength. It is not such a big deal as long as the character stats are balanced.

Eslin

2014-11-24, 04:56 AM

In a fight at lvl 17, your martial characters will die to either charisma or intelligence saves, to hit bonuses will not save them there.
True. But all characters have save vulnerabilities, it's expected you'll compensate.

Regarding extra damage, my barbarian has 14 strength a +2 VERY rare weapon will hit as if i had 18 strength. It is not such a big deal as long as the character stats are balanced.
Not true. Increasing hit chance has a huge effect and is far stronger on some characters than on others.

Strill

2014-11-24, 07:19 AM

For what it matters, the playtest documents had magic weapons up to +3. So you can probably get away with that without too much issue.

Eslin

2014-11-24, 07:21 AM

For what it matters, the playtest documents had magic weapons up to +3. So you can probably get away with that without too much issue.

He says after two pages of people detailing exactly why you shouldn't.

MaxWilson

2014-11-24, 01:21 PM

It isn't a diferrence of opinion, if you plan to run a table you legitimately need to understand that. The bit about magic items being optional isn't true. It was an off the cuff remark that didn't make it into the final product, the monk (and druid) class and non magic weapon resistance illustrate this, magic weapons are assumed by a certain level. The numerical bonus may not be, but the existence of such a weapon for the martial class is. It is an assumed part of the game, balance issues will occur if you don't provide them.

This actually proves the opposite of what you claim it does. If magic items were assumed, then it would be unbalanced in favor of the fighter that his 6th level feature is a free ASI/feat and the monk only gets a (redundant) ability to overcome damage resistance with his strikes. The fighter gets that for free and he gets a +1 attack/damage bonus to go with it!

In order for the monk/druid class ability to be fair at all, magic items have to be rare.

silveralen

2014-11-24, 02:58 PM

This actually proves the opposite of what you claim it does. If magic items were assumed, then it would be unbalanced in favor of the fighter that his 6th level feature is a free ASI/feat and the monk only gets a (redundant) ability to overcome damage resistance with his strikes. The fighter gets that for free and he gets a +1 attack/damage bonus to go with it!

In order for the monk/druid class ability to be fair at all, magic items have to be rare.

Except a shifted druid can't use a magic weapon, and unarmed attacks by their very nature don't use weapons. That's why the feature exists, so those classes can punch/claw without running into problems with enemies resisting half their damage.

Also, monk gets ki and druid gets spells.

Are you really going to look at level 6 monk and go "wow, he really struggles comapred to fighter" because I'm not. The classes are very close together, certainly not to the point fighter's damage being cut in half makes things fair.

Demonic Spoon

2014-11-24, 03:17 PM

This actually proves the opposite of what you claim it does. If magic items were assumed, then it would be unbalanced in favor of the fighter that his 6th level feature is a free ASI/feat and the monk only gets a (redundant) ability to overcome damage resistance with his strikes. The fighter gets that for free and he gets a +1 attack/damage bonus to go with it!

In order for the monk/druid class ability to be fair at all, magic items have to be rare.

First off, stop comparing the different classes' level X features in a vacuum.

Secondly, the fighter absolutely does not get that for free. You can't just hand the fighter a free magic item (a very powerful one, due to its aforementioned ability to ignore DR) and then compare it to a vanilla monk and say that the fighter is overpowered. For balance purposes we would have to assume that the monk also has a magic item of equal worth.

With regards to druids: Moon druids are capable of using magic items that would make sense for the form to be able to use. Shapeshifting does not blanket-remove your ability to use magic items.

MaxWilson

2014-11-24, 03:18 PM

Except a shifted druid can't use a magic weapon, and unarmed attacks by their very nature don't use weapons. That's why the feature exists, so those classes can punch/claw without running into problems with enemies resisting half their damage.

Also, monk gets ki and druid gets spells.

Are you really going to look at level 6 monk and go "wow, he really struggles comapred to fighter" because I'm not. The classes are very close together, certainly not to the point fighter's damage being cut in half makes things fair.

1.) Fighters get spells too if they want them. Including Magic Weapon, castable with a bonus action.
2.) Fighters are much, much better than monks at ranged combat. They don't need extra feats as a free boost.
3.) Your damage doesn't get cut in half, because most monsters aren't weapon-resistant in the first place, the ones that do often have a way to bypass resistance (silver or adamantine), and fighter has mitigation strategies available (grapple/prone costs you two actions but lets you recoup 25% of the damage, putting you at about 75% damage instead of 50%).
4.) Parties can fight as a team instead of a collection of disparate individuals.

