What if no two-handed Power Attack? -It never did: Failed 3.5 updates

[Fizban]

So a lot of people agree that the 2:1 return on Power Attack for two-handing is vital for melee combat, and there's also a bit of trivia/gossip/actual quote? that I've heard about them making it 2:1 because someone thought 1.5:1 would be too complicated to do on the fly. This is not about 1.5:1 though-

What if Power Attack only gave 1:1 regardless of weapon type? Not counting Frenzied Berzerker, how would that influence melee builds? I assume people would still eschew shields because reasons, but if PA only gave +1 for each -1, would people still demand it on every build?

Edit: And since I don't feel like waiting till tomorrow, I"ll go ahead and drop the reveal now-

Power Attack never gave 2:1 returns.

Not in its original version, not as part of core balance (and that may not be surprising to some, but hey).

The 3.0 PHB has no differing returns or restrictions on weapon size, its just 1:1. Ya see, while arguing about baseline characters, I've seen some people claim that "Power Attack is there for a reason" in order to justify the viewpoint that massive level based damage bonuses were expected from the beginning*. But Power Attack didn't do that from the beginning. So in addition to all the other non-core stuff that never actually figured into monster (and thus game) balance, even the two handed power attack return has nothing to do with MM1, MM2, or Fiend Folio monsters.

I did want to get a few responses before bringing that up, because that's the point- as I search for the actual intent behind various elements and updates, I find more and more updates and revisions people claim are absolutely necessary, that are just blatant power grabs on things that were originally far less game-changing. And these first responses seem to indicate about what I'd expected: THF still technically better, but without this glaringly huge change in 3.5, its regarded more as a speed bump comparable to Combat Expertise (which isn't actually a speed bump) and other styles become a bit less unattractive.


As for concern of buffing the other styles, oh I've got a whole feat tri/quadrangle and extensions and buffs for swashy and tanky styles, but I know that "forum optimizer" would just turn their noses up because THF is always better. If my goal is to present a group of feats and tweaks to even the playing field without just making everything more powerful, then nerfing Power Attack needs to come first, and it just so happens that it's not so much a nerf as it is undoing a buff they didn't fully grasp at the time.


*The other was of course sneak attack, already mentioned here, but that has piles of restrictions and reduced hp, BAB, etc tied to it.

[Catarang]

What if Power Attack only gave 1:1 regardless of weapon type? Not counting Frenzied Berzerker, how would that influence melee builds? I assume people would still eschew shields because reasons, but if PA only gave +1 for each -1, would people still demand it on every build?

Well imho I feel this would make it more of a speed bump feat, like combat expertise. Unfortunately PA is just about one of the biggest prereqs for other feats and PrC’s for martial combatants. Nerfing it in this way would make it so people would only take it to qualify for something else. You probably wouldn’t see a huge drop in people taking it, but you’d see a large drop in people liking it.

[Doctor Awkward]

You would see a shift in the meta more so than anything else.

When considering a high-strength melee combat type of character, there are two things in 3rd Edition that make two-handed weapon fighting inherently superior to dual-wielding or a sword and board fighter: the first is 1.5 strength modifier to damage, and the other is 2:1 returns when using Power Attack.

For the cost of a single feat, the damage output of a 2H is well above the other two archetypes without having to do anything other than follow the rules as written.


Getting rid of either of those is definitely a nerf to 2H builds.

[johnbragg]

It might not do much, unless you ALSO replace it with more attractive alternatives.

Two-handed weapons would still be doing 1.5xSTR, plus a point or two from bigger dice. That's still better than the +2 AC from a shield.

So unless you 1. Nerf 2HPA *and* 2. Give mundanes alternative strategies, the best way to Beatstick is still going to be with a two-handed weapon and full Power Attack.

I get what you're thinking. It's one of the things about 3X that makes one sad that swashbucklers, sword-and-board-ers, two-weapon fighters etc are basically not doing their jobs in the party as damage-dealers.

[Quertus]

I mean, TWF is still the superior strategy. From 3.0 Improved Crit Keen Vorpal decapitation, to the true damage dealer of Rogue / Thug Sneak Attack, that wants as many attacks as possible, one big weapon is a clear sign of being suboptimal. Or of killing the party, which, arguably, is also suboptimal.

Not, mind you, that this has ever stopped me from welding a single big weapon when it fit the character concept / image, mind you. But it's a clearly suboptimal choice.

What would change? I suppose more people might start playing more optimal builds.

[death390]

PA is one of the few nice things that mundane fighters have. if you want it more in line with other options i suggest upgrading the other options.

if you dropped it to 1-1 then 2h is still good but two weapon might be better with PA due to the bonus damage to 2 weapons (kinda = to 2h currently just impractical due to feat taxes). 1-1 PA puts it on part with single weapon fighting such as einhander and sword & board. like i said however 2-1 pa is one of the few nice things for mundanes.

a better idea as i started with would be to upgrade the other styles.
two weapon fighting (reduce feat tax, give dual strike feat as basic effect of two weapon fighting)
sword & board (make a feat that increases shield AC as you level)
einhander (honestly the hardest to "fix", probably find something to do with the off-hand)

[Fizban]

With a few responses in I've updated the first post with the true intent: bringing up the fact that the original 3.0 Power Attack never gave 2:1 returns (or cared about weapon size). The fact that the 3.5 version dominates the melee game only makes it more obvious that two-handed Power Attack is not an essential core element, but rather the first of many unbalanced buffs in 3.5 updates.

[Psyren]

I'm a bit confused - you seem to think that powering up melee options wasn't an intended result in going from 3.0 to 3.5. Remember how 3.0 monks were even worse? Rangers and Barbarians also got buffs going from 3.0 to 3.5, and Fighters were buffed indirectly. Sure, they went about it in a pretty lackluster way, but the intent was there; so the fact that Power Attack got buffed seems pretty in line with the other changes they made.

[Zanos]

With a few responses in I've updated the first post with the true intent: bringing up the fact that the original 3.0 Power Attack never gave 2:1 returns (or cared about weapon size). The fact that the 3.5 version dominates the melee game only makes it more obvious that two-handed Power Attack is not an essential core element, but rather the first of many unbalanced buffs in 3.5 updates.
I think it's more likely that two handed power attack is just viable where other options are bad, since they don't keep pace with monster HP pools, AC, DR, or some combination thereof.

Power Attack with a greatsword isn't OP on it's own, it's OP when combined with shocktrooper, leap attack, pounce, valorous, etc.


From 3.0 Improved Crit Keen Vorpal decapitation, to the true damage dealer of Rogue / Thug Sneak Attack, that wants as many attacks as possible, one big weapon is a clear sign of being suboptimal.
Even in 3e two weapon fighting required twice as much gold, and had even bigger problems with DR since stuff like 20/+3 or even 40/+3 wasn't unheard of. Unless vorpal goes off on all crits instead of just 20s and many more enemies are vulnerable to critical hits, both those builds seem mediocre.

[Fizban]

I'm a bit confused - you seem to think that powering up melee options wasn't an intended result in going from 3.0 to 3.5. Remember how 3.0 monks were even worse? Rangers and Barbarians also got buffs going from 3.0 to 3.5, and Fighters were buffed indirectly. Sure, they went about it in a pretty lackluster way, but the intent was there; so the fact that Power Attack got buffed seems pretty in line with the other changes they made.
I'm not convinced. I think its entirely possible that Power Attack was changed because someone decided its all strengthy so it should act more like strength, not because the fighter needed more power. The Barbarian buff is just earlier trap sense and DR (1/- at 7th instead of 11th), and the Monk buff is still obviously derived from TWF (as it ended up). The Paladin buff is essentially "oh hey maybe have smite more than 1/day," and the Ranger buff is the most obviously Fighter-based: "oh rangers suck at fighting because they have no bonus feats, give them some bonus feats so they don't have to multiclass Fighter."

None of those are damage buffs at all, not in any sort of continuous way, and 3/4 of them are based on feats (the paladin had Extra Smiting in Defenders of the Faith). Fighters got tons of feats, other classes didn't, so they got buffed to compete with the Fighter. The fact that two-handed Power Attack rose dramatically in power and made all other weapon styles look puny seems to me a completely separate thing, and as noted it actually nerfed the possibility ofusing PA and TWF because. . . light weapons didn't sound strengthy enough? (Someone's idea of "realism" failed pretty hard there). The Fighter did get a direct buff in 3.5. . . in PHB2, with Weapon Mastery, which I believe was in response to the realization that Rage was super popular for outpacing Weapon Spec+Greater Weapon Spec at essentially all levels.

Fighters were buffed indirectly in core 3.5? In the sense that Greater Weapon Focus/Spec were made core (which is actually a direct buff, not that anyone cares about spec line) allowing them to keep up with Rage at high levels, and Power Attack was buffed for two-handed users only, and. . . ?

I also find it a little suspicious how in Complete Warrior a bunch of feats from Sword and Fist were re-printed- but not Power Lunge or Mantis Leap, which gave double str damage on charges, the former itself a PA base feat with an AoO for a penalty and no care of weapon use, the latter for monks (maybe this was early enough they were actually considering the grandfather rule significant, but . . ). Instead we got Shock Trooper, and Leap Attack in Complete Adventurer. Call me a conspiracy theorist, but Power Attack gets buffed followed by a bunch of things that ramp up Power Attack even more but nothing else besides minor parity bits and focus on individual features until PHB2 flat upgrades the Spec line? Sounds less like Fighters were being stealth buffed to compete with monsters, and more like someone had an unhealthy fascination with Power Attack that took over the whole 1st party melee scene.

It was probably even well-intentioned, get rid of all sorts of other penalties and requirements and just use power attack for all their feats, make sure you have to pay for damage with accuracy, they just didn't account for the fact that maybe some people didn't want to use power attack and maybe two handed weapons already had enough bonus damage and maybe we should stop printing things that let people just ignore attack penalties.


I think it's more likely that two handed power attack is just viable where other options are bad, since they don't keep pace with monster HP pools, AC, DR, or some combination thereof.
And everyone says this, and I don't think it actually holds water outside of specific straw comparisons*. The fighter is not expected to keep pace with monster hp pools: fights are expected to involve the other 3/4 of the party and maybe even last more than 2 rounds. Their attack bonus does just fine (when you actually use swords higher than +1), their AC does just fine (when you actually use shields), DR was specifically made far easier to penetrate, and so on. As I've said in many, many threads: the only thing wrong with other options is that people build games that make those options wrong, and claims that anything else isn't "viable" are empty.


Power Attack with a greatsword isn't OP on it's own, it's OP when combined with shocktrooper, leap attack, pounce, valorous, etc.
Right, the first of many problems (it doesn't need to be fully OP to devalue other combat styles after all). Which brings the question of which is easier to fix. You can go through all the extra stuff and have people whine at every step, or just hit PA itself and. . . have them whine about that instead. In the end there's so many things to stack that you can't really fix the main problems just by halving the PA damage, but if the only problem is lack of shield use because 2:1 is so important, it might fix that. And that's to say nothing of how it reduces the lethality of two-handed monsters.

And people get mad when I say whine (and its not like that's an actual problem since you can't control other people's games and make the changes clear before recruiting), but again that's kinda the point here: if 3.5 had never doubled Power Attack for two-handers, would people expect that sort of damage? No. They'd still play melee characters, and if they'd never had that sweet sweet double damage to lose, they wouldn't complain about it being necessary. They'd have learned how to fight without it. People would still complain about melee being useless because magic, and they'd still tell you to dip for Rage and that Leap Attack Shock Trooper Pouncing was the best thing and Frenzied Berserker is bonkers, and they'd still make cuisinart Rogues that assume favorable conditions at all times, but they wouldn't say that this thing that doesn't exist is necessary if it never existed. Which is why I see it as so much whining that 2:1 PA is required when its not and never has been- its required for a specific style of play that people have grown accustomed to, nothing to do with the game itself.


*And I've debunked at least one "the monster just walks past you" myth with a basic Ogre encounter. The usual straw man is the Pit Fiend, which an unbuffed Fighter can still land at least one 50/50 hit and block 50% of attacks with level appropriate gear, if they're actually using a +5 shield and +5 sword as expected, and a CR20 monster being threatening is kinda . I'd have thought say, Purple Worms might be a serious spoiler, but attacking from inside means swallow whole actually reduces their already low AC so the Fighter has plenty of DPS to help the party kill it quickly.

[Zanos]

This seems like a strangely specific issue to be so passionate about.

I don't think a two handed power attacking fighter that isn't stacking a ton of additional boosts is ending combats with CR appropriate threats in two rounds.

[RFLS]

This seems like a strangely specific issue to be so passionate about.

I don't think a two handed power attacking fighter that isn't stacking a ton of additional boosts is ending combats with CR appropriate threats in two rounds.

