Making throwing a viable option for characters

[Banjoman42]

So I was thinking about a few ideas I had for making throwing builds be a little bit better for characters in the middle or low range of optimization in 3.5. I don't have anything really specific written out, but I want to see how much of a difference these things might have.

What if throwing weapons came in sets when you bought them enchanted (like arrows or bolts)? So if I spent 1300 gp I could get 3 +1 Throwing axes. How many should come in a set? Would this really reduce the amount of money characters would have to sink into weapons by a good amount?

What if there were a feat that let me make multiple attacks by only throwing one weapon (say, 3 attacks)? So if I were making a full attack, I throw 1 dagger, and make 3 separate attack rolls and possibly 3 separate damage rolls.

What if characters could have weapon finesse (or whatever the feat is that allows you to use strength on throwing attack rolls) with throwing weapons for free?

What if effects that normally only apply to melee attacks (like Awesome blow) apply to attacks with throwing attacks as well? I feel like this one might be going a bit too far, as this would open the door for a ton of ridiculous shenanigans.

What if we added the better archery feats from Pathfinder (like Deadly Aim and the better Point Blank Shot)? And maybe the Blink back belt as well?

What if drawing a throwing weapon counted as drawing ammunition?

What if throwing weapons counted as two handed melee weapons for the purpose of Power Attack? This kind of negates the addition of Deadly Aim.

Will all of this be enough to make throwing just as good as a two handed kind of build?

[OldTrees1]

The Returning weapon ability is only a +1 ability so gp is not a big concern for throwing builds. However improving the Returning weapon ability to allow full attacks with the same weapon would be wise(basically Blinkback for 1 weapon but without needing to draw it again).

Yes granting Weapon Finesse and Brutal Throw for free is a wise move.

Currently 2 levels of Bloodstorm Blade(ToB) allows your thrown attacks to count as melee attacks. It seems to be powerful enough to warrant a cost(levels, feat, ability checks, or etc) but does not have overpowered consequences. Personally I consider Knockback(feat from RoS) to be quite a nice addition.

[MisterKaws]

Bloodstorm Blade is just everything you asked and quite a bit more, take a look, it's Tome of Battle material.

[ben-zayb]

Complete Warrior's Master Thrower has plenty of tricks, including making ricocheting attacks from a single thrown weapon, and throwing two weapons in one thrown attack

[Banjoman42]

I wasn't aware of the Tome of Battle stuff, thanks for the info! I think I'll write them up as feats anyway because personally I've never been a big fan of PRCs.

[Ger. Bessa]

Eberron has a feat for boomerangs that allow either or both multi-hit and stun (daze). I can't remember it's name, but I know it's quite good.

Look first in Secrets of Xendrik, then in ECS (it's for talenta halflings or drows...).

It allows a thrower to make a lockdown as scary or even scarier than a spiked chain user.

[Grod_The_Giant]

It's actually not that bad. A bit feat intensive, but what isn't in 3.5?

Brutal Throw makes you SAD.
Power Throw is ranged power attack, which conventional archery is missing.
TWF and Rapid Shot can both apply, letting you make bucketloads of attacks.
Boomerang Daze is flat-out broken, and Boomerang Ricochet also exists to double your attack output.
Iaijutsu Focus works with a lot of throwing weapons, potentially adding a nice big chunk of extra damage.
Bloodstorm Blade, as aforementioned, also solves most of the issues: make ranged attacks like melee ones, and have your weapon instantly bounce back to your hand.
Master Thrower gives lots of tricks--throwing weapon trips, double throwing weapon output (at the cost of Str damage, sure, but if you get other bonus damage from Inspire Courage or Power Throw or something?), and throwing weapon attacks as touch attacks. Combine that with Power Throw and Palm Throw and you can make, like, a dozen ranged touch attacks for substantial damage each.

[Talionis]

A big problem is overcoming Damage reduction. Throwers are also cripplingly feat intensive. The volley rules hurt because many attacks don't add sneak attack damage . Greater Multishot fixes it for arrows. Sadly many feats and spells mention specifically arrows, bows, and crossbows. Range can also be a issue . Also many of the ways to add damage to weapons are MAD and/ or require multiple base and prestige classes.

Bloodstorm Blade is good in some ways, but you actually eat your swift action to treat your attacks as melee attacks for the turn, which can be limiting for some builds. It also is the only prestige class that doesn't progress initiator level, so it's actually almost just not an initiator prestige class, even though it has stances and uses maneuvers to power abilities, and for entry, so it's also Tome of Battle heavy.

Master Thrower in Complete Warrior is feat heavy for entry, it grants quick draw which you'll want. Personally, I dip Swordsage or Cleric in the builds to pick up Weapon Focus often. Fighter levels also help here, but when you also may need Two Weapon fighting feats and thrower feats.