First off, stop comparing the different classes' level X features in a vacuum.

Secondly, the fighter absolutely does not get that for free. You can't just hand the fighter a free magic item (a very powerful one, due to its aforementioned ability to ignore DR) and then compare it to a vanilla monk and say that the fighter is overpowered. For balance purposes we would have to assume that the monk also has a magic item of equal worth.

I wouldn't hand it to a fighter for free. Since we both agree that ignoring DR is a "very powerful feature" which ought to be paid for instead of assumed, what's your substantive disagreement here?

Demonic Spoon

2014-11-24, 03:32 PM

I wouldn't hand it to a fighter for free. Since we both agree that ignoring DR is a "very powerful feature" which ought to be paid for instead of assumed, what's your substantive disagreement here?

my point is just that "assumed magic items" do not intrinsically imbalance the game in favor of the fighter, unless "assumed magic items" means "the fighter gets magic weapons and no one else does".

MaxWilson

2014-11-24, 03:47 PM

my point is just that "assumed magic items" do not intrinsically imbalance the game in favor of the fighter, unless "assumed magic items" means "the fighter gets magic weapons and no one else does".

That's a truism.

Demonic Spoon

2014-11-24, 05:11 PM

That's a truism.

Apparently not, because you said:

In order for the monk/druid class ability to be fair at all, magic items have to be rare.

silveralen

2014-11-24, 05:12 PM

1.) Fighters get spells too if they want them. Including Magic Weapon, castable with a bonus action.
2.) Fighters are much, much better than monks at ranged combat. They don't need extra feats as a free boost.
3.) Your damage doesn't get cut in half, because most monsters aren't weapon-resistant in the first place, the ones that do often have a way to bypass resistance (silver or adamantine), and fighter has mitigation strategies available (grapple/prone costs you two actions but lets you recoup 25% of the damage, putting you at about 75% damage instead of 50%).
4.) Parties can fight as a team instead of a collection of disparate individuals.

1. Yep, which creates a really weird imbalance between subclasses. In a low magic campaign where magic items are rare... people should choose to play as the magic using fighter variant, as counter intuitive as that is. At least, if you want actually be certain you can contribute.

2. Not noticeably. A fighter specced for ranged combat will be, but a great weapon fighter, or any strength based build, has 1 additional attack (or 2 at capstone) and a slightly better weapon selection, whereas the monk has dexterity as his main attribute. That's going to even out overall.

3. It isn't that rare at all. Look through the monster manual, trying to remove monsters with resistance to normal weapons removes entire categories of creatures. It also doesn't mitigate anything, if knocking someone prone upped your overall damage more than using a normal attack the fighter would already be doing so, so it is still half what fighter's damage should be.

4. They should, but in order for that to be the case each party member should be pulling their own weight. It's annoying for a wizard to be spending spell slots just so a fighter isn't a drain on the party. That isn't teamwork that's fighter being carried by his team.

Fighter's without magic weapons are strictly inferior to monks. They have to go out of their way or get help from teammates just to do what they are supposedly good at.

Demonic Spoon

2014-11-24, 05:30 PM

1. Yep, which creates a really weird imbalance between subclasses. In a low magic campaign where magic items are rare... people should choose to play as the magic using fighter variant, as counter intuitive as that is. At least, if you want actually be certain you can contribute.

2. Not noticeably. A fighter specced for ranged combat will be, but a great weapon fighter, or any strength based build, has 1 additional attack (or 2 at capstone) and a slightly better weapon selection, whereas the monk has dexterity as his main attribute. That's going to even out overall.

3. It isn't that rare at all. Look through the monster manual, trying to remove monsters with resistance to normal weapons removes entire categories of creatures. It also doesn't mitigate anything, if knocking someone prone upped your overall damage more than using a normal attack the fighter would already be doing so, so it is still half what fighter's damage should be.

4. They should, but in order for that to be the case each party member should be pulling their own weight. It's annoying for a wizard to be spending spell slots just so a fighter isn't a drain on the party. That isn't teamwork that's fighter being carried by his team.

1. Magic Weapon provides a weaker buff than other level 2 buff spells. Compare +1 attack/damage with Blur, which forces disadvantage on every attack against you. Magic weapon is balanced with the idea that it's really useful against things that resist nonmagical damage. Eldritch Knight is not relatively better off here than any other time.