Sometimes you just need to pick a hill and die on it.

[Fizban]

This seems like a strangely specific issue to be so passionate about.

I don't think a two handed power attacking fighter that isn't stacking a ton of additional boosts is ending combats with CR appropriate threats in two rounds.
Neither do I, hence why I responded with first of and the caveat that by itself the two-handed PA boost is only devaluing other styles -if you actually restrict all the other things that people hate restricting. But do you dispute the idea that if PA was never updated melee characters would still exist? Of course not, that would be silly.

I don't think its that strangely specific of an issue. People say the entire melee system hinges on one thing that it provably doesn't hinge on, and it bugs me the same as any caster based problem does, the same as every argument that "the game" works a certain way when it doesn't. While complaining about casters is generally accepted, disagreeing about power attack is not, and sure most people's response to imbalance seems to be just ramping up the power on everything they notice until it matches or stops mattering. But most people do also agree that having two-handed PA dominate the melee space is bad, and I find it amusing that without that change in 3.5, it would dominate far less.

Of course you'd think there would be more people saying to just make it 2:1 PA for all weapons at all times with no stat requirements, if it was so necessary. It's not a fix I can remember ever seeing suggested, but if the solution really is to just make everyone better at everything, why not just do that? I've seen plenty of people make Power Attack itself a main system rule rather than a feat, but they never include a line to remove the two-handed supremacy.

[ShurikVch]

Remember how 3.0 monks were even worse?Really? How? Tell me!



Unless vorpal goes off on all crits instead of just 20sYes - it worked that way in 3.0

[emeraldstreak]

Simple =/= good. Power Attack is simple. Found in the Core itself most tables can figure on their own how to benefit from it in melee.

[death390]

here is the thing about power attack. it in of itself is the ONLY good fighting style for fighters/ rangers/ barbarians. why? BECAUSE it has x2 when used on a 2h weapon, not counting all the ubercharger builds which take great care stacking insane damage on alpha strike rinse and repeat, it actually keeps parity with casting damage. by keeping up with casting damage it made casters less likely to use their spells on straight damage dealing, the act of crowd/battlefield control was much more useful.

PA get 2/1 per level of full BaB classes (the mundane fighting classes). the base weapon only deals d4-d12 damage (2d8 for a full blade). strength damage does not scale at all and must wait for either 8 levels to get 1 more point (2 if bumping to a str score divisable by 4) of attack/damage from strength, or a magic item.

so best case a 2h greatsword 2d6 damge 1.5 str +2 damage/lvl from PA. then you must spend cash to upgrade it. while most of the weapon upgrades do increase damage it is usually only d6 elemental (d4 for odd like desicating/force/ect) the cost for that is exponential 2k/8k/18k/32k and on and on that is just a +5 weapon, +1 of which is chosen for you as +1 atk/dmg. so average damage with a base 20 str +1@ 4/8 for 22 str @ lvl8 spending all 18k of the 27k wealth by level you should have for a +1 flaming frost greatsword is. . . drumroll. . . . 40 whopping points, with a max of 54. 7 weapon +9 str +16 PA+8 enhancement (+7 +7 for weapon & enhancement for max).

meanwhile a lvl 8 wizard is sending out a fireball a lvl 3 spell doing 8d6 fireball to everyone within its 40ft diamager circle. that is AVERAGE 28 points, with max being 42 TO EVERYTHING.

no mundane can keep up with that. not to mention using ALL your BAB to increase your damage means that you are going to have a hard time hitting (if you dont use shocktrooper). reducing it down to 1-1 damage @ lvl 8 alone you lose 8 damage bringing the average to 32 instead (46 max) to a single target with 2 attempts. being more concervative with your Bab to 1/2 drops it by another 4, bringing you to 28 which is the average damage a fireball does. it gets worse with smaller weapons. a d8 single handed weapon loses 2.5 average damage and 4 from the Max.

lets look at the other options though.
sword and board: AC is flat has no scaling you will get hit unless you enchant it @ 1/2 the cost of another weapon. on average 1h weapon deals d6-d8 damage, not counting exotic or we bring fullbalde into this too. now compared to d8/2d4-d12/2d6 a 1h weapon innately loses a about a third of its base damage output, further it loses ANOTHER third of its base output because its 1x str compared to 1.5. enhancements however are the same.

two weapon fighting: str to off-hand weapon is .5x so it is = to 2h str bonus over both weapons. as standard it is 1 light 1 1h weapon (or 2 light). a light weapons damage range is d3-d6 losing 2/3 of its possible damage output on the off-hand weapon. so two weapons TOGETHER = a single 2h weapon on average BUT both have to hit in order to deal out the appropriate damage. this edges out sword and board since while is is more expensive to enchant a weapon (x2 cost) each enchantment is = power to the weapon. however this means that you are spending more gold than the 2h fighter always. this style is better than 2h power attack if 1-1 only due to the possibility to hit with more enchantments but still expensive as hell and has so many feat taxes to even get extra attacks. really really shines with extra damage such as SA though.

the "balancing" factor is critical hits. which is laughable since they removed the stacking mechanic that enabled it to be viable anyway. the problem was vorpal crit stacking, should have just removed vorpal TBH. most weapons wih high crit modifiers x3/x4 had crappy crit range to compensate usually only working on 20 (19-20 if keen 1/10 shot). the crit range weapons only get x2 modifiers and 18-20 base (15-20 or 1/4 shot with keen). that x2 damage would only barely put them even-ish with 2h weapons base damage while the heavy 2h weapons when they crit kill everything with that x4 damage (8d6 anyone?)


as you can see nerfing power attack does put 2h fighting back down in the power line of other mundane fighters but at the same time increases the power disparity of caster v mundane. this is why we say its better to improve the other styles than nerf power attack. (and yes i used the lvl 8 bit because i don't want to rehash that pit fiend crap again)

[emeraldstreak]

In 3.5, Fullblade is just a Large bastard sword. The most damaging weapon (unarmed strike excluded) is the sugiin(sp?), preferably a heavy version of it.

IMO it's plausible to build for high damage with weapon dice, strength, sneak attack, higher number of attacks, certain enchants, etc; but any of these require way more expertise and often splats than Power Attack.

[Sam K]

Neither do I, hence why I responded with first of and the caveat that by itself the two-handed PA boost is only devaluing other styles

The fact that they are either unpractical or overly complicated to use is what devalues other styles.

3.0 was wrong about all fighting styles. 3.5 core got one right. Now if only they had made two weapon fighting a single feat with no dex requirements, and made sneak attack work on everything (or at least had feat support for it in the players handbook)...

[Mordaedil]

Would it break dual-wielding if you upgraded the half strength bonus to a full bonus? And if you allowed power attack to apply to both weapons individually?

[Fizban]

PA already gives 2x for two handing, no reason it shouldn't apply 1x to both hands other than someone decided it doesn't work with light weapons*. It's a ruling that's only needed if dual-wielding would have given out more PA than normal, say because two-handing and one-handing were the same. Its got the restriction you'd want on the 3.0 version if you were afraid of higher damage caps on TWF, at the same time as the buff that makes the restriction unnecessary.

Full str on the off hand not so much, as that's actually putting your paper damage higher. TWF pays a penalty, but that penalty gets them more reliable curves on average damage and multiple triggers for bonus damage- such as oh, weapon spec and sneak attack and the weapon's own effects. They don't need double str.

And of course, there's always the realism factor to consider. While in fantasy people want to be dual-wielding spinny slashy doom machines, in real life that was rather low on the list of good ideas. Mechanically people want their feat to make them not just better at this thing, but as good as the best thing they could have otherwise got for the feat. Dual wielding in real life is not a primary tactic, not as reliable as a proper shield or polearm, even if you train yourself to do it. Someone with the same amount of training in a conventional style has the advantage, and DnD starts on the ground as a highly detailed simulation attempt with a lot of elements grounded in realism.

*Well unless you're counting people with more than two arms.

[johnbragg]

Fizban, if you're arguing that the early 2000s WOTC designers weren't good at knowing what their game would do, I think everyone grants that premise. Internet CharOp hivemind was in its infancy. Interesting historical note about 3.0 2HPA not paying two-for-one, but I don't think it convinces anyone of anything about their 2018 3X or PF games.


PA already gives 2x for two handing, no reason it shouldn't apply 1x to both hands other than someone decided it doesn't work with light weapons*. It's a ruling that's only needed if dual-wielding would have given out more PA than normal, say because two-handing and one-handing were the same. Its got the restriction you'd want on the 3.0 version if you were afraid of higher damage caps on TWF, at the same time as the buff that makes the restriction unnecessary.

Full str on the off hand not so much, as that's actually putting your paper damage higher.

I'll have to think about this. It would make me sad, but so be it.


And of course, there's always the realism factor to consider. While in fantasy people want to be dual-wielding spinny slashy doom machines, in real life that was rather low on the list of good ideas. Mechanically people want their feat to make them not just better at this thing, but as good as the best thing they could have otherwise got for the feat. Dual wielding in real life is not a primary tactic, not as reliable as a proper shield or polearm, even if you train yourself to do it. Someone with the same amount of training in a conventional style has the advantage, and DnD starts on the ground as a highly detailed simulation attempt with a lot of elements grounded in realism.

I would say no there isn't. This is a *fantasy* roleplaying game, so saying "the math must disadvantage cool-but-impractical styles because REALISM" is bad. I can accept "the math disadvantages cool-but-impractical styles, and rewriting the math of the game is too much work to do." But asking me to agree that it's a GOOD thing is going too far. *REALISM* says that the best tactic is to use a shield phalanx and to count as "disabled" after the first solid hit.

An ideal RPG would make being a double-wielding spinny slashy doom machine, or a stick-and-move rapier-and-run swashbuckler, or a master archer or a grappling-punching-kicking martial artist OR a monkey-gripping two-handed ogre-sword valid options--without any of them being a mooch in terms of earning their 1/N of the XP.

And of course, the problem of 2HPA martial supremacy is, as the kids say, "intersectional" with the problem of caster supremacy. If your fix nerfs 2HPA, you make the Linear Fighter, Quadratic Wizard problem worse by reducing the coefficient of the Linear Fighters.

I'm working on something about this, with Fighting Styles replacing Feats as the fighter's "thing" (Full BAB get two, sneaky's get one, casters get none, gishes may get one, or gishes may just have to dip Full BAB and dip caster before gishing from 3rd level.) But it's in E6, which puts a hard limit on LFQW.

[Gnaeus]

And of course, there's always the realism factor to consider. While in fantasy people want to be dual-wielding spinny slashy doom machines, in real life that was rather low on the list of good ideas. Mechanically people want their feat to make them not just better at this thing, but as good as the best thing they could have otherwise got for the feat. Dual wielding in real life is not a primary tactic, not as reliable as a proper shield or polearm, even if you train yourself to do it. Someone with the same amount of training in a conventional style has the advantage, and DnD starts on the ground as a highly detailed simulation attempt with a lot of elements grounded in realism..

3.5 never tries to simulate realism. It’s full of elves and dragons. It tries to simulate fantasy. And fantasy is full of light weapon fighters, like the Grey Mouser, or Legolas (movie version) or Silk. And they start out behind the curve for gamist reasons (2 weapons more expensive to enchant, harder to beat DR with multiple light hits, greater need for full attacks, to hit penalties).

In a game in which I can duplicate and far exceed any fictional/mythological caster demigod, from Circe to Merlin to Gandalf, in a game where people turn into giants so they can trip things with a spiked chain, making the Grey Mouser suck because dagger and shortsword is unrealistic makes no sense.

[Fizban]

Interesting historical note about 3.0 2HPA not paying two-for-one, but I don't think it convinces anyone of anything about their 2018 3X or PF games.
And those who refuse to learn history are doomed to repeat it as the saying goes. Its a perfect example of a flawed revision leading to more problems down the line, if you recognize the flaw as a flaw anyway ('cause yeah, plenty of people don't think its a flaw).


I would say no there isn't. This is a *fantasy* roleplaying game, so saying "the math must disadvantage cool-but-impractical styles because REALISM" is bad. I can accept "the math disadvantages cool-but-impractical styles, and rewriting the math of the game is too much work to do." But asking me to agree that it's a GOOD thing is going too far. *REALISM* says that the best tactic is to use a shield phalanx and to count as "disabled" after the first solid hit.
If you consider some amount of realistic grit at low levels good, then its gotta come from somewhere. The higher level you get, the more you can make TWF worth it, but the base feat shouldn't do that on its own unless you want that to be a thing the simulated common soldiers can do.