Thrown Weapons are curiously like ammunition and simultaneously not ammunition, possibly some middle road in price between them would be appropriate, like getting eight of the same weapon for slightly more than the price of two...

None of these things are insurmountable but they require such massive investments that the characters feel cookie cutter and like one trick ponies.

[daremetoidareyo]

pairing point blank shot with far shot and precise shot, where changing between their effects is a free action that you can use once a round would go a long way towards alleviating the feat taxes.

The other problem is getting high damage at higher levels. Power throw and knowledge devotion make you MAD. Making a dex based power attack type feat for any weapon thrown from a hand would help.

[Grod_The_Giant]

pairing point blank shot with far shot and precise shot, where changing between their effects is a free action that you can use once a round would go a long way towards alleviating the feat taxes.

The other problem is getting high damage at higher levels. Power throw and knowledge devotion make you MAD. Making a dex based power attack type feat for any weapon thrown from a hand would help.
Eh. 13 Strength to qualify for Power Throw is fine, then go Palm Throw+Weak Spot+full Power Throw. That should do plenty of damage.

[Fizban]

What if throwing weapons came in sets when you bought them enchanted (like arrows or bolts)? So if I spent 1300 gp I could get 3 +1 Throwing axes. How many should come in a set? Would this really reduce the amount of money characters would have to sink into weapons by a good amount?
Not a bad idea. I'd say sets of 4 seems a nice round number, and make a note that throwing sets only have their magic when thrown and not when used in melee.

What if there were a feat that let me make multiple attacks by only throwing one weapon (say, 3 attacks)? So if I were making a full attack, I throw 1 dagger, and make 3 separate attack rolls and possibly 3 separate damage rolls.
Replacing the standard bajillion attacks per round game with a single aimed shot multiplier is a common enough plan. The main problem is that now you have 6' longbows attacking at high speed, crossbows that take forever to reload, and throwing weapons that get sniper damage. Everything's on the wrong weapon.

What if characters could have weapon finesse (or whatever the feat is that allows you to use strength on throwing attack rolls) with throwing weapons for free?
That's how 5e's done it. You can use strength or dex and get accuracy and damage with both melee and ranged attacks just by wielding the appropriate weapon. I'd suggest doing the lot, rather than just mincing around with free Weapon Finesse or Brutal Throw or whatever just give attack and damage both, str for melee and thrown, dex for finesse melee and any ranged.

What if effects that normally only apply to melee attacks (like Awesome blow) apply to attacks with throwing attacks as well? I feel like this one might be going a bit too far, as this would open the door for a ton of ridiculous shenanigans.
As mentioned, Bloodstorm Blade already does that and is the go-to for pretty much every serious throwing build (I don't like it myself). The reason to restrict some effects to melee is so they can't be used at range, throwing range is relatively short so you adjust the game assumptions and move on. Throwing range is usually within charge range anyway so it's not actually a serious adjustment.

What if drawing a throwing weapon counted as drawing ammunition?
Also helps, makes Shuriken useless though. If you want throwing to be just as easy as shooting (minus the range) then go ahead. You'll need to specify weather this works with melee capable thrown weapons: it'd actually make a nice stealth-buff for spears but daggers are already ubiquitous.

What if throwing weapons counted as two handed melee weapons for the purpose of Power Attack? This kind of negates the addition of Deadly Aim.
I'd point out that all this does is make ranged combat into melee combat, isn't there supposed to be a difference somewhere? Power Attack polarization is already a problem with melee, why drag it into throwing archetypes as well? That's why I don't like Bloodstorm Blade. Throwing weapons are usually a speedy character trope, and since they suck for everyone else at least they stay there. Power Attacking with thrown weapons is like Power Attacking while dual-wielding: congratulations, now everything is a strength build again.

Something not yet mentioned: Telekinetic Boomerang, Kinetisicst/Psywar 3. Swift action to manifest, makes your weapon bounce back fast enough to make multiple attacks. No Bloodstorm Blade required, just Brutal Throw and go. I'd use it with Rock Hurling myself, basically have a boulder continuously orbiting past me and into people's faces with a light push every so often. Yeah I just said throwing is for speedy people, but boulders are the exception and we're still not using Power Attack are we?

There's also the Gauntlet of Infinite Blades/Glove of Endless Javelins. Not technically enhance-able as normal weapons and the GoIB uses a swift action so you can't actually multi-throw with it, but easy enough to change. You could go full bow-style: throwing gauntlets are enhanced like any other weapon and transfer their bonuses, throwing weapons are drawn as ammunition and enhanced in batches (standard is 50*), and you combine the properties on attack same as when firing a magic arrow from a magic bow. Side by side damage properties gives you a method of increasing damage output when needed and thrown weapons could have an advantage in that they're massive enough they aren't destroyed on a miss (but still expend their magic on a hit). And of course you add a cheap extradimensional storage item for holding 50+throwing weapons, just like the Quiver of Ehlonna/Efficient Quiver.