2. ...And, you know, all of the other class features that a fighter gets that a monk doesn't, since most of the fighter's features work fine with ranged weapons whereas very few of the monk's do.

3. It's not super-rare, but it's not common either. Didn't someone post a breakdown at some point?

4. A monster having resistance to damage doesn't make the fighter a drain on the party. It's not like monsters don't have elemental/magical resistances as well. Furthermore, monsters with physical damage resistance typically pay for it a lot in terms of their other stats (including base HP).

MaxWilson

2014-11-24, 05:34 PM

Apparently not, because you said:

Ah, so that's the statement you're disagreeing with. I should have said, "rare, or else equally-distributed in a such a way as to benefit all PCs equally (perhaps in varying ways)." Since my preferred playstyle is "rare" (and since we were talking about game design inferences, and not DMing), I didn't explicitly acknowledge the other possible playstyle, wherein all fighters are entitled to +1 swords at 6th level and all monks are entitled to something equally powerful. In fact, I'm not really sure how you would go about designing something "equally powerful." Maybe a dagger which is permanently envenomed with Snake Poison? That will also situationally double your damage.

Since I prefer the "rare" playstyle and am skeptical that the "entitlement" playstyle can be done well, sometimes my speech will default to talking about that. If you're looking for a concession, though, there it is.

1. Yep, which creates a really weird imbalance between subclasses. In a low magic campaign where magic items are rare... people should choose to play as the magic using fighter variant, as counter intuitive as that is. At least, if you want actually be certain you can contribute.

2. Not noticeably. A fighter specced for ranged combat will be, but a great weapon fighter, or any strength based build, has 1 additional attack (or 2 at capstone) and a slightly better weapon selection, whereas the monk has dexterity as his main attribute. That's going to even out overall.

3. It isn't that rare at all. Look through the monster manual, trying to remove monsters with resistance to normal weapons removes entire categories of creatures. It also doesn't mitigate anything, if knocking someone prone upped your overall damage more than using a normal attack the fighter would already be doing so, so it is still half what fighter's damage should be.

4. They should, but in order for that to be the case each party member should be pulling their own weight. It's annoying for a wizard to be spending spell slots just so a fighter isn't a drain on the party. That isn't teamwork that's fighter being carried by his team.

Fighter's without magic weapons are strictly inferior to monks. They have to go out of their way or get help from teammates just to do what they are supposedly good at.

1 and 2.) You're claiming that "fighters are useless," and now it turns out that you're just claiming that "STR Champions and Battlemasters (and Barbarians) are useless." At least you've implicitly narrowed your overbroad claim. Monks can attempt ranged combat, but they don't have the class or feat support (Archery Style, Sharpshooter, martial weapon access) or number of attacks to be as good at it as fighters are. They're going to be doing about 50-70% as much damage as the fighter, with shorter range. Further, see 3a.

3a.) So, I just rolled 4 random encounters for level 7 characters using kobold.com. I got 8 classes of creatures total (displacer beast, dryad, pentadrone, will o'wisp, faerie dragon, yuan-ti Malison, Myconid, Giant Hyena). AFB, but I believe the Will o'Wisp and maybe the Pentadrone are weapon-resistant. If they are, then 25% of the time the fighter will be doing half damage if he sticks with regular tactics, or in other words he's at least 87.5% as effective as he would be with magical +0 weapons. That's a floor on effectiveness not a ceiling, but it certainly doesn't match the "fighter is useless" hyperbole.

3b.) "if knocking someone prone upped your overall damage more than using a normal attack the fighter would already be doing so, so it is still half what fighter's damage should be.". This is fallacious. Knocking someone prone at the cost of 2 actions only benefits you if the additional damage on subsequent rounds is worth more than the 2 actions that you lose. If you're doing half damage, that opportunity cost (2 actions) goes down, ergo prone + grapple is more worthwhile.

4.) You've already refuted yourself so I'm not going to.

Vogonjeltz

2014-11-24, 08:00 PM

Eslin

2014-11-24, 08:30 PM

That doesn't make any sense. Magic weapons and armor are magically better tools. Wondrous magic items make the person better.

Yes it does. They work on two different design metrics - magic weapons are a straight increase, meaning they're best for people who are already have that (usually strength or dexterity) high. Stat items set the stat to a certain amount, meaning they're worst for people who already have that stat high.