Realism says the best thing to do is use shield phalanxes, at least until you face better soldiers or better tech levels or better resources than your own, and as long as you're fighting in an army. It also doesn't do you much good if the other guy is just doing the same thing. DnD characters are not armies. DnD also says that common soldiers are in fact disabled after the first "solid" hit, since 1d8 hp vs 1d8 weapon damage means any average or greater hit is a drop. The armor table actually works quite well for proper 1st level warriors, with armor and shield being appropriately valuable and one-handed weapons being appropriately lethal, while those fortunate enough to be wearing full plate are indeed nigh invulnerable against most infantry: it takes a skilled foe or a group attack to deal with someone in full plate, at which point they drop as fast as anyone else once you've hit them. And those with exceptional skill- more than one hit die, are dramatically harder to kill and much better at downing individual foes. The main point at which it fails is not differentiating between the reach of daggers and greatswords, and anti-armor weapons only reflecting the quality in their crit multiplier.


And of course, the problem of 2HPA martial supremacy is, as the kids say, "intersectional" with the problem of caster supremacy. If your fix nerfs 2HPA, you make the Linear Fighter, Quadratic Wizard problem worse by reducing the coefficient of the Linear Fighters.
Except it doesn't, because that comparison is a result of a particular play style. As before, people who make casters a problem will never stop complaining about casters being a problem, so what does that have to do with weapon combat? Nothing. The same sort of people would still play fully aggro focused melee characters, but with 3.0 PA there would be less difference between those melee characters- and with that clearer position, it becomes more obvious where and when you may or may not need to nerf a caster.

The whole problem of using "but casters" to excuse anything that's not a caster (and then using those to excuse even more caster power!) is its own thing.


In a game in which I can duplicate and far exceed any fictional/mythological caster demigod, from Circe to Merlin to Gandalf, in a game where people turn into giants so they can trip things with a spiked chain, making the Grey Mouser suck because dagger and shortsword is unrealistic makes no sense.
If they Grey Mouser doesn't have the character levels or synergy to make that TWF worth it, they deserve to suck. Just as many fantasy badasses are only 6th level, plenty of other fantasy badasses are higher level.

The point about turning into giants to trip with a spiked chain is incredibly apt though. Improved Trip is ridiculously strong, but you're still combining it with an exceptional exotic weapon (that I'm fairly certain couldn't be used in the manner you'd need for Improved Trip), and a direct magical effect. So again, if the Grey Mouser lives in a world full of magic and fights people with three feats worth of deadly skill combined with magical backup, they ought to have quite a few levels of their own. Does the Grey Mouser stand toe to toe with giants and dragons and kill them in seconds? Probably not a low level realistically gritter character.

[Doctor Awkward]

Realism says the best thing to do is use shield phalanxes, at least until you face better soldiers or better tech levels or better resources than your own, and as long as you're fighting in an army.

Historically, shields fell out of use because of the advent of more advanced forms of plate armor. When you have a soldier in full-plate covering nearly every vital area on his body, also carrying a shield wouldn't provide him with any more protection than he already had.

So if historical accuracy and realism is your goal then a big step in that direction would be to change AC granted by shields into an armor bonus instead of a shield bonus.

[ericgrau]

Power attack by itself isn't a good feat so I can't see it as expected for anything in 3.5 either. Not in core at least. Depending on the situation the trade-off is between slightly worse than break even and slightly better than break even. It's good for combos.

With or without PA, core only, it's 2-2.5 rounds to drop an average tough foe at low level and 2-2.5 rounds to drop an average tough foe at high level. So damage does keep up even in core-only builds.

[johnbragg]

And those who refuse to learn history are doomed to repeat it as the saying goes. Its a perfect example of a flawed revision leading to more problems down the line, if you recognize the flaw as a flaw anyway ('cause yeah, plenty of people don't think its a flaw). ]

I agree that "2HPA is the One True Way to Beatstick" is a flaw. But, I can understand people playing LFQW games clinging to that as the only way for mundanes to stay relevant.


If you consider some amount of realistic grit at low levels good, then its gotta come from somewhere. The higher level you get, the more you can make TWF worth it, but the base feat shouldn't do that on its own unless you want that to be a thing the simulated common soldiers can do.

Simulated common soldiers have other feats though. OR they don't have as many feats because they're NPC Warriors and not Fighters who get a bonus feats.




Realism says the best thing to do is use shield phalanxes, at least until you face better soldiers or better tech levels or better resources than your own, and as long as you're fighting in an army. It also doesn't do you much good if the other guy is just doing the same thing. DnD characters are not armies.

Realism says "be in an army"


DnD also says that common soldiers are in fact disabled after the first "solid" hit, since 1d8 hp vs 1d8 weapon damage means any average or greater hit is a drop. The armor table actually works quite well for proper 1st level warriors, with armor and shield being appropriately valuable and one-handed weapons being appropriately lethal, while those fortunate enough to be wearing full plate are indeed nigh invulnerable against most infantry: it takes a skilled foe or a group attack to deal with someone in full plate, at which point they drop as fast as anyone else once you've hit them. And those with exceptional skill- more than one hit die, are dramatically harder to kill and much better at downing individual foes. The main point at which it fails is not differentiating between the reach of daggers and greatswords, and anti-armor weapons only reflecting the quality in their crit multiplier.

I think you've got something here--playing with the idea of light piercing weapons ignoring a point of armor, one-handed ignoring two, two-handed ignoring four? "Stick them with the pointy end" indeed.


Nothing. The same sort of people would still play fully aggro focused melee characters, but with 3.0 PA there would be less difference between those melee characters- and with that clearer position, it becomes more obvious where and when you may or may not need to nerf a caster.

[quote]The whole problem of using "but casters" to excuse anything that's not a caster (and then using those to excuse even more caster power!) is its own thing.

Sure. But understand that people who aren't you are going to hear your idea that nerfs the mundanes-as-played in 3X, and unless they're also hearing something that addresses LFQW, they're going to say "Naaah."


If they Grey Mouser doesn't have the character levels or synergy to make that TWF worth it, they deserve to suck. Just as many fantasy badasses are only 6th level, plenty of other fantasy badasses are higher level.

The point is that 3X Grey Mouser has to be significantly higher level than 3X Conan to face the same CR enemies. That's bad.

[Eldariel]

I mean, TWF is still the superior strategy. From 3.0 Improved Crit Keen Vorpal decapitation, to the true damage dealer of Rogue / Thug Sneak Attack, that wants as many attacks as possible, one big weapon is a clear sign of being suboptimal. Or of killing the party, which, arguably, is also suboptimal.

Eh, Rogue/Thug TWF is not nearly as good at damage dealing as a two-hander in most cases. You have to jump through hoops to overcome crit immunity, to trigger sneak attack, etc. and you still fall prey to any non-standard crit immunity (Heart of X-spells, G. Fortification Armor, etc.) and you can't move and attack without jumping through even more hoops. Penetrating Strike, Swordsage levels/Cloistered Cleric dip, Darkstalker and stealth optimization/boatloads of magic items bring it to some reliability and relevance around level 10-15 by when martial damage dealers are already 100% obsolete as actual PCs; useful class features (animal companion, zombie hydra, skeletal hydra, zombie dragon, etc.) though. Yes, 3.0 Vorpal stacking was good after you got Vorpal but that was a +5 ability; it's still rather weak for most of the game (though less terrible than many of the alternatives). You needed two +6 weapons (+7 for Keen) to actually benefit of TWF. With comparable investment you could just be one-shotting enemies with damage instead.

[Fizban]

Historically, shields fell out of use because of the advent of more advanced forms of plate armor. When you have a soldier in full-plate covering nearly every vital area on his body, also carrying a shield wouldn't provide him with any more protection than he already had.

So if historical accuracy and realism is your goal then a big step in that direction would be to change AC granted by shields into an armor bonus instead of a shield bonus.
Except shields were still used if you expected something that might be able to penetrate your armor, and people continued inventing armor tech for a reason. Indeed, with 18 base AC vs an attack bonus of one, carrying a shield only reduces enemy accuracy from 15% to 5% against most foes- while if they're lower on armor, you've got much more than that. Switching to a two-hander to go from a 50/50 drop on the 1d8 damage to a much more certain drop with 2d6 damage is the way to go. But a shield will still obviously make you that much harder to hit, so if you're expecting skilled foes its still the safer bet. Without modeling for armor piercing weapons the plate is basically foolproof, but the shield is still giving a significant benefit even against unskilled foes, so I'd call that a wash on incentives.


I agree that "2HPA is the One True Way to Beatstick" is a flaw. But, I can understand people playing LFQW games clinging to that as the only way for mundanes to stay relevant.
I can understand intellectually, but that's kinda my whole thing: yelling at people to stop worshiping RAW and fix their games when they have problems. Instead of making your mundanes irrelevant, fix your game, simple. The part where I'm disappointed in people is when they decide "fixing" their mundanes means making them all uberchargers and ubertrippers, but at least they're usually consistent about it.

Simulated common soldiers have other feats though. OR they don't have as many feats because they're NPC Warriors and not Fighters who get a bonus feats.
Yes, that's the point. A common soldier is a 1st level warrior, DMG, with one feat. Their best feat would actually be Toughness to survive that first hit more reliably, though Shield Wall results in phalanxes that turn mail into plate.

Realism says "be in an army"
Well realism says "don't get in a fight in the first place," but adventurers like doing it anyway. And considering the distributed nature of medieval military and the importance of skirmishing tactics and cavalry, plenty of non-phalanx combat in the faux-medieval setting if its being run right. All of which works without and isn't heavily disrupted by 1st level feats.


I think you've got something here--playing with the idea of light piercing weapons ignoring a point of armor, one-handed ignoring two, two-handed ignoring four? "Stick them with the pointy end" indeed.
It sounds good, but all it really does is screw up the armor and AC system. Even with blunt weapons maybe bending armor or spikes piercing mail, that doesn't account for the movement of the foe, glancing blows, parries, or any of that. At the end of the day, even an "anti-armor" weapon requires a much more difficult hit against someone in better armor, it doesn't just ignore it -so many blows with the same weapon that would work on an unarmored target still *don't* work on armor, meaning the AC of the armor should still be effective. Its such a fine distinction (and one that most fantasy focused types don't care about) that I don't think it works.

If you do go around giving effective attack bonuses, you need to include natural armor, and build a whole new weapon system that's actually predicated on varying bonuses. This leads to even more "golf bag of weapons" fightery, which people also like to complain about.

The crit stats can still give it a nod, with rare axe or spear/lance thrusts that do wreck the armor with a confirmed crit resulting in almost certain death from the x3 multiplier against normal people. This does result in the odd effect that high crit anti-flesh weapons (scimitars falcions) will penetrate armor nearly 3x as much as the actual anti-armor weapons, but again I'm willing to let it slide (just like the even more significant reach problems with daggers) for fantasy.


But understand that people who aren't you are going to hear your idea that nerfs the mundanes-as-played in 3X, and unless they're also hearing something that addresses LFQW, they're going to say "Naaah."
Except when they don't -there are other people on the forum that aren't bound by that playstyle. You see why I don't make my own threads that often though, since indeed, many active posters don't give a fig about analyzing the rules past the playstyles they've settled on as being "true." I could (and am, and might even continue posting) makes lists of all sorts of bad revisions that made the game worse which people immediately internalized rather than questioned, but if they don't care they don't care. One question I think very few people bother to ask is "Okay, so why wasn't it this way before?," though that's a lot more useful for spells than for this PA change.


The point is that 3X Grey Mouser has to be significantly higher level than 3X Conan to face the same CR enemies. That's bad.
I could evaluate this better if I had examples, but even so I just don't see how its bad. Assuming this Grey Mouser is some sort of less burly type, they should absolutely require more skill to fight the same things the burly type can fight.

[Psyren]

I'm not convinced.

And I highly doubt you will be, regardless of what anyone says on the subject or the numbers they show you.

The buffs to all three classes I mentioned absolutely increased their DPR. Consider for example that the monk's flurry went from +13/+13/+8/+3 @ 1d20 per hit in 3.0, to +15/+15/+15/+10/+5 @ 2d10 per hit in 3.5. And 3.0 Ki Strike only let you count as a +1 weapon, in an edition where massive amounts of DR were gated behind +2 or more at the higher levels. When you take the time to do the math, the damage difference between them was obscene even before optimization.

For the ranger, their damage bonus was doubled. Equally important, they were allowed to use the ranged bonus beyond 30ft, and were give archery as a combat style, making bow-using rangers (instead of just "Drizzt-style") actually feasible. And Barbarians didn't just get more DR (though a 50% increase is nothing to sneeze at) - their rage progression was accelerated by 4 levels, giving them more damage throughout their careers. So to conclude, I have little doubt the power attack change was someone saying (however inadequately they did so in 3.5) "let's give martial classes a little more."

If you're going to discuss what a martial feat should be doing, being able to calculate DPR properly is something you should be learning more about how to do.