Once you've got that you're in the same spot as any other ranged build, with less range but option of bringing in TWF. Incidentally, that's the sort of hidden power of throwing weapons: you can use TWF instead of Rapid Shot and avoid taking Point Blank. Over in the core only 1st level thread there's a build doing just that, getting two attacks with dex for accuracy at level 1 without being human. It's a narrow use, but if all you need is "not melee" and "extra attack" and nothing else, throwing wins.

*An item with 50 charges is 1/2 cost, but a batch of 50 arrows is full cost. I don't know if this is the designers being dumb or smart, since being able to stack arrow properties with bow properties is worth something. I've leaned towards making it 100 per batch myself.

[ace rooster]

Throwing feats at it is probably going to make into just another damage build, which I think is a mistake (except for hulking hurlers). Thrown builds are already able to get huge numbers of attacks, which at least distinguishes them a bit. At low levels throwing alchemists fire and acid is viable, especially if you see lots of high AC targets with low touch AC. Swift hunter builds especially can use this, as it permits skirmish damage. They are also best able to use poisons, because they can apply them in advance and the poison is not used up if they miss (arrows have a 50% loss rate on misses). The DC of 13 for Drow poison does not sound like much, but if you are throwing 6 (level 6) per round it is suddenly much more dangerous.

I like using thrown builds this way, so I would like there to be more variety and some scaling to alchemical items (possibly by explicitly magic versions). In particular smokesticks that go off on impact would be nice, and a flashbang that duplicates pyrotechnics to a small radius would be cool too. An expanded poison system that includes magical poisons would go a long way towards helping all mundanes too.

[Talionis]

Throwing feats at it is probably going to make into just another damage build, which I think is a mistake (except for hulking hurlers). Thrown builds are already able to get huge numbers of attacks, which at least distinguishes them a bit. At low levels throwing alchemists fire and acid is viable, especially if you see lots of high AC targets with low touch AC. Swift hunter builds especially can use this, as it permits skirmish damage. They are also best able to use poisons, because they can apply them in advance and the poison is not used up if they miss (arrows have a 50% loss rate on misses). The DC of 13 for Drow poison does not sound like much, but if you are throwing 6 (level 6) per round it is suddenly much more dangerous.

I like using thrown builds this way, so I would like there to be more variety and some scaling to alchemical items (possibly by explicitly magic versions). In particular smokesticks that go off on impact would be nice, and a flashbang that duplicates pyrotechnics to a small radius would be cool too. An expanded poison system that includes magical poisons would go a long way towards helping all mundanes too.

I think that's part of the problem... Action Economy in throwing builds. Skirmish makes you need to move. You can't normally move and full attack... Yes you can get around it a little with Sudden Leap (maneuver) and Travel Devotion (Divine Feat), but they both use resources and eat up your Swift action.

[Itsjustsoup.com]

Sliding Axe Throw (Combat)

You may aim your thrown axe to avoid an enemy’s shield and even trip your opponent.

Prerequisites: Dexterity 13, base attack bonus +1.

Benefit: You can choose to take a –2 penalty on a ranged attack roll with an axe, bouncing it or sliding it along the ground. If the target is flat-footed, running, or charging, this attack ignores any bonuses to the target’s AC from its shield. If the attack hits, you may immediately make a trip attempt against the target as a free action. If you fail to trip your opponent, your opponent does not get an attempt to trip you in return.

This ability may not work in certain circumstances as determined by the GM, such as if the ground is soft, there is an obstacle or difficult terrain on the floor between you and your target, and so on.


Two-Handed Thrower (Combat)


You hurl weapons with both hands and with great force, sometimes using a whirling technique to send your weapon flying through the air at tremendous speeds.

Prerequisite: Str 15.

Benefit: Whenever you use two hands to throw a one-handed or two-handed weapon, you gain a bonus on damage rolls equal to 1-1/2 times your Strength bonus. Using two hands to throw any weapon requires only a standard action for you. If you also have the Quick Draw feat, you can throw two-handed weapons at your full normal rate of attacks.

Normal: You add your Strength bonus on thrown weapon damage, regardless of available hands. Throwing a two-handed weapon is a full-round action.

[heavyfuel]

They main issue with throwing is the price. The greataxe-wielding barbarian only needs to upgrade his one weapon. A thrower needs to upgrade at least 6 of them, and they all need to have that pesky +1 returning property (or a crystal, I think)

The way I do it is I allow for magical gloves, that fuction like magical bows - any weapon thrown from a magical glove gets its magical properties, much like a mundane arrow shot from a magical bow is magical.

[MisterKaws]

Just remembered something: Last Iron Chief's fifth place was a TO build using Bloodstorm Blade and Crinti Shadow Marauder in a cheeky way to allow for indiscriminate use of ranged full-attacks while shadowpouncing non-stop.