They're two examples of completely conflicting design principles, and it's best to homebrew one to work in the way the other does for any game.

Baptor

2014-11-24, 08:31 PM

Well now, this has been a lively discussion...

Here's what I've learned so far...

1. If the RAW for the classes and monsters were balanced without enhancement bonuses, then enhancement bonuses break that balance.

2. Though #1 is true, it's not any more true than it was in previous editions.

3. Editions like 3.5 and 4e included the enhancements in monster design, so in those games they are required to be effective. In 5e you already are effective, and the enhancements put you ahead of the game. This is either good or bad depending on your style of play.

4. If my players and I want to eliminate enhancement bonuses, the game easily supports this decision and there will be no ill consequences.

I appreciate all the feedback. It's given me a lot to think about. I still believe, in essence, my initial assumptions are correct. I also believe that saying 5e D&D is supposed to be a game where "magic items exist but you know are like really rare so players could get some or none but its all cool lol" is not realistic. Either you are going to assume a robust magic item reward system and plan as a DM for this or you are going to severely limit items and plan for that. I think that believing you can just run 5e laissez faire in regards to items and think that its OK for the fighter to have a +3 frostbrand greatsword and the rogue to have a mundane rapier will be fine is poor planning, but ymmv.

Would an in-depth post on the mathematical import of a +1 bonus be useful? I've considered writing one, but it would be complicated, fairly technical, and would have to cover a lot of different cases (hit rolls, contests, absolute vs relative changes in probability of success, opportunity costs, rolls with DCs at intervals representing different levels of success, etc.). No promises, but if you would find such an endeavor useful that would increase the odds I actually get around to it. :)

If you ever work it up, I'd love to see how it turns out. :smallsmile:

So....

The only argument unresolved is one I'm not really concerned about, and that is if we eliminate enhancement bonuses, do we need to keep the "magic tag" on weapons so that pure martials like champion fighters can be viable later in the game when there are lots of monsters resistant to normal weapons. There seems to be a lively debate about this issue and it is what this entire thread has become at this time, which wasn't my intention but that's just how forums work. Since its been going on for over a page and the discussion of enhancements is pretty much over, I'll go ahead and lay into this new rabbit trail.

1. Combat isn't everything, that's true, but it's not fair to say that just because there are all sorts of problem solving trials besides combat that issues of combat balance are invalid. That's almost as bad as the "roleplayer vs rollplayer" debate, it's a false dichotomy.

2. D&D is still a game that overwhelming favors magic over martial. It's just the ugly truth. It's not nearly as bad in this edition as prior ones, but it's there. Characters with magical or even just supernatural (monk) abilities have an edge over purely non-magical ones (champion fighters) that is only balanced out by the distribution of magical items (weapons in this case).

3. These back and forths have me so confused I am no longer which poster is arguing on which side but if you don't give a pure martial (ie. champion fighter, assassin rogue, etc) a magic weapon (even if its just the aforementioned "tag" with no bonuses) and run the game as written without making changes or substitutions that character will be noticeably behind and lagging in the one area he's meant to shine: combat. People play fighters to fight things, it's right in the name. :smallwink:

4. Yes, as a DM you can alter the game and make substitutions and so forth to ensure said magic-less fighter or rogue isn't "left out," but the point is that we were told we wouldn't have to by the game's developers. We were told this game would work just fine for all classes and combinations without a single magic item, and that just isn't so.

5. I think this can easily be solved with my aforementioned rule that silver weapons overcome the normal weapon resistance, but while this is an easy houserule, it doesn't invalidate #3 and still proves #4.

Bottom line is that it will be mostly a non-issue in a standard game with a level headed DM, but if you wind up in one of these, "there are no magic weapons anywhere" games, you had better play a monk or eldritch knight otherwise you are going to be in a world of disappointment.

Vogonjeltz

2014-11-24, 08:41 PM

Yes it does. They work on two different design metrics - magic weapons are a straight increase, meaning they're best for people who are already have that (usually strength or dexterity) high. Stat items set the stat to a certain amount, meaning they're worst for people who already have that stat high.

They're two examples of completely conflicting design principles, and it's best to homebrew one to work in the way the other does for any game.

I meant you saying weapons should set damage to a particular specific zone didn't make any sense, for exactly the reasons it articulated.

silveralen

2014-11-24, 08:43 PM

Eslin

2014-11-24, 08:48 PM

I meant you saying weapons should set damage to a particular specific zone didn't make any sense, for exactly the reasons it articulated.