Really? How? Tell me!

See above.


Sometimes you just need to pick a hill and die on it.

I don't see the necessity at all personally, but he is certainly within his rights to die wherever he wants.

[Eldariel]

@OP: I wouldn't change it by default, but your variations might change that equation. Doubled returns merely make Power Attack usable in most cases as opposed to being restricted to single attack/True Strike/Wraithstrike/etc. duty; the system discourages losing AB due to iteratives by default and I'd assume your variation tends towards that default rather than the higher powered options the system is rife with. However, depending on how your other changes affect the system, this equation might change too. If you made iteratives higher attack bonus or removed them entirely or some such, PA gets better. In that case, it might not be too punishing to go down to 1.5x or even 1x returns, depending again on the whole.

But yes, it would definitely change the dynamics. However, one of the reasons THF is supreme in 3.5 is reach; only THF gets good reach weapons. Weapon damage dice are kinda secondary but reach tends to amount to an extra attack in all equally matched martial combats and it's also the sole way to make proper area control/tanking work in melee. Much of melee's power comes from getting free attacks out of turn but due to the way the system handles turns and movement, only two-handers (and Kusari-Gama users, which I doubt your games would allow) really get to take advantage of it.

[Fizban]

And I highly doubt you will be, regardless of what anyone says on the subject or the numbers they show you.
If you have a monster in mind go ahead and show me, but-


The buffs to all three classes I mentioned absolutely increased their DPR.
DPR is a myth. I was going to be less absolute, but if you're going to tell me I can't calculate DPR, I'll just make that clear. Actual effectiveness depends on more than what an arbitrary attack routine aimed at nothing says. Full attacks depend on positioning, rage and smite are limited resources, sneak and favored enemy have even more specific limits. DPR calculations aren't proofs. Those classes that got buffed got some more damage capability, so they don't become the dreaded "liability xp mooch," but they didn't make martial classes "better"- they caught the Paladin, Ranger, and Monk up to the Fighter of all things, but the only one that can claim to be a buff above the Fighter is the Barbarian.

And bumping up rage can actually be read as a response to canonizing Greater Weapon Spec, which would make the whole thing tied to the Fighter. But you haven't presented anything to do with Power Attack. Meanwhile, the fact that it also mysteriously lost the ability to be used with light weapons points far more strongly to it being a separate thing based on weapon classifications and str effects.


I don't see the necessity at all personally, but he is certainly within his rights to die wherever he wants.
I do so love how disagreeing with the popular opinion gets people to start calling me crazy. I don't see the necessity in keeping Power Attack king of everything, but hey.



@OP: I wouldn't change it by default, but your variations might change that equation. Doubled returns merely make Power Attack usable in most cases as opposed to being restricted to single attack/True Strike/Wraithstrike/etc. duty; the system discourages losing AB due to iteratives by default and I'd assume your variation tends towards that default rather than the higher powered options the system is rife with. However, depending on how your other changes affect the system, this equation might change too. If you made iteratives higher attack bonus or removed them entirely or some such, PA gets better. In that case, it might not be too punishing to go down to 1.5x or even 1x returns, depending again on the whole.
Again with the "usable" term, but it's nice to see someone acknowledge attack penalties for once. I do indeed have most of the offenders nerfed or banned, but not all. In particular I've left Shock Trooper [Heedless Charge] intact with an added AoO a 'la Power Lunge (before I even rediscovered the feat), Valorous weapons at a +3 cost, Rhino's Rush and Find the Gap intact for those who cast it, and of course lances still lance (but no charge stuff applies to more than one attack by default even if you have a legal pounce). That's multipliers and cost reducers still in play. The main reason I'd want to leave PA alone is, ironically, because the other combat cycle feats are currently based on the return, enough so that I've kinda canonized it in myself.

But again, better to get people's reaction to 1:1 first, since that's the 3.5 update I'm interested in.


But yes, it would definitely change the dynamics. However, one of the reasons THF is supreme in 3.5 is reach; only THF gets good reach weapons. Weapon damage dice are kinda secondary but reach tends to amount to an extra attack in all equally matched martial combats and it's also the sole way to make proper area control/tanking work in melee. Much of melee's power comes from getting free attacks out of turn but due to the way the system handles turns and movement, only two-handers (and Kusari-Gama users, which I doubt your games would allow) really get to take advantage of it.
Yeah, kusari-gama's quite right out. But you've left out what's supposed to be the main balancing factor of a two-handed weapon: no shield. Reach should actually be the forefront of two-handed weapons (and you'll hear all about it from people who fight with them), so if nerfing PA meant THF was still the king simply because of reach, that'd be a win. If AC works (and it does), and two-handed damage is properly in line (but still a bit higher), then it comes down to reach vs close-quarters AC, and that's a heck of a lot more interesting.

[Doctor Awkward]

Except shields were still used if you expected something that might be able to penetrate your armor

This is still incorrect. Shields-- particularly kite shields that provided the highest level of protection both on foot and from the back of a horse-- were large, cumbersome, and very difficult to use effectively. This is something else that is not reflected well at all in D&D: how awkward and heavy a shield is, and how much of a burden it is to carry with you into combat (except in the case of tower shields).

Shields primarily fell out of use for two reasons: 1) The rise in armoring techniques that made shields unnecessary, and 2) the use of a two-handed weapon was important enough to forgo the use of a shield.

By the late 15th century, armor had evolved to a point that a man in full plate was basically invulnerable to harm. Steel plate could deflect anything from arrows to bullets from period firearms, and the joints were designed with additional plating that no longer left vulnerabilities in gaps like in previous styles of armor. Gothic armor, as pictured below, even had additional fluting and ridges to provide further reinforcement against the crushing blows from warhammers and halberds. Among the wealthy, there was nothing a shield could block that you couldn't also block with your massive, shiny chest.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bf/Gothic_armour_with_list_of_elements.jpg

Whether or not a soldier carried a shield had almost everything to do with his unit assignment in whatever military he belonged to. Pikemen were lightly armored and never carried shields. Neither did bowmen. With the advent of the pike, shields saw the most use in units of shock troops consisting of enormous numbers of men armed with longswords and bucklers who cut into gaps created in enemy formations by their own pikemen units.

Most of the time, those who had enough money to afford the highest levels of armor discarded a shield in favor of a two-handed weapon for the increase in mobility, better reach, and the ability to land more telling blows against their opponent. Meanwhile, the two-handed weapons techniques developed to fight men in armor (more like armed wrestling, really) required that your left hand be as free as your right to grapple with your opponent.

The rise of pike-heavy formations meant that soldiers could not easily use shields but the presence of armor that was cheap enough to be distributed to many of the men meant that their presence was not too sorely missed. In the case for formation warfare, the greatest concern for a formation is how intact it is, regardless of the lives of individual men.

In mass melee combat, a shield was indeed most often a wall to hide behind. However, in single combat the function of a shield, especially a buckler, was not primarily for passive defense. Nor was it even for active defense in intercepting blows or to batter away the enemy's weapon. A shield was a companion weapon, used defensively only in the same sense that a Master Cut from a longsword is defensive. This is something else not reflected very well in D&D: a person does not move a shield around defensively. A shield is a large and awkward slab of metal. Rather, the wielder moves around the shield, utilizing footwork to keep it between himself and his opponent. In personal combat it is not a wall to hide behind, it is a ten pound knuckleduster.

Personal combat involving large shields is primarily about the shield, which can be engaged to bind, batter, or hook your opponent. The sword was used sparingly, most often when the maneuvering with the shield successfully opened a line of attack. Unlike the flurry of sword swings you see with most reenactors. This is another thing not reflected well in D&D.

[darkdragoon]

Shields exist, they just spend a chunk of their enhancement on animated. Aside from that one guy who keeps ranting that bucklers are anime cheese with 0 penalty and all.

For the off-hand, your typical Rogue or Monk probably can't focus on Strength too much and even a SA Fighter or Ranger is probably not going to do backflips over 20 more damage if they don't miss.

Dual wielding was specialized, but notable. Is it rarer than NFL quarterbacks or astronauts? How rare would it be if you could buy gloves that make you fight better?

[Fizban]

-snip-
Yes, with shields getting smaller in between, that armor didn't develop overnight. DnD full plate isn't fluted but there are a couple armors that go up to +10, which is the point of nigh invulnerability and shield obsolescence against standard 1st level soldiers (charge bonus can be negated by fighting defensively). Nothing else there is contradictory, better armor means less need for shields, spear formations rely on formation as they always had (and apparently still have guys that drop despite better armor), grappling or tripping is needed to fight people in good plate armor and requires an open hand while grappling or tripping requires an open hand in dnd and lets you ignore or reduce armor, and shields are big. Though there's this contradictory line:

Rather, the wielder moves around the shield, utilizing footwork to keep it between himself and his opponent. In personal combat it is not a wall to hide behind, it is a ten pound knuckleduster.
So do you punch or do you maneuver around it? Either way, dnd shields have bashes, they just remove AC to discourage TWF since TWF extra attacks are supposed to come at the cost of AC. How you're moving or swinging your weapon is fluff, mechanically the shield is still making you hard to hit, and being hard to hit means you have more time to roll attacks until you find that opening with a good attack roll. The aggressive "binding battering or hooking" is just part of those attack rolls when a proficient user fights with a shield.

More historical realism is nice, but trying to model that many things turns into its own system rather than being dnd.


Animated shields give up 2 points of AC for a significant part of the game (if they're allowed, not by me hah). Dual wielding isn't impossible for a common soldier, the only requirement is dex 13 which is even within non-elite array and you get two chances to kill someone per turn. But is it worth losing reach or risking the double miss into non-shielded AC on the enemy turn?

[Eldariel]

Again with the "usable" term, but it's nice to see someone acknowledge attack penalties for once. I do indeed have most of the offenders nerfed or banned, but not all. In particular I've left Shock Trooper [Heedless Charge] intact with an added AoO a 'la Power Lunge (before I even rediscovered the feat), Valorous weapons at a +3 cost, Rhino's Rush and Find the Gap intact for those who cast it, and of course lances still lance (but no charge stuff applies to more than one attack by default even if you have a legal pounce). That's multipliers and cost reducers still in play. The main reason I'd want to leave PA alone is, ironically, because the other combat cycle feats are currently based on the return, enough so that I've kinda canonized it in myself.

But again, better to get people's reaction to 1:1 first, since that's the 3.5 update I'm interested in.

"Usable" seems pretty clear in this sense: improves your expected output against a significant number of creatures where it matters (i.e. which are threatening enough that it matters how efficiently you can damage them and where it's not an overkill) to warrant investing a feat in Power Attack over anything else. Put other way, so that it's worth the opportunity cost. 1-for-1 Power Attack generally fails that test outside some ways to basically make everything autohit. It is a good demolition tool for breaking walls and the like though. As long as we're considering how powerful various options are comparatively, we also have to acknowledge the base level where that option is not much of an improvement over not having it at all, or where the best choice is generally to not use it. This makes the option quite undesirable far as investing resources in getting it goes.

But yes, attack penalties are quite relevant when not using a penalty negating framework or one of the ways to negate most of the enemies' defenses. Thus if you have "naked" Power Attack, you do generally need 2-for-1 returns to make it worthwhile, but if you alter the extremely poorly implemented single/full attack mechanics or make the default case that everyone mostly fights with single attacks as opposed to full attacks, it gets much better.


Yeah, kusari-gama's quite right out. But you've left out what's supposed to be the main balancing factor of a two-handed weapon: no shield. Reach should actually be the forefront of two-handed weapons (and you'll hear all about it from people who fight with them), so if nerfing PA meant THF was still the king simply because of reach, that'd be a win. If AC works (and it does), and two-handed damage is properly in line (but still a bit higher), then it comes down to reach vs close-quarters AC, and that's a heck of a lot more interesting.

This does, however, cause the problem of making non-reach two-handed weapons comparatively terrible. They need more than a single damage die increase to be worth it compared to reach. And the power of reach is of course because of a complex interplay of the terrible 3.5 movement rules; 5' steps often negate the issue of not being able to hit adjacent enemies entirely (and it not provoking an AoO to draw a weapon allowing you to simply switch being another) so there's no trade-off against a melee range enemy getting through your cover, and 5' steps conveniently make non-reach weapons pretty much unable to prevent casters/archers from getting free attacks off ignoring melee threat unless you've actually got them cornered.

Similarly, since players take turns moving and you can move a lot (a Hasted character can easily move 120' a turn while someone on Phantom Steed can move up to 480' while still taking their usual actions), creatures can mysteriously slip past each other without non-reach martials being able to block their movement with their own movement for...reasons. Readied move actions or such are a necessary step to remedy such, but they again have side effects such as being able to defensively ready move actions to basically negate the chance of ever getting a melee full attack and indeed, to make it very hard to ever catch up to anyone.

