Dragodar
2019-02-22, 03:16 PM
Unearthed Arcana: "Light, Dark, Underdark!" or "Underdark Characters" contains a Fighting Style called Tunnel Fighter which reads as follows:
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You excel at defending narrow passages, doorways, and other tight spaces.
As a bonus action, you can enter a defensive stance that lasts until the start of your next turn.
While in your defensive stance, you can make opportunity attacks without using your reaction, and you can use your reaction to make a melee attack against a creature that moves more than 5 feet while within your reach.
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RaW, this fighting style allows a character to gain a potentially infinite number of Opportunity Attacks so long as enemy creatures continue to provoke them. This becomes particularly problematic when combined with the Polearm Master feat:
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You can keep your enemies at bay with reach weapons. You gain the following benefits:
-When you take the Attack action and attack with only a glaive, halberd, or quarterstaff, you can use a bonus action to make a melee attack with the opposite end of the weapon.
The weapon's damage die for this attack is a d4, and the attack deals bludgeoning damage. This attack uses the same ability modifier as the primary attack.
-While you are wielding a glaive, halberd, pike, or quarterstaff, other creatures provoke an opportunity attack from you when they enter the reach you have with that weapon.
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So given the fact that Polearm Master allows the character to make Opportunity Attacks both when enemies enter AND leave their reach, the character could hypothetically stand next to a congo line of enemies and get TWO Opportunity Attacks against EACH enemy, with no limit on how many attacks can be made per turn. Thus when fighting any large number of melee opponents, the Tunnel Fighter with Polearm Master gets an essentially infinite number of attacks per turn.
Of course, the GM should create encounters that stymie this tactic, whether by using ranged enemies or enemies that are intelligent enough to keep their distance. However, the mere possibility of an infinite number of attacks per turn bothers me, because it is entirely unrealistic.
Therefore I developed the following changes to the Tunnel Fighter fighting style. My intentions included: (1) limiting the number of Opportunity Attacks you can get in one turn to something realistic that also scales with level, and (2) limit the number of Opportunity Attacks you can make against any given foe in one round. Thus we have the revised edition:
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You excel at defending narrow passages, doorways, and other tight spaces. As a bonus action, you can enter a defensive stance that lasts until the start of your next turn.
While in your defensive stance, you can make a number of opportunity attacks up to but not exceeding [your DEX modifier + your Proficiency bonus] without using your Reaction, and you can use your Reaction to make a melee attack against a creature that moves more than 5 feet while within your reach. When taking the free Opportunity Attacks granted by your defensive stance, you may only make one Opportunity Attack per foe per round.
If, after making all the free Opportunity Attacks granted by your defensive stance, you have still not used your Reaction to make a melee attack against a creature that has moved more than 5 feet within your reach, you may use your Reaction to make one final Opportunity Attack, as per the normal rules. This Opportunity Attack that uses your Reaction is a standard Opportunity Attack and does not count as being granted by your defensive stance, thus it can be used against a foe you have already made an Opportunity Attack against in the same round.
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Thoughts, criticisms, suggestions?
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You excel at defending narrow passages, doorways, and other tight spaces.
As a bonus action, you can enter a defensive stance that lasts until the start of your next turn.
While in your defensive stance, you can make opportunity attacks without using your reaction, and you can use your reaction to make a melee attack against a creature that moves more than 5 feet while within your reach.
=
RaW, this fighting style allows a character to gain a potentially infinite number of Opportunity Attacks so long as enemy creatures continue to provoke them. This becomes particularly problematic when combined with the Polearm Master feat:
=
You can keep your enemies at bay with reach weapons. You gain the following benefits:
-When you take the Attack action and attack with only a glaive, halberd, or quarterstaff, you can use a bonus action to make a melee attack with the opposite end of the weapon.
The weapon's damage die for this attack is a d4, and the attack deals bludgeoning damage. This attack uses the same ability modifier as the primary attack.
-While you are wielding a glaive, halberd, pike, or quarterstaff, other creatures provoke an opportunity attack from you when they enter the reach you have with that weapon.
=
So given the fact that Polearm Master allows the character to make Opportunity Attacks both when enemies enter AND leave their reach, the character could hypothetically stand next to a congo line of enemies and get TWO Opportunity Attacks against EACH enemy, with no limit on how many attacks can be made per turn. Thus when fighting any large number of melee opponents, the Tunnel Fighter with Polearm Master gets an essentially infinite number of attacks per turn.
Of course, the GM should create encounters that stymie this tactic, whether by using ranged enemies or enemies that are intelligent enough to keep their distance. However, the mere possibility of an infinite number of attacks per turn bothers me, because it is entirely unrealistic.
Therefore I developed the following changes to the Tunnel Fighter fighting style. My intentions included: (1) limiting the number of Opportunity Attacks you can get in one turn to something realistic that also scales with level, and (2) limit the number of Opportunity Attacks you can make against any given foe in one round. Thus we have the revised edition:
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You excel at defending narrow passages, doorways, and other tight spaces. As a bonus action, you can enter a defensive stance that lasts until the start of your next turn.
While in your defensive stance, you can make a number of opportunity attacks up to but not exceeding [your DEX modifier + your Proficiency bonus] without using your Reaction, and you can use your Reaction to make a melee attack against a creature that moves more than 5 feet while within your reach. When taking the free Opportunity Attacks granted by your defensive stance, you may only make one Opportunity Attack per foe per round.
If, after making all the free Opportunity Attacks granted by your defensive stance, you have still not used your Reaction to make a melee attack against a creature that has moved more than 5 feet within your reach, you may use your Reaction to make one final Opportunity Attack, as per the normal rules. This Opportunity Attack that uses your Reaction is a standard Opportunity Attack and does not count as being granted by your defensive stance, thus it can be used against a foe you have already made an Opportunity Attack against in the same round.
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Thoughts, criticisms, suggestions?