What do you mean? It makes just as much sense as setting stats to that same amount.

Strill

2014-11-24, 09:03 PM

He says after two pages of people detailing exactly why you shouldn't.

If it's good enough for the DM's guide, it's good enough for me.

GoodbyeSoberDay

2014-11-24, 09:37 PM

If I've learned anything playing a wide variety of games, it's to not trust game designers.

A character with an additional +3 to hit and damage is going to be demonstrably superior at killing things than a similar character with a mundane weapon. Let's take an example, assuming no advantage or disadvantage for a moment:

b = base damage
c = base chance to hit

Damage without any bonuses, per attack: bc
Damage with a +x bonus: (b+x)(c+0.05x)
Additional damage per attack: cx+0.05x^2+0.05bx

So with a base damage of 10 and a base hit chance of 50%, your damage per attack is 5, and your increase in damage per attack is 1.05 for a +1, 2.2 for a +2, and 3.45 for a +3. So a +3 weapon will increase your damage by about 70% in this example. Again, demonstrably superior.

It's just that, IME, it's okay for the fighter to be demonstrably superior in stabbing things as long as other characters are demonstrably superior at other things.

Baptor

2014-11-24, 10:41 PM

Baptor, that's an excellent summary. I'll quit debating it since you did a far better job than I am able to.

Slightly related topic, what do people think of magic weapons as another form for stored spells? Rather than just giving a damage boost or on hit effect, it'd have an activated ability like a wand or staff. Such weapons already exist, but I'm curious how people feel about making them the norm.

Funny you should bring that up. Charged weapons were one of the ideas we had to replace the static bonus weapons in the game. We got the idea, again, from the Elder Scrolls series of games, where your sword had charges just like a wand or staff.

Here's an example:

Flame Tongue
magic longsword
This longsword has 6 charges and restores 1d6 charges per day at dawn. Whenever you score a hit with this weapon, you can expend a charge. If you do, the attack deals +2d6 fire damage.

Ultimately my players thought it was a neat idea but we decided not to adopt it because they didn't like all the book keeping involved with keeping up with the charges. We all have very micro-managing jobs and I think they don't want to micro manage when they play! :smallbiggrin: But your players might like the idea.

silveralen

2014-11-24, 10:58 PM

Funny you should bring that up. Charged weapons were one of the ideas we had to replace the static bonus weapons in the game. We got the idea, again, from the Elder Scrolls series of games, where your sword had charges just like a wand or staff.

Here's an example:

Flame Tongue
magic longsword
This longsword has 6 charges and restores 1d6 charges per day at dawn. Whenever you score a hit with this weapon, you can expend a charge. If you do, the attack deals +2d6 fire damage.

Ultimately my players thought it was a neat idea but we decided not to adopt it because they didn't like all the book keeping involved with keeping up with the charges. We all have very micro-managing jobs and I think they don't want to micro manage when they play! :smallbiggrin: But your players might like the idea.

Flametongue was actually the first idea I had, my variation was a little different though.

So say six charges, same recharge, expend one charge to cast burning hands as a bonus action when you make an attack action. Boost the effect using extra charges if you want.

Nothing earth shattering, just a neat little effect that could be coupled with it that actually changes how you use it, even if only slightly. The micromanagement is an issue, but my table has more trouble with keeping up with +1s and +2s (yeah, they have trouble with it in 5e. I can't imagine the hell third or fourth would've been for them) so it'd be a was on this front most likely.

Oscredwin

2014-11-24, 11:15 PM

I think the question is what is the power band that characters fall into. Let's say we have a party of a Fighter, Cleric, Wizard, Rogue at level 15, each with 3 attuned magic items. Let's say they're captured by the big bad and dumped into a prison. They break out because they're PCs and raid the guards supplies (getting level 1 type equipment). The mundanely equipped party should be able to take out patrols that were easy (but not trivial for them when they were geared up), and with effort take out hard but not boss level challenges. If they fought the big bad they would lose (fighter can't do damage, wizard gets killed to easily, etc). Then they find their old gear and can fight the big bad and win.

This is a reasonable design goal. We're going to have to wait till the DMG comes out to see if it was reached.

Vogonjeltz

2014-11-25, 01:41 AM

What do you mean? It makes just as much sense as setting stats to that same amount.

Not at all. It makes sense that magic that makes the user as strong as an ogre won't make them stronger than an ogre. It makes no sense that a magic sword would suddenly stop being any more effective because the wielder got better.