Shields have their own sets of issues; in real combat where everyone uses swords and arrows it's natural to want to defend against martial weapons but about 50% of stuff in D&D completely ignores shields (touch attacks, all save-targeting attacks, auto-effect auras, etc.) while under 1% ignore damage (there is some damage immune stuff in this game but it's a small fraction of stuff overall outside very high optimization standards). Thus the extra AC has to have a sufficiently greater value compared to the extra damage to make up for it not being applicable in a significant number of the cases. And there's Bucklers and Improved Buckler Defense and Animated Shields anyways, so you can still get a shield albeit at a cost even if you two-hand. Which is probably okay far as AC calculations go but of course, characters can just cheat by opting out of AC and spending those resources elsewhere in more generally applicable defenses while taking some alternative route to defend against physical threats.

[Gnaeus]

I could evaluate this better if I had examples, but even so I just don't see how its bad. Assuming this Grey Mouser is some sort of less burly type, they should absolutely require more skill to fight the same things the burly type can fight.

Without touching on the logic behind that statement, which I would also question, it’s not really the point. The point is that a player in a magic elf game has no reason to think that Grey Mouser and Legolas should suck compared with Aragorn or Fafhrd because some guy named Fizban said that THIS is the place where we will let realism intrude into their high fantasy. And the most likely way that they will find out is by building a character and sucking through a campaign. It honestly doesn’t matter what happened in the 14th century. It matters that they took an option that many people consider iconic/flavorful/cool and made people using it worse than the druid’s Pet bear.

[Psyren]

If you have a monster in mind go ahead and show me, but-

Wait, a monster? Are we not talking about a feat intended for PCs?


DPR is a myth.

With this, I can only be glad that you're not in charge of designing any edition of this game :smallconfused:

Your premise is that the designers must have made a mistake of some kind in buffing power attack from 3.0 to 3.5. I responded by pointing out several other buffs to martial damage output that were made between those editions. Neither of us possesses designer telepathy, but I feel confident in asserting that what they did to Power Attack was not an anomaly. Without obtaining Monte Cook's phone number somehow or stalking his residence, this is as good as either of us is likely to get.



I do so love how disagreeing with the popular opinion gets people to start calling me crazy. I don't see the necessity in keeping Power Attack king of everything, but hey.

I didn't call you "crazy," so feel free to climb down from that cross anytime. I'm agreeing with the folks saying this is an odd hill to die on.

[death390]

hmm interesting thought reach does make a massive difference. the only weapon type that has reach while having adjacent melee is the spiked chain/ meteor hammer line. but later feats helped negate this problem, haft strike, shorten grip, ect.

no non-2h weapon has reach, and reach is a major difference in both AoO's and dealing with large+ sized creatures. the large creatures get a free AoO for all 1h and light weapons users since they have to travel within the larger creatures reach (yes tumble can negate this but that requires skill investment)

[Quertus]

I think it's more likely that two handed power attack is just viable where other options are bad, since they don't keep pace with monster HP pools, AC, DR, or some combination thereof.

Power Attack with a greatsword isn't OP on it's own, it's OP when combined with shocktrooper, leap attack, pounce, valorous, etc.

Even in 3e two weapon fighting required twice as much gold, and had even bigger problems with DR since stuff like 20/+3 or even 40/+3 wasn't unheard of. Unless vorpal goes off on all crits instead of just 20s and many more enemies are vulnerable to critical hits, both those builds seem mediocre.

A good buffing Cleric could easily buff your weapon to overcome +3 or +4 DR. So the amount you had to spend buffing your weapon in 3.0 is minimal. At least until you reach Vorpal... which does, indeed, trigger on crit. And Improved Crit and Keen stack.


Eh, Rogue/Thug TWF is not nearly as good at damage dealing as a two-hander in most cases. You have to jump through hoops to overcome crit immunity, to trigger sneak attack, etc. and you still fall prey to any non-standard crit immunity (Heart of X-spells, G. Fortification Armor, etc.) and you can't move and attack without jumping through even more hoops. Penetrating Strike, Swordsage levels/Cloistered Cleric dip, Darkstalker and stealth optimization/boatloads of magic items bring it to some reliability and relevance around level 10-15 by when martial damage dealers are already 100% obsolete as actual PCs; useful class features (animal companion, zombie hydra, skeletal hydra, zombie dragon, etc.) though. Yes, 3.0 Vorpal stacking was good after you got Vorpal but that was a +5 ability; it's still rather weak for most of the game (though less terrible than many of the alternatives). You needed two +6 weapons (+7 for Keen) to actually benefit of TWF. With comparable investment you could just be one-shotting enemies with damage instead.

Yes, there were multiple ways for martial characters to contribute - beheading foes, or one-shotting them with damage were the most obvious of the most effective builds. But, if the Fighter soloing the encounter didn't count as contributing, then, clearly, we have different bars for "contribute", and will likely be talking past each other a lot.

For damage: 80d6 SA is, if I'm doing the math right, around 280 damage. Power attack needs to jump through a few hoops - in build and conditions - to meet that, too. IME, SA wins at lower-op, übercharger wins at higher-op.

For full attack: as you touched on, both builds really want to full attack. Yes, 2HPA fares better with a single attack than 2WF. But both really should invest in something to maximize their ability to start combat with a full attack. And SA arguably has more options in that regard, with stealth skills being a Rogue thing.

For non-standard crit immunity: just how many monsters come with that? How many published modules will I encounter that in? Because I've never once noticed* an opponent using the things you listed.

For companions: while it will never be as powerful as a good fighter, the zombie dragon has a special place in my heart, and thus is the clear winner.

* of course, that may just be because I run wizards, so my actions don't tend to care much about crit immunity.

[Fizban]

This does, however, cause the problem of making non-reach two-handed weapons comparatively terrible. They need more than a single damage die increase to be worth it compared to reach.
I am admittedly pretty fine with that. People still gonna use 'em anyway, and there's also big-weapon build. Which costs resources, but so does getting more than a single AoO out of that reach. Against monsters with reach, your reach doesn't get you an extra attack anyway, it just lets you avoid one -which is great, but what else could have let you avoid that AoO? AC.


And the power of reach is of course because of a complex interplay of the terrible 3.5 movement rules; 5' steps often negate the issue of not being able to hit adjacent enemies entirely (and it not provoking an AoO to draw a weapon allowing you to simply switch being another) so there's no trade-off against a melee range enemy getting through your cover, and 5' steps conveniently make non-reach weapons pretty much unable to prevent casters/archers from getting free attacks off ignoring melee threat unless you've actually got them cornered.
Unless you can't 5' step back because positioning matters, and backup weapons are still backup weapons. There's still the expectation that melee DPS is whats supposed to stop casters and archers, but its not. If you're fighting ranged opponents, you use a ranged weapon unless you already have them cornered. People expecting to melee everything is not the game's fault in any way other than allowing it.


Similarly, since players take turns moving and you can move a lot (a Hasted character can easily move 120' a turn while someone on Phantom Steed can move up to 480' while still taking their usual actions), creatures can mysteriously slip past each other without non-reach martials being able to block their movement with their own movement for...reasons. Readied move actions or such are a necessary step to remedy such, but they again have side effects such as being able to defensively ready move actions to basically negate the chance of ever getting a melee full attack and indeed, to make it very hard to ever catch up to anyone.

If the party is splitting up their formation, thats their own fault. If the party is fighting super fast hasted monsters that's the DM's fault, and they shouldn't have made those monsters so strong it was a game ender. The existing high speed/pounce monsters I've evaluated (the MM1 chargers, which were derided as a medieval sahara and kinda shows how narrow that range can be) never have enough damage to one-round the wizard, so cries of "wah they walked past me" kinda fall flat.


Shields have their own sets of issues; in real combat where everyone uses swords and arrows it's natural to want to defend against martial weapons but about 50% of stuff in D&D completely ignores shields (touch attacks, all save-targeting attacks, auto-effect auras, etc.)
But weather that's 50% of encounters is less certain. Monsters with "unstoppable" attacks can generally be classified as EIHP (Easy If Handled Properly), with plenty of spells meant to counter them, and regardless of their book space should only be 20% of encounters according to the DMG. Furthermore, these monsters still allow other defenses- petrifying gaze has a low DC that targets the fighter's best save, damage rays are still damage and the fighter (or barb) has the most hit points, incorporeal undead can't one round a fighters str or con (or wis unless they've got like 6), and so on: the whole point is that the EIHP monster hits you with a scary attack, you run, and you come back with the counter. As discussed in other threads, this once again isn't the game's problem, its the DM's problem: most ultra deadly monsters are designed to be escapable simply by not having the ability to unfailingly pursue, and if you build encounters that the PCs can't run away from you've just optimized the encounter against them, no surprise they're screwed.


of course, characters can just cheat by opting out of AC and spending those resources elsewhere in more generally applicable defenses while taking some alternative route to defend against physical threats.
Except AC is also cheapest defense and skipping out on it makes you far more vulnerable than is popular to admit. Unless you're using a significant amount of splat-tier defenses (your Wings of Cover and such), you're still going to want some AC. Or you should, ironically because of Power Attack. Concealment defenses don't stack, but its still cheap and easy for someone with AC to get those defenses in various ways and then survive better than you.



Wait, a monster? Are we not talking about a feat intended for PCs?
And the balance of feats intended for PCs have nothing to do with DPR comparisons of this PC vs that PC. Balance comes from PCs vs monsters (specifically the standard party), and DPR is not a role. Just because people want it to be, just because it actually was canonized in 4e, just because 5e's "full attack all the time every time and screw tactical positioning" doesn't care, doesn't mean those conventions apply to 3.5. You've been in threads where I've explained this in laborious detail before, I wouldn't have thought you'd need reminding.

If you have some monsters in mind that you think prove on the whole that melee characters need to specifically use two handed weapons and 2:1 Power Attack in order for the party to accomplish their goal, then go ahead and present them. I've been raring for another go since Pleh ditched out rather than actually read by "Ogre ignores the fighter" analysis.


With this, I can only be glad that you're not in charge of designing any edition of this game :smallconfused:
I don't see how the viewpoint of "pay attention to the rest of the game you've designed besides DPR" could be considered a bad thing.


Without obtaining Monte Cook's phone number somehow or stalking his residence, this is as good as either of us is likely to get.
Indeed. I do sometimes wish I could take a peek into the past and catch the wider picture, but its probably no better than even odds of weather they actually stated it anywhere even then.


I didn't call you "crazy," so feel free to climb down from that cross anytime. I'm agreeing with the folks saying this is an odd hill to die on.
Which he did as a non-contributing one-liner, and I've already explained why questioning the PA change is a fine thing to do. Considering how I've admited that my own feats have effectively canonized the return rate and the threat of PA should make people care more about AC, what hill am I dying on? Presumably its the "melee needs to be balanced too" hill, otherwise known as the "melee should have nice things" fallacy- again, back to the fact that DPR is not a role or requirement.


Without touching on the logic behind that statement, which I would also question, it’s not really the point. The point is that a player in a magic elf game has no reason to think that Grey Mouser and Legolas should suck compared with Aragorn or Fafhrd because some guy named Fizban said that THIS is the place where we will let realism intrude into their high fantasy.
Point of order, I'm not the one that said it, that's the 3.5 rulebooks, I'm just agreeing with it. If you have a problem then you're free to make your own changes, and I do in fact have my own changes to make non-str builds catch up. But as for the logic behind a combatant with more strength and equal skill and equipment winning, no that's pretty absolute, and I absolutely will question the logic of declaring every character that doesn't have the most powerful combat style as "sucking," or demanding that some arbitrary character from an arbitrary book be an arbitrary level. This is dnd, not something else.

(Oh look, Legolas is an elf, which in LotR are just better than humans and live how long? to master combat, fighting an army of humanoids, that's what level vs 1 HD warriors again?).

[PanosIs]

@OP

Having tested both [Power Attack] with 1 to 1 returns and actually Two-Handed Weapons gaining 1-1 from STR (in two different occasions, not at the same time) it didn't seem too disruptive, the charging THW Barbarian still did a lot of damage, and most of my players decided to use [Power Attack] anyways.

However it does turn [Power Attack] into an engine rather than an all around good feat, meaning that each character that uses it needs a way to mitigate the attack penalty for it to be worth it. In our case it's [True Strike] for the gish and smites/tripping for the paladin/monk. It does get you into thinking of interesting ways to get around it, which is good, but I do think it will not be worth it for most characters, which is not necessarily a bad thing, but if I were to keep such a change in my regular games, I would certainly try to make some other changes to make up for it.