MaxWilson

2014-11-25, 01:47 AM

Eslin

2014-11-25, 02:59 AM

Not at all. It makes sense that magic that makes the user as strong as an ogre won't make them stronger than an ogre. It makes no sense that a magic sword would suddenly stop being any more effective because the wielder got better.

Let's pass on ogre, since it's the only one of it's type, and use every other stat item as an example. You have a headband of intellect and 20 strength and 20 intelligence and a +2 sword. If you equip the headband of intellect, you get no more intelligent, while if you equip the sword you do get better at swording things. How does that make sense?

Gwendol

2014-11-25, 04:33 AM

Let's pass on ogre, since it's the only one of it's type, and use every other stat item as an example. You have a headband of intellect and 20 strength and 20 intelligence and a +2 sword. If you equip the headband of intellect, you get no more intelligent, while if you equip the sword you do get better at swording things. How does that make sense?

Because the headband gives you peak human intelligence, not just more intelligence. While the sword just makes you slightly better (and can bypass certain defences to damage).
It's a design choice, and not necessarily a bad one. Allowing stat boosting items like these makes for easier multiclassing when using the standard array for example.

Rallicus

2014-11-25, 05:05 AM

This might have some merit if 5e was balanced to begin with. But l like every non-4e edition, it's not. Yes, class discrepancy might not be as glaring, but everything else is.

I never understood why people believe in the "no magic items" lie. If that were the case, why do so many monsters have immunity to mundane weapons?

The sooner people can accept the system for what it is, the sooner they can enjoy it. If you can't get past a martial having an item that allows him to hit more, you should probably play something else.

EDIT: just read baptors post. This entire thread should have died there... he sums it up better than I ever could.

Gwendol

2014-11-25, 08:22 AM

Even so, running a team with the four basic classes covered there should be an opportunity to cast magic weapon when facing resistant enemies.
That will quickly grow old though.

Sindeloke

2014-11-25, 10:51 AM

Baptor, that's an excellent summary. I'll quit debating it since you did a far better job than I am able to.

Slightly related topic, what do people think of magic weapons as another form for stored spells? Rather than just giving a damage boost or on hit effect, it'd have an activated ability like a wand or staff. Such weapons already exist, but I'm curious how people feel about making them the norm.

I agree with Baptor's group: too much bookkeeping.

5. I think this can easily be solved with my aforementioned rule that silver weapons overcome the normal weapon resistance, but while this is an easy houserule, it doesn't invalidate #3 and still proves #4.

Once you're houseruling, though, you might as well just leave some +0 magic shortswords of orc detection in the next troll-cave you send your PCs to. Access to silvered or adamantine weapons is just as dependent on DM ruling as access to magic ones, since you still have to provide the alchemist or blacksmith who'll make or customize them, the city large enough to have a wide selection on sale, or the elven forest patrol willing to loan them (or die while carrying them, or whatever).

Actually once you're houseruling you should probably just give the fighter something other than DPR to be good at, because it addresses multiple problems at once, rather than just this one. As you say, though, that's sort of a systemic problem and a lot easier spoken of than repaired.

MaxWilson

2014-11-25, 01:39 PM

This might have some merit if 5e was balanced to begin with. But l like every non-4e edition, it's not. Yes, class discrepancy might not be as glaring, but everything else is.

I never understood why people believe in the "no magic items" lie. If that were the case, why do so many monsters have immunity to mundane weapons?

Hardly any do. Immunity to normal weapons has been drastically scaled back in 5E compared to 2nd edition.

One interesting and low-bookkeeping method of making charged magic items: it has a limited number of charges, but once you activate it, it stays activated for 24 hours. E.g. 2d6 flame damage per strike for the next 24 hours, 4 times over the life of the weapon.

GiantOctopodes

2014-11-25, 02:48 PM

For a fighter? It actually is pretty close. In combat, a fighter dealing half damage is only slightly ahead of a fighter of half as many levels.

Okay, not everything should be, but fighter should be good at actually fighting monsters, right?

The only thing that actually makes fighter good at fighting monsters in 5e is hitting hard and hitting often.

If fighter's damage is being reduced to half, while the rest of his party is normal, fighter isn't doing his job property.

Fighter attacks. That's what the class is good at. Other classes are better at skills (rogue, bard, even barbarian has rages). Other classes have spells, or dramatically better spells. So please, explain to me why fighter shouldn't always be exceptional at the one area he is actually good at.