Wether we like it or not, within the current framework of 3.X, [Power Attack] and are the two things most worth doing, and outside of that and fairly optimized builds you'd be hard pressed to not be better at meleeing by doing one of the above.


Point of order, I'm not the one that said it, that's the 3.5 rulebooks, I'm just agreeing with it. If you have a problem then you're free to make your own changes, and I do in fact have my own changes to make non-str builds catch up. But as for the logic behind a combatant with more strength and equal skill and equipment winning, no that's pretty absolute, and I absolutely will question the logic of declaring every character that doesn't have the most powerful combat style as "sucking," or demanding that some arbitrary character from an arbitrary book be an arbitrary level. This is dnd, not something else.

(Oh look, Legolas is an elf, which in LotR are just better than humans and live how long? to master combat, fighting an army of humanoids, that's what level vs 1 HD warriors again?).

This are two bad arguments though, the fact that out of the book TWF is worse than say THWF does not hold any authority over the fact that it should be better or worse.

And neither is the fact that [I]you think that a combatant with more strength should always win over the one with more dexterity provided equal skill (I do not even think you actually believe that, or at the very least that you are this absolute about it), an argument for why TWF should be worse that THWF at a given level, because really you can't argue for that, because the only base for it is realism, which doesn't really have a place in this discussion both for lack of actually evidence towards one or the other, and because we're playing a fantasy elf mage game.

D&D is fantasy, and there is a fair case to be made that all combat styles should be if not equal (all and all, interparty balance is overrated), relatively close to each other in terms of throughput (damage, defense, control, whatever it is the player wants to do) and that is absolute in terms of providing a good experience in terms of design.

[Psyren]

And the balance of feats intended for PCs have nothing to do with DPR comparisons of this PC vs that PC. Balance comes from PCs vs monsters (specifically the standard party), and DPR is not a role. Just because people want it to be, just because it actually was canonized in 4e, just because 5e's "full attack all the time every time and screw tactical positioning" doesn't care, doesn't mean those conventions apply to 3.5. You've been in threads where I've explained this in laborious detail before, I wouldn't have thought you'd need reminding.

I agree that DPR is not the only data point that matters. But it is the only one that the player has total control over; they can't control what they encounter, where they encounter it, nor even what gear they have on hand when they do. ALL of that is in the DMG for a reason. What they can control are their feats, which lo and behold are in the PHB.



If you have some monsters in mind that you think prove on the whole that melee characters need to specifically use two handed weapons

Please point out where I said this? Or is this just a strawman you want to tilt against? :smallconfused:



I don't see how the viewpoint of "pay attention to the rest of the game you've designed besides DPR" could be considered a bad thing.

It's not, but that's not what you said, now is it? Your exact words were "DPR is a myth"; that's objectively false, it's a real data point. Not the only one, but a data point nonetheless.


Which he did as a non-contributing one-liner, and I've already explained why questioning the PA change is a fine thing to do. Considering how I've admited that my own feats have effectively canonized the return rate and the threat of PA should make people care more about AC, what hill am I dying on? Presumably its the "melee needs to be balanced too" hill, otherwise known as the "melee should have nice things" fallacy- again, back to the fact that DPR is not a role or requirement.

The hill in question is your belief that 3.5 Power Attack was somehow a mistake, and that nerfing it is in any way called for. If you think other fighting styles need a buff, buff them.

[Fizban]

@OP

Having tested both [Power Attack] with 1 to 1 returns and actually Two-Handed Weapons gaining 1-1 from STR (in two different occasions, not at the same time) it didn't seem too disruptive, the charging THW Barbarian still did a lot of damage, and most of my players decided to use [Power Attack] anyways.

However it does turn [Power Attack] into an engine rather than an all around good feat, meaning that each character that uses it needs a way to mitigate the attack penalty for it to be worth it. In our case it's [True Strike] for the gish and smites/tripping for the paladin/monk. It does get you into thinking of interesting ways to get around it, which is good, but I do think it will not be worth it for most characters, which is not necessarily a bad thing, but if I were to keep such a change in my regular games, I would certainly try to make some other changes to make up for it.
Ah, thank you for your experience.


This are two bad arguments though, the fact that out of the book TWF is worse than say THWF does not hold any authority over the fact that it should be better or worse.
That argument comes from people who spar with weapons saying that TWF is worse than TH or shield unless you have coordinated and trained enough to do it. TWF has a minimum dex, feat cost, and does in fact give you two chances to kill a man rather than one. It's fine in a duel, but on a battlefield where killing one man doesn't protect you from the rest, its strictly inferior to having better AC if you care about survival, and if you have enough armor that you dont need a shield then its still easier to use a two-handed weapon.


And neither is the fact that you think that a combatant with more strength should always win over the one with more dexterity provided equal skill (I do not even think you actually believe that, or at the very least that you are this absolute about it),
In real life strength and dexterity aren't nearly as divided as they are in DnD (many things considered "dex" are derived from weight vs strength), and in general yes, the stronger guy has the advantage. A person with more "dex" might have the advantage at higher levels of skill, I admit I don't watch much in the way of high tier martial arts, but that's higher levels and most martial artists don't have strength penalties. And be sure to check your absolutism: advantage doesn't mean auto-win. 13 str vs 13 dex is still an even matchup, attack bonus of one is countered by the AC bonus of the other, they both have the same hp and a high chance of dropping on a single hit, and a difference of two points is only +/- 5% from whatever the base hit is. Armor is far more important, skill -as in HD for more hit points and attack, is far more important.


D&D is fantasy, and there is a fair case to be made that all combat styles should be if not equal(all and all, interparty balance is overrated), relatively close to each other in terms of throughput (damage, defense, control, whatever it is the player wants to do) and that is absolute in terms of providing a good experience in terms of design.
The case could be made, but the rules actually do quite clearly fall against that case at low levels, where the game is maintaining some semblance of realism. I don't see how anyone could honestly look at all those fiddly encumbrance tables and slight variations in armor penalty and weapon advantages and not see it as obviously making an attempt at bottom floor realism, and its common knowledge that DnD grew out of miniature wargaming which was about simulating fights, not high fantasy snowflakes. I'm not sure if by interparty balance you mean vs each other or working as a team, but the game isn't built on characters competing for best in melee. As long as each party member contributes enough to get the job done it doesn't matter if they're using a "suboptimal" fighting style, weather its sword 'n board or TWF without bonus damage.

It's telling how we've got one group saying TWF is actually superior thanks to all that bonus dice a rogue can have, and another saying that TWF is inferior because. . . it doesn't do that at 1st level? Badass fantasy characters are not 1st level, and unless they fight in a party there's no grounds to claim that whatever level DnD assigns them is "wrong." The problem isn't that DnD makes someone's favorite character bad, its that someone expects to play a higher level archetype starting at low levels- no one complains about not having Fireball at 1st level (though they surely complain that someone else gets fireball when they chose not-magic)- well actually I suppose some of them do. If that's a problem then you don't start at 1st level, but having the whole continuum from russian roulette to demigod is what makes 3.5 good.

If you want your characters to start out with more of what 3.5 makes higher level capabilities at 1st level, well 5e does that. You can move and make all your attacks at any point of the move, all characters are equally adept with str and dex and two handing natively and two-handed weapons give little benefit. Though from what I remember dual wielding is actually still pretty terrible so maybe not.



ALL of that is in the DMG for a reason.
And so are the encounter guidelines and instructions on how to DM. If the DM ignores them, that's not the game's fault.

Please point out where I said this? Or is this just a strawman you want to tilt against? :smallconfused:
Well you're saying 2:1 PA is a melee buff because DPR is important, I would assume that means there are foes against which you consider normal DPR insufficient. Because if normal DPR was sufficient it wouldn't be a buff to make things a little nicer for melee, it would be overpowered.

It's not, but that's not what you said, now is it? Your exact words were "DPR is a myth"; that's objectively false, it's a real data point. Not the only one, but a data point nonetheless.
But it has gotten you to clarify that you're aware of things other than DPR, while also expressing my displeasure at the implication I can't do math. DPR the way you presented it, with "this guy deals more damage therefore. . . " without further context on when and how and why is a myth, and you didn't include context. Well I suppose you did in the sense that you were supplying it as justification for why you think they made the PA change, but again, accusing me of not being able to do math ("something I should be learning more how to do") is pretty provocative. We're not going to convince each other on why they made the change, so I think that line's closed.


The hill in question is your belief that 3.5 Power Attack was somehow a mistake, and that nerfing it is in any way called for. If you think other fighting styles need a buff, buff them.
I don't think the other fighting styles need a buff, if one keeps 3.0 Power Attack -which just so happens to be weapon agnostic. Other styles don't need buffs to function, but then people start complaining about DPR and I have to call them out on what and how they're fighting and how their game assumptions don't match the game. I have buffs for other weapon styles that are predicated on the 3.5 Power Attack returns, and more moving parts is more fun so I'd rather keep all of them. But non-THF PA styles wouldn't be nearly as far in the hole in the public consciousness without that 2:1 change, and I think that's worth pointing out- as always, maybe pointing it out finally will give the people who act like it can't be fixed a fix idea they'll actually find acceptable (such as making Power Attack 2:1 for everything, so its actually a buff for everyone that takes it rather than a specific archetype advantage).

The big one there: more moving parts are fun, but instead of making more moving parts, they made a specific moving part stronger for a specific archetype (while cutting off another), which then dominated the meta. That's obviously a mistake, as evidenced by every single thread where people come asking for advice on how to make anything thats not THF "relevant" or "viable."

[Psyren]

And so are the encounter guidelines and instructions on how to DM. If the DM ignores them, that's not the game's fault.

1) I have no problem with the DM tailoring encounters to fit the group. But that doesn't mean the player is off the hook for those parts of their character they can control, like damage output. Damage is the one surefire way of overcoming the game's most dangerous encounter type, combat. Every monster has hit points.

2) Even following those guidelines to the letter, the DM can (and in fact is expected to - DMG 49) make some encounters challenging and even difficult. Furthermore - bad rolls, unlucky criticals, and misapplied tactics happen, even in encounters that the DM had every confidence the players were supposed to conquer or even survive.



Well you're saying 2:1 PA is a melee buff because DPR is important, I would assume that means there are foes against which you consider normal DPR insufficient.

You assume wrongly - it's about normalizing performance due to variances in die rolls and player skill. I have no doubt that sufficient melee damage was possible in 3.0 as well, but the core design needs to shoot slightly above that, because the goal of any commercial game is to attract new players that (a) would lack system mastery going in, and (b) could get easily turned off the entire genre by a string of bad rolls. After all, the DM can always ramp up the challenge themselves if things feel too easy. So buffing the player options is a good thing. And I believe this to be the case, because after playtesting they came back and said "all of these martial classes need more stuff."


We're not going to convince each other on why they made the change, so I think that line's closed.

My posts aren't just for you though, they're to provoke thought in anyone else reading this thread (as discussion forums do.) I'll let them draw their own conclusions based on the evidence we have, that the designers made fairly sweeping and almost universally positive changes to martial class damage potential between 3.0 and 3.5. About the only regretful thing is that they didn't go far enough, but thankfully Pathfinder continued where they left off.

[Eldariel]

Yes, there were multiple ways for martial characters to contribute - beheading foes, or one-shotting them with damage were the most obvious of the most effective builds. But, if the Fighter soloing the encounter didn't count as contributing, then, clearly, we have different bars for "contribute", and will likely be talking past each other a lot.

For damage: 80d6 SA is, if I'm doing the math right, around 280 damage. Power attack needs to jump through a few hoops - in build and conditions - to meet that, too. IME, SA wins at lower-op, übercharger wins at higher-op.

For full attack: as you touched on, both builds really want to full attack. Yes, 2HPA fares better with a single attack than 2WF. But both really should invest in something to maximize their ability to start combat with a full attack. And SA arguably has more options in that regard, with stealth skills being a Rogue thing.

For non-standard crit immunity: just how many monsters come with that? How many published modules will I encounter that in? Because I've never once noticed* an opponent using the things you listed.

For companions: while it will never be as powerful as a good fighter, the zombie dragon has a special place in my heart, and thus is the clear winner.

* of course, that may just be because I run wizards, so my actions don't tend to care much about crit immunity.

To hit factors and 80d6 rarely lands in its entirety. Not to mention it doesn't benefit of crits and you can't two-handed lance charge with sneak attack and so on. As for published modules, not a single one of them actually challenges characters built to mid tier standards so they feel like a poor benchmark. Monster Manuals do include things with innate casting though.

Zombie Dragons actually have things Fighters basically can't access; negative energy and massive AOE SoL breath weapons, vast flight speeds, party taxis, etc. Find a Great Wyrm body (Dragon Cemetaries are a fair bet), get a Great Wyrm Zombie on level 10, profit. I'd take one of these over a Fighter 10 any day (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?499642-Best-Dragon-to-Zombie-Dragon).


I am admittedly pretty fine with that. People still gonna use 'em anyway, and there's also big-weapon build. Which costs resources, but so does getting more than a single AoO out of that reach. Against monsters with reach, your reach doesn't get you an extra attack anyway, it just lets you avoid one -which is great, but what else could have let you avoid that AoO? AC.

You should never be able to have enough AC to reliably avoid AoOs, which are done at maximum bonus. If you do, the game's math is askew.


Unless you can't 5' step back because positioning matters, and backup weapons are still backup weapons. There's still the expectation that melee DPS is whats supposed to stop casters and archers, but its not. If you're fighting ranged opponents, you use a ranged weapon unless you already have them cornered. People expecting to melee everything is not the game's fault in any way other than allowing it.

Uh. Have you ever tried to shoot a bow while someone is swinging a sword at you? It's pretty hard. The fact that you can do it in the game is a bug, not a feature. Ranged attacks and spells have vast advantages over melee and the advantage of melee is supposed to be that if you close in, they can't do their stuff because you threaten AoOs. Same with reach weapons. Yeah, there are situations where it's not applicable but it's applicable often enough to be a problem. You aren't always locked from taking 5' steps and you don't usually lose your zone of control if you cover a 50' square by giving up 5'. 5' steps completely **** non-reach melee over.


If the party is splitting up their formation, thats their own fault. If the party is fighting super fast hasted monsters that's the DM's fault, and they shouldn't have made those monsters so strong it was a game ender. The existing high speed/pounce monsters I've evaluated (the MM1 chargers, which were derided as a medieval sahara and kinda shows how narrow that range can be) never have enough damage to one-round the wizard, so cries of "wah they walked past me" kinda fall flat.

What about an NPC Wizard with a Phantom Steed, or any monster with innate casting capable of replicating it?


But weather that's 50% of encounters is less certain. Monsters with "unstoppable" attacks can generally be classified as EIHP (Easy If Handled Properly), with plenty of spells meant to counter them, and regardless of their book space should only be 20% of encounters according to the DMG. Furthermore, these monsters still allow other defenses- petrifying gaze has a low DC that targets the fighter's best save, damage rays are still damage and the fighter (or barb) has the most hit points, incorporeal undead can't one round a fighters str or con (or wis unless they've got like 6), and so on: the whole point is that the EIHP monster hits you with a scary attack, you run, and you come back with the counter. As discussed in other threads, this once again isn't the game's problem, its the DM's problem: most ultra deadly monsters are designed to be escapable simply by not having the ability to unfailingly pursue, and if you build encounters that the PCs can't run away from you've just optimized the encounter against them, no surprise they're screwed.

Whether or not it targets a good save says nothing of the value of the shield. Shield doesn't add to your Fort-save so it's worthless there.


Except AC is also cheapest defense and skipping out on it makes you far more vulnerable than is popular to admit. Unless you're using a significant amount of splat-tier defenses (your Wings of Cover and such), you're still going to want some AC. Or you should, ironically because of Power Attack. Concealment defenses don't stack, but its still cheap and easy for someone with AC to get those defenses in various ways and then survive better than you.

AC isn't cheap. You need to invest close to a 4th of your WBL to keep up with level appropriate monsters. Other types of defenses are flat investment while AC constantly requires more investment to keep up with the ever-increasing AB and even then, you'll never be out of range for the first attacks of equally optimised monsters/NPCs.

[Fizban]

2) Even following those guidelines to the letter, the DM can (and in fact is expected to - DMG 49) make some encounters challenging and even difficult. Furthermore - bad rolls, unlucky criticals, and misapplied tactics happen, even in encounters that the DM had every confidence the players were supposed to conquer or even survive.
Not sure what the point of this is supposed to be. Yeah, some encounters are difficult, and bad luck happens, which means characters can die, and? The PCs are also expected to be able to flee and make preparations, not just w+m1 into everything. People who don't know how to dungeon die in dungeons, weather they actually undershot damage, or can't hold a formation, or refuse to do anything but melee, or. . .


You assume wrongly - it's about normalizing performance due to variances in die rolls and player skill. I have no doubt that sufficient melee damage was possible in 3.0 as well, but the core design needs to shoot slightly above that, because the goal of any commercial game is to attract new players that (a) would lack system mastery going in, and (b) could get easily turned off the entire genre by a string of bad rolls. After all, the DM can always ramp up the challenge themselves if things feel too easy. So buffing the player options is a good thing. And I believe this to be the case, because after playtesting they came back and said "all of these martial classes need more stuff."
I still don't think I'm assuming wrongly- you say that the core design needs to shoot above that, which implies that you think it doesn't meet it already (not just in 3.0 to 3.5, but also in your statement that 3.5 didn't go far enough), while I have no trouble modeling basic parties that do the job just fine, as a party, as intended (though its not like I've tested everything individually). And you're specifically referring to damage again, focusing on one character who is 1/4 of the party, not any of the other things.

I'd agree if you said that the game failed to communicate its combat rules well enough that new players would hit the baseline, as there are plenty of people who know all sorts of char-op builds but don't know the basic PHB rules that you need to learn to play a baseline melee character effectively (or how to function in a party), the sorts of things the designers already had internalized, and the lack of direction on party composition and playstyle left 3.5 wide open to people showing up and playing "wrong" and then wondering why things didn't work.

And you want to normalize performance? What do you think agnostic 1:1 Power Attack does? It normalizes performance, just at level you think is too low- including a reduced delta on anyone who say, doesn't want to use Power Attack (and that's again where I'd ask why you think it's too low, because you must have some reason to believe it). You can normalize either end, and I ask "why did two-handed need more power?" If all melee needed more power and Power Attack was assumed standard, why not make it 2:1 for everyone?

The angle you haven't taken is that they decided THF needed more damage because of shields, which if I was betting on something other than "because str and weapon sizes wah," it would be that. Monster attacks clearly expect a shield progression, THF has no shield, so they boosted PA for two-handers and refunded them their shields with Animated and so on because people whined about characters determined to use a two-handed weapon at all times not having enough AC and not having drastically higher damage. And since they listened to the aggro fiends and just kept printing more and more aggro boosters, THF wins (again, we're all aware that its combos that inflate it).

Normalize power attack returns and even when you can ignore the cost, you're not getting more than other characters would. Same feat, same combo, same benefit.


My posts aren't just for you though, they're to provoke thought in anyone else reading this thread (as discussion forums do.) I'll let them draw their own conclusions based on the evidence we have, that the designers made fairly sweeping and almost universally positive changes to martial class damage potential between 3.0 and 3.5. About the only regretful thing is that they didn't go far enough, but thankfully Pathfinder continued where they left off.
And obviously my posts aren't just for you either, yes I've run out the same line before. Universally improved martial characters? Sure, they normalized them quite a bit by bringing the non-fighter classes closer to the fighter. Phrasing anything in terms of "damage potential?" No- that only leads to people learning the wrong message when 3.5 has far more context than just DPS.

5e sure, they've got the DPS race with monsters right in the DMG and streamlined out anything that would prevent you from making all your attacks every round.



You should never be able to have enough AC to reliably avoid AoOs, which are done at maximum bonus. If you do, the game's math is askew.
There's Mobility, Combat Expertise, and the basic fight/full defense options. You can avoid AoOs as reliably as you avoid any other attack, which if you have a shield is more reliable than a two-hander does.

Uh. Have you ever tried to shoot a bow while someone is swinging a sword at you? It's pretty hard. The fact that you can do it in the game is a bug, not a feature. Ranged attacks and spells have vast advantages over melee and the advantage of melee is supposed to be that if you close in, they can't do their stuff because you threaten AoOs. Same with reach weapons. Yeah, there are situations where it's not applicable but it's applicable often enough to be a problem. You aren't always locked from taking 5' steps and you don't usually lose your zone of control if you cover a 50' square by giving up 5'. 5' steps completely **** non-reach melee over.
How does this support the idea that it's melee's job to suppress ranged fire? Even assuming it is, if you have them cornered you get the AoO, and if you rush them they have to choose between taking a 5' and letting you 5' after them to keep attacking or actually disengaging their ranged butt (or switching to melee). As always, if they're shooting the meatshield then the meatshield is doing their job. At range the meatshield can provide cover to allies, and the party can sync up their 5' steps to allow the back rank to fire unhindered, an imperfect solution but few ranged monsters are threatening enough anyway.


What about an NPC Wizard with a Phantom Steed, or any monster with innate casting capable of replicating it?
What about not cherry picking specific hypotheticals? That sounds more aggressive than I want it to, but still. NPC Wizards aren't a melee threat, who cares if they circle around you? They're a ranged threat, its not melee's job to deal with them (though it is melee's job to pull their ranged weapon and help if they can't close to melee). If they've cast the Phantom Steed for someone else, that's an optimized encounter, buyer beware. Phantom Steed also has hit points you can shoot, and most monsters that could innately cast Phantom Steel already have reasonably quick flight (in the MM you've got what, dragons, naga, and coutals?). So how does Phantom Steed screw the standard party in a standard game again?

Whether or not it targets a good save says nothing of the value of the shield. Shield doesn't add to your Fort-save so it's worthless there.
And? You're acting like the shield is bad because it only helps against most monsters. Once again, false absolutism. You have the shield because AC is important, and things that ignore the shield don't make it less important, unless the DM is throwing so many at you it actually doesn't matter.


AC isn't cheap. You need to invest close to a 4th of your WBL to keep up with level appropriate monsters. Other types of defenses are flat investment while AC constantly requires more investment to keep up with the ever-increasing AB and even then, you'll never be out of range for the first attacks of equally optimised monsters/NPCs.
Uh huh, and what levels, and what items? Do you remember when you just said above that AC should never (your own words) prevent AoOs because they're at full attack bonus? Which is it? Level appropriate AC gear with shield provides around 50% (with significant variation from more like 30-70%) protection against most monsters, which stacks with those "flat" cost other defenses. There's not much cheaper than say, a Shadowy Diadem for 20% miss chance in 3 fights per day at around 5k (maybe Mithrilmist Shirt), and that is indeed cheap enough that you might as well get it. . . and then combine it with actual AC so you get hit even less.

What is this mystical all-powerful AC slaying item people like to go on about? I think its usually the Cloak of Displacement? Yeah that's 24,000gp, half your WBL at 10th for a 20% miss chance. Or you could have +2 armor, shield, and +1 amulet or ring for AC 25, for 12,000, around 1/4. Mithrilmist shirt sticks you in place and has limited uses, Shadowy Diadem doesn't work against devils and has limited uses, blur doesn't work against True Seeing (which starts showing up after 10th, when the "flat" costs stop being so huge), consumable items cost actions (lowering DPS of course), and of course teamwork doesn't count right?

Flat costs are still costs. Claims that AC doesn't matter because two-handed PA is so important are self-contradicting, as anyone who actually tanks their AC is open to more PA damage right through their miss chance, if its even functioning. The actual best source of miss chances is your party spellcasters, which does not impact your WBL, and thus does not impact your AC budget, at all.

[RFLS]

I don't see the necessity at all personally, but he is certainly within his rights to die wherever he wants.

I probably should have included /s or blue.

...does /s cancel out?

[Psyren]

Not sure what the point of this is supposed to be. Yeah, some encounters are difficult, and bad luck happens, which means characters can die, and?

The point is that core options can be buffed, not because they are underpowered as-is, but to minimize/prevent punishing/uninteresting occurrences.



I still don't think I'm assuming wrongly- you say that the core design needs to shoot above that, which implies that you think it doesn't meet it already (not just in 3.0 to 3.5, but also in your statement that 3.5 didn't go far enough), while I have no trouble modeling basic parties that do the job just fine, as a party, as intended (though its not like I've tested everything individually). And you're specifically referring to damage again, focusing on one character who is 1/4 of the party, not any of the other things.

What I'm saying is that the designers felt that 3.0 PA didn't achieve that goal of perfect imbalance. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e31OSVZF77w#t=3m33s) Their buff to it was, by my estimation based on the other changes they made, intended to go in that direction.

You felt this wasn't necessary, that PA was fine as-is, and that's fine, you're more than welcome to think that. I mean, good luck getting anyone else to actually nerf it, but you can certainly talk about it.



I'd agree if you said that the game failed to communicate its combat rules well enough that new players would hit the baseline, as there are plenty of people who know all sorts of char-op builds but don't know the basic PHB rules that you need to learn to play a baseline melee character effectively (or how to function in a party), the sorts of things the designers already had internalized, and the lack of direction on party composition and playstyle left 3.5 wide open to people showing up and playing "wrong" and then wondering why things didn't work.