That's... just not true. In 3.5e, perhaps, but 5e Fighters have skill options (both from the class and from background), have the choice of spell selection, tactical maneuvering (which is not only likely far more helpful than raw damage, but which works regardless of the damage being dealt), or sure, just raw damage. The statement "The only thing that actually makes fighter good at fighting monsters in 5e is hitting hard and hitting often" is so much less true about 5e than any other edition so far I can't even understand why you would make that statement.

So, beyond the Fighter being able to do more than just dish out damage, even pretending you did make terrible choices and managed to pigeonhole yourself into a purely combat role of dishing out raw DPS and sitting there stupidly the rest of the time, the bigger issue at hand is that *everyone* has times where that which they are good at is not the best option. Rogues vs Alert. Spellcasters vs Silence or AMFs. Barbarians (in terms of tanking damage) vs Spellcasters. Sometimes your schtick is just not the right choice, that's not a flawed system, it's just a chance for someone else to shine.

Speaking of which, Monks have exactly the same amount of skills as Fighters. Your specific complaint seems to be that in certain, specialized instances, when hitting things is what people are doing, Fighters are not the absolute best at that task. Monks get a class also devoted to martial prowess, with the same amount of spellcasting potential and skills as a fighter. Monks are less consistent in terms of their ability to deal large numbers of hits (having to pump a limited resource into it) and damage, but have times where they can be the superior option, such as when faced with a creature which requires magic to damage in a low or non existent magic campaign. Is your complaint *really* that Fighters are not superior at dealing damage compared to monks in absolutely every situation?

Edit: And here's the real thing: If it is assumed that everyone has magic weapons, the resistances to weapons which require magic to overcome cease being meaningful. Whether you agree or disagree with the concept that they have them (as really, your main point seems to be against monsters having them in the first place, that essentially is the crux of your whole argument, monsters should not resist weapons), the fact is they *do*. What you are then arguing is that this design decision should be mitigated, since you disagree with it in the first place. This can be done by having magic weapons available. I argue that the following is true:

If Magic Weapon is never a superior option to Blur, it may as well not exist as a spell. The whole *point* of that spell is to overcome exactly those types of resistances. This is just one example, but the point remains- Tools Exist to Overcome Resistances. Negating those resistances outright also negates the value of the tools. You cannot argue that those tools are less useful than other ones in situations other than that for which they were designed, and then use that to argue those situations should not exist. That specifically reduces the depth of combat decisions and abilities available in the game.
Fighters dishing out raw damage is *NOT* the way in which they excel in combat! Everyone can dish out damage. Unless you chose a Champion (because you like being pigeonholed, in which case I don't believe you have the right to complain), your strength is in moving people around and controlling the field of battle (which is just as effective whether you deal 2 damage or 20), or in augmenting your martial prowess with spells, in which case you have magic weapon available.

I just don't understand how the complaint would be that someone does half damage when faced with an enemy with resistance to the type of damage they deal.

Vogonjeltz

2014-11-25, 05:16 PM

Unless it's a Sword of Mastery which makes you as skilled as an expert.

Good point, I was referencing +1/+2/+3 weaponry though. Sorry I didn't make that explicitly clear.

I think the Sword of Mastery you're mentioning is functioning as a Headband of Intellect, or Gauntlets of Ogre strength as a category, whereas superior weaponry/armor is in the +X enhanced category. Better gear vs Personal improvement.

Let's pass on ogre, since it's the only one of it's type, and use every other stat item as an example. You have a headband of intellect and 20 strength and 20 intelligence and a +2 sword. If you equip the headband of intellect, you get no more intelligent, while if you equip the sword you do get better at swording things. How does that make sense?

Gwendol pretty much nailed this one on the head. The Sword +2 is a better sword. You aren't getting better, the weapon you're using is. The headband is improving you (up to a specific point). If you're already at that point, it can't get you past it, and it (fortunately) doesn't reduce you from it.

Baptor

2014-11-25, 05:38 PM

I agree with Baptor's group: too much bookkeeping.

Once you're houseruling, though, you might as well just leave some +0 magic shortswords of orc detection in the next troll-cave you send your PCs to. Access to silvered or adamantine weapons is just as dependent on DM ruling as access to magic ones, since you still have to provide the alchemist or blacksmith who'll make or customize them, the city large enough to have a wide selection on sale, or the elven forest patrol willing to loan them (or die while carrying them, or whatever).

Actually once you're houseruling you should probably just give the fighter something other than DPR to be good at, because it addresses multiple problems at once, rather than just this one. As you say, though, that's sort of a systemic problem and a lot easier spoken of than repaired.

The way I do this typically is to have a fighter "earn" his first magic weapon by slaving through a short adventure or dungeon without one where he's facing things like wights or other resistant creatures. When I've gotten him beat down and sweating blood and cursing the ground these things walk on, he finds the mystical weapon. The rest of the dungeon he gets to take out his rage on these things by cutting through them like butter. The fighters I play with love it, and I change the situation up enough to where they still aren't expecting that magic weapon when they get it.

silveralen

2014-11-25, 06:08 PM

Speaking of which, Monks have exactly the same amount of skills as Fighters. Your specific complaint seems to be that in certain, specialized instances, when hitting things is what people are doing, Fighters are not the absolute best at that task. Monks get a class also devoted to martial prowess, with the same amount of spellcasting potential and skills as a fighter. Monks are less consistent in terms of their ability to deal large numbers of hits (having to pump a limited resource into it) and damage, but have times where they can be the superior option, such as when faced with a creature which requires magic to damage in a low or non existent magic campaign. Is your complaint *really* that Fighters are not superior at dealing damage compared to monks in absolutely every situation?

Monks do not have the same access as fighters, their access is far better in many ways. Base fighter does not have invisibility built in, or immunity to disease,poison, frighten, and charm. He doesn't have damage resistance, or prof with every save (and monk gets indomitable as well, except again better). He lacks monks mobility, not having the same speed, the ability to run everywhere, or his ability to disengage/dash/dodge as a bonus action. Better base AC, stunning strikes, and missile deflection also help distinguish monk from fighter.

This is just the base class, without archetypes. When all fighter gets is ability scores (he doesn't get feats since feats are no more assumed than magic weapons and arguably less) action surge, second wind, and indomitable, and more base attacks. So.... yeah his only stand out abilities are damage and self healing. So if fighter can't even be guaranteed to actually be a consistent combatant? No. If magic weapons aren't assumed, you go eldritch knight or monk, any other type will struggle in every way in comparison, out of or in combat.

Fighters dishing out raw damage is *NOT* the way in which they excel in combat! Everyone can dish out damage. Unless you chose a Champion (because you like being pigeonholed, in which case I don't believe you have the right to complain), your strength is in moving people around and controlling the field of battle (which is just as effective whether you deal 2 damage or 20), or in augmenting your martial prowess with spells, in which case you have magic weapon available.

Battle master is pretty crap compared to open hand monk if we want to start comparing archetypes. For one ki (which can go up to 20 compared to the six dice fighter gets), monk can push two enemies, deny two enemies AoO or other reactions, or knock two enemies prone. Or apply two separate conditions to a single enemy. Fighter can do two of these, but less efficiently. Monk can also do this to any sized enemy (fighter can't). Battle master has a few tricks that it can do, with the same restriction of maybe 1-2 times per combat, like given an ally an extra attack at the cost of one of his or apply disadvantage to an enemy's attacks, but monk can force enemies to make a save or die and walk around with sanctuary. So I fail to see how battle master really stands out s a batlte field control option. He can let a teammate move or attack about twice a battle tops, and that's really all he has to offer that open handed monk can't.

Eldritch knight is good though. In fact, I'm struggling to think of any reason not to go eldritch knight in a game where magic items aren't assumed. In fact, in such a case isn't it OP for fighter to now have the ability to face any type of opponent, if not being able to do so was somehow a balancing point before? Maybe eldritch knight is giving up something really important by going this route, to gain an ability you see to think is incredibly important and not assumed. Well... he has more out of combat options, efficient usage of buff spells allows for as much combat power than any other type of fighter, if not more, and battle field control? Ray of frost, ray of sickness, thunder wave, gust of wind, haste (on an ally), fear, bestow curse, ray of enfeeblement, web, etc. So many good options, though he will have to be selective with the non evocation/abjuration ones.

But surely there must be a downside? Well... the battle master can use his abilities and attack, something eldritch knight can only sort of do. So... he gives up some raw damage, literally the only thing the other types of fighter are of any use for whatsoever. So once again, fi champion and battle master aren't even going to be winning on damage with any consistency, there is absolutely no reason to go that route.