Please, it's a rules-heavy game. Even now, on this very forum, veterans are finding stuff in core they weren't even aware was there. Chalk that up to poor communication by the rules if you want, but if folks who've been reading core for years can miss things, how much more of a disadvantage would a brand new player be at?



And you want to normalize performance? What do you think agnostic 1:1 Power Attack does?

Check the video I linked above; 1:1 is balanced, but not necessarily desirable in crafting the best play experience for the most people. That kind of thinking is what distinguishes the veteran designers.


Phrasing anything in terms of "damage potential?" No- that only leads to people learning the wrong message when 3.5 has far more context than just DPS.

Again, it does, but also again, DPR is still a valid data point and one I'm going to continue using.

[Fizban]

I mean, good luck getting anyone else to actually nerf it, but you can certainly talk about it.
Convince people to nerf it? Obviously not, no one gives up their favorite toys. But jab them over and over about how if its so important they should be applying it to all weapons? I don't expect to convince anyone because internet, but lets see "them" argue their way out of it. You've told me that I should be buffing the other options, but that's essentially what I'm putting on you: I think PA was fine and wouldn't have buffed it, you think it deserved the buff, but are you willing to give non-THF the same buff? Well presumably you are, since you're a Pathfinderist and Pathfinder did indeed make more PA alternates, but would you go straight 2:1 on everything in 3.5?


Please, it's a rules-heavy game. Even now, on this very forum, veterans are finding stuff in core they weren't even aware was there. Chalk that up to poor communication by the rules if you want, but if folks who've been reading core for years can miss things, how much more of a disadvantage would a brand new player be at?
So we agree? Because that's what I just said. And this very thread is a veteran finding something they were never aware of in core -core revisions.


Check the video I linked above; 1:1 is balanced, but not necessarily desirable in crafting the best play experience for the most people. That kind of thinking is what distinguishes the veteran designers.
Sure, why not. Looks familiar though, lets see if I've seen it.

Hmm, don't think I've seen this specific video, but yeah I did in fact already kow that. Problem is, 2:1 PA isn't a carefully crafted imbalance. Its a unique imbalance that only applies to two-handers, no cycles, just dead stop. DnD already has a "weapon triangle", with upsides and downside -when its not drowned out by other things. Shields have more AC, two-handed weapons have more damage, period*. Sword 'n board vs reach vs raw damage could go around in circles all day, but they don't because raw damage can go high enough that no one cares about shields, and have reach at the same time. That's the whole freaking point of why you'd want to nerf two-handing, there is an underlying cycle that it's walking all over. Failing or in addition to that, you can add things to the other options to make them more distinct, but 3.5 didn't do that, they screwed over what little they had working in the first place -or at least they did once they started spitting out things to combo with the 2:1 PA.

Maybe you'll say it's not about weapons vs each other, its about magic vs melee vs etc? But its not. Because its a team game and no one is playing against each other. They're playing against themselves, and to certain extent mirrors of themselves. If you've got a good cycle of melee options yeah, you can go from people thinking shields are OP to TWF is OP to reach is OP and around, based on their style vs monsters and especially "monsters" that are bascially NPCs using another style. If one fixes the system, melee players could have a more perfect imbalance. But 2:1 Power Attack is held up as so important to melee that its the only option.

Nothing about 2:1 PA for two-handers normalizes anything. It gives one type of weapon vastly more damage potential, which isn't a main value of the game but does allow for greater variance between characters. It doesn't make an interesting tradeoff when the meta is so strong that merely suggesting anything else incites active hostility from some people, when people feel bad for not wanting to use it.


*How about that greatsword with strength and a half? Losing a shield is generally 2-7 points of AC. 1d8->2d6 is 2.5, +1 for str at 1st, starts with +3.5 damage in exchange for that 2 AC, which is itself worth 2 points of attack. With animated shield you're only 2 points behind (until you're zero points behind), for what goes up to say +7.5 per hit, with no rage or tomes. And without the animated shield sure, you don't get a 4:1 return on that effective +2 AB for foes (which would be worth -2 attack if you Combat Expertise'd), the bonus from two-handing doesn't scale that well overall, but its still bonus. A bonus that people wanted even before 2:1 PA and animated shields. 2:1 PA is not needed to differentiate two handed weapons.

[Gnaeus]

I’ve been doing my research, and I have discovered that in historical fights, people armed with 2 weapons won exactly as many fights as they lost against people turned into bears. Curiously, they were also 50/50 in dragon combats. Given the math, anything less than that is very unrealistic.

[emeraldstreak]

I’ve been doing my research, and I have discovered that in historical fights, people armed with 2 weapons won exactly as many fights as they lost against people turned into bears. Curiously, they were also 50/50 in dragon combats. Given the math, anything less than that is very unrealistic.

Historically, people with two weapons (and most of all weapon+shield) pwned people with two-handed weapons for millenia, until the advent of really good armor.

[Eldariel]

There's Mobility, Combat Expertise, and the basic fight/full defense options. You can avoid AoOs as reliably as you avoid any other attack, which if you have a shield is more reliable than a two-hander does.

Combat Expertise and defensive fighting require actually attacking. Thus you can't avoid most AoOs with them since they're about closing in or escaping before closing in to your opponent. Yeah, Mobility exists but spending two feats just to avoid a part of AoOs is a terrible plan unless you plan on taking AoOs all the time (and even then, why?). You should just invest in Tumble instead.


How does this support the idea that it's melee's job to suppress ranged fire? Even assuming it is, if you have them cornered you get the AoO, and if you rush them they have to choose between taking a 5' and letting you 5' after them to keep attacking or actually disengaging their ranged butt (or switching to melee). As always, if they're shooting the meatshield then the meatshield is doing their job. At range the meatshield can provide cover to allies, and the party can sync up their 5' steps to allow the back rank to fire unhindered, an imperfect solution but few ranged monsters are threatening enough anyway.

It's in the inherent balance of the combat styles. Ranged gains range in exchange for being vulnerable in melee. Reach gains reach in exchange for being vulnerable up close. Spells are awesome in exchange for being interruptable (okay, the balance doesn't actually work, but that's the idea). Now medium/small non-reach warriors get shafted for some reason. Reach warriors can't be 5' stepped away from and Tumble can be interrupted. Thus one getting up your grill stops you from using bows/spells without problem. Same with Enlarged/Large/bigger non-reach warriors; 5' step is ineffective against them. However, against non-reach warriors 5' step eliminates the whole balancing part of their combat style (this includes TWF, S&B and THF non-reach). In short, the majority of the combat styles get shafted.


What about not cherry picking specific hypotheticals? That sounds more aggressive than I want it to, but still. NPC Wizards aren't a melee threat, who cares if they circle around you? They're a ranged threat, its not melee's job to deal with them (though it is melee's job to pull their ranged weapon and help if they can't close to melee). If they've cast the Phantom Steed for someone else, that's an optimized encounter, buyer beware. Phantom Steed also has hit points you can shoot, and most monsters that could innately cast Phantom Steel already have reasonably quick flight (in the MM you've got what, dragons, naga, and coutals?). So how does Phantom Steed screw the standard party in a standard game again?

NPC Wizard can take full double move off Phantom Steed, quicken Polymorph into Remorhaz or whatever, eat your squishy, burrow underground and end their turn. How does that not qualify as a melee threat? Dragons are pretty fast too, and gishes can cast Phantom Steed. Outsiders are reasonably fast as a rule and can use Potions of Haste or Boots of Speed to further that angle. It's just the inherent mechanic that's the issue though; it inflates the value of reach ridiculously compared to how the game should function.


And? You're acting like the shield is bad because it only helps against most monsters. Once again, false absolutism. You have the shield because AC is important, and things that ignore the shield don't make it less important, unless the DM is throwing so many at you it actually doesn't matter.

Great, so you have some bonuses that apply occasionally compared to bonuses that apply constantly. How much better do you think the occasional boost should be than the constant boost for them to be equal?


Uh huh, and what levels, and what items? Do you remember when you just said above that AC should never (your own words) prevent AoOs because they're at full attack bonus? Which is it? Level appropriate AC gear with shield provides around 50% (with significant variation from more like 30-70%) protection against most monsters, which stacks with those "flat" cost other defenses. There's not much cheaper than say, a Shadowy Diadem for 20% miss chance in 3 fights per day at around 5k (maybe Mithrilmist Shirt), and that is indeed cheap enough that you might as well get it. . . and then combine it with actual AC so you get hit even less.

Level appropriate AC gear means you lack something else. A fourth of your gold is a lot. It's pretty much the same on all levels. If you overinvest in AC, you pay a lot for minor improvements so you get more or less a fixed rate. Honestly though, beyond getting an armor and maybe a Buckler/Animated Shield and Magic Vestment cast on them, you probably should just invest in utility items if you're not a caster and definitely invest in utility items if you're a caster since you can replicate all the basic bonus types with spells anyways.


What is this mystical all-powerful AC slaying item people like to go on about? I think its usually the Cloak of Displacement? Yeah that's 24,000gp, half your WBL at 10th for a 20% miss chance. Or you could have +2 armor, shield, and +1 amulet or ring for AC 25, for 12,000, around 1/4. Mithrilmist shirt sticks you in place and has limited uses, Shadowy Diadem doesn't work against devils and has limited uses, blur doesn't work against True Seeing (which starts showing up after 10th, when the "flat" costs stop being so huge), consumable items cost actions (lowering DPS of course), and of course teamwork doesn't count right?

Honestly, the best defenses vs. physical attacks are in order:
- Killing the enemy before they can get an attack edgewise
- Disabling the enemy before they can get an attack edgewise
- Stopping the enemy before they can get an attack edgewise
- Immediate action movement or protection
- Mirror Image
- Environment/Fog-based miss chances
- Other illusion-based defenses
- AC

Get enough AC that you don't have to invest meaningfully to it (say, +1 armor and +1 animated shield on high enough level) and invest the rest in consumables, utility items, etc.

[Psyren]

You've told me that I should be buffing the other options, but that's essentially what I'm putting on you: I think PA was fine and wouldn't have buffed it, you think it deserved the buff, but are you willing to give non-THF the same buff? Well presumably you are, since you're a Pathfinderist and Pathfinder did indeed make more PA alternates, but would you go straight 2:1 on everything in 3.5?

1) PF has Piranha Strike and Deadly Aim for the non-THF options.

2) As a matter of fact, I am in favor of buffing TWF actually - at our tables, we collapse the TWF chain down to a single scaling feat, granting all the bonus attacks for free and opening up those feats for other uses. (This also indirectly buffs sword and board, and archery doesn't need a buff in PF.)



So we agree? Because that's what I just said. And this very thread is a veteran finding something they were never aware of in core -core revisions.

You're saying you think they were wrong to buff an option that may have already been sufficient, I'm saying I think they weren't. Not sure how you got "we agree" out of that, it seems clear to me that we don't.



Sure, why not. Looks familiar though, lets see if I've seen it.

Problem is, 2:1 PA isn't a carefully crafted imbalance. Its a unique imbalance that only applies to two-handers, no cycles, just dead stop. DnD already has a "weapon triangle", with upsides and downside -when its not drowned out by other things. Shields have more AC, two-handed weapons have more damage, period*.

It's the first kind actually (metagame imbalance, not cyclical.) A puzzle for newer players to solve, and feel cleverer when they do.

As for people that get hostile when anything else is suggested, that is a problem with those people, not the game.

[Gnaeus]

Historically, people with two weapons (and most of all weapon+shield) pwned people with two-handed weapons for millenia, until the advent of really good armor.

While I agree with you, I don’t think that’s any more relevant than Fizban’s point.

[Yogibear41]

Don't take Power attack, take feats that give you extra attacks for -x to hit(slashing flurry, etc). Take Bastard Sword and Exotic Weapon Master.

Almost all of my character are melee based, and I think I have taken power attack once. Only time I have wished I have had it, is when I am fighting something like an Ooze who I know has an AC of like 3 or something.

To be fair these character have been less than level 10, none of them have been 100% full bab classes, and none of them had something like wraith-strike or shock trooper to ignore the to hit penalty. Usually spend my feats on stuff to give me options other than I attack it with my sword, so when I attack it with my sword isn't an option I actually have something else to do, or spend my feats on defensive stuff so I don't fail a single will or fort save and then be out of the fight completely, I rather miss out on a few points of damage and still be up and fighting than getting knocked down by a sleep or a color spray or something.

[emeraldstreak]

1) PF has Piranha Strike and Deadly Aim for the non-THF options.


And Vital Strike to offer an alternative to THF users.

Again, it's not that 3.5 can't do it, but it does it in very roundabout ways. We could get a sugiin from this book, make it gold/platinum with that book, increase the sizes of the attack with them books, and get comparable results...except in simplicity of execution.