Path of the Cannonade [Archive] - Giant in the Playground Forums

NotPrior

2020-03-06, 08:26 PM

Path of the Cannonade

I AM ERIGAT OF THE SEVEN HILLS, AND THIS is my weapon. She weighs one hundred fifty pounds and fires two copper piece roughshod flechettes at four rounds per second. It costs two days' wages to fire this weapon for ten seconds.

There is a beauty in destruction and fire which is appreciated by all barbarians. Some few however, see that the true wonder can only be obtained by the mightiest weapons. These barbarians inevitably turn to the Path of the Cannonade, a path of gun-toting semi-insane brutes.
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The Path of the Cannonade is an alternative Barbarian path, to be chosen at 3rd level. It is focused on ranged combat, using three special high-powered weapons.

Cannonade Weapon

When you choose this path at 3rd level you become proficient with Cannonade weapons. You will be able to find a Cannonade weapon shortly afterwards, or otherwise acquire one for free.

At 3rd level you also gain the ability to enter a *Cannonade Rage* instead of a normal rage when you activate your rage. A *Cannonade Rage* is identical to a normal rage with the following exceptions:

While in a Cannonade Rage you may fire ranged weapons at targets within 5 feet without incurring disadvantage.
Your movement speed is reduced by half while in a Cannonade Rage.
While in a Cannonade Rage you may perform a Reckless Attack with ranged weapons, as well as melee weapons.

Improved Cannonade

At 6th level your practice begins to manifest itself as improved skills, the exact nature of which depends on your personal inclinations. You may choose one of the following perks permanently.

**Artillerist:** The range of any cannonade weapon you use is doubled while you are using it.

**Trick Shooter:** Creatures you target with a cannonade weapon recieve a reduced benefit from cover (counting full cover as three-quarters cover, three-quarters cover as half cover, and half cover as no cover at all) so long as
a line can be drawn between you and them without passing through a solid object.

**Manic Attacker:** Once per long rest you may make an additional attack when you make an attack action. If you are above fourth level you instead make two additional attacks. These additional attacks can only be used to fire or reload cannonade weapons. You then immediately recieve one level of exhaustion, and cannot use your action next turn.

Cannonade Specialisation.

At 10th level your proficiency with one of the three types of Cannonade weapon improves. Choose one of the following perks to permanently recieve.

**Rending Fire:** Attacks you make with Fusillade guns recieve a permanent +1 damage modifier.

**Puncturing Fire:** Whenever you hit a creature with a shot from an Impact Cannon that creature's armour class is reduced by one point until such a time as it can be repaired, healed, or replaced. Only creatures with natural armor or worn armor can be affected in this way.

**Rolling Fire:** Shatter Launchers increase the distance listed in their Shatter Blast rule to 20ft while you are using them. You may choose to ignore this rule if you wish.

Masterful Cannonade

At 15th level you have truly mastered using one of the three cannonade weapons. You may choose one of the following perks to permanently recieve.

**Suppression:** When you hit a creature with an attack from a Fusillade Gun you may choose for that attack to not do any damage. Instead the creature you hit must make a wisdom saving throw with a DC of 12. If they fail the save then they become afraid of you until the start of your next turn.

**Impalement:** Before you make an attack against a creature with an Impact Cannon you may choose for that attack to be an impaler shot. Creatures hit by an Impaler shot take increased damage from the attack compared to normal Impact Cannon atacks- Medium and large creatures take twice as much damage as usual, huge creatures take three times as much damage, and gargantuan creatures take four times as much damage. After an Impact Cannon is used to make an Impaler Shot an action must be spent cleaning it in order to remove the horible jam produced by the shot.

**Devastation:** Whenever you kill a creature with a Shatter Launcher every creature within five feet of that creature takes 2d6 slashing damage as they explode into a shower of bone fragments. Creatures killed by this damage also explode in the same way, causing every creature within 5 feet to take 2d6 slashing damage. This process continues until no creatures are killed by exploding creatures, or thirty creatures have been killed by creatures exploding.

Cannonade Weapons
| Name | Damage| Weight | Properties |
|:----:|:-------------|
| Fusillade Gun | 1 piercing |150lb | Cannonade Weapon, Heavy, Fusillade, Two Handed, Ammunition (range 100/400) |
| Impact Cannon | 5d6 piercing |150lb | Cannonade Weapon, Heavy, Complex Reload, Two Handed, Ammunition (range 100/400) |
| Shatter Launcher | 3d6 slashing |150lb | Cannonade Weapon, Shatter Blast, Heavy, Complex Reload, Two Handed, Ammunition (range 100/400)|

**Cannonade Weapon:** This weapon can only be used by someone in a Cannonade Rage. In addition the user's strength modifiers can be applied to attack and damage rolls made with the weapon instead of their dexterity modifiers.

**Complex Reload:** This weapon is difficult to reload. This weapon can be reloaded either as an action, or instead of perfrming an attack.

**Fusillade:** When an attack is made with this weapon and additional attack is also immediately made. The additional attack does not generate further additional attacks. This weapon cannot benefit in any way from the *Sharpshooter* feat.

**Shatter Blast:** When a creature or object is hit with this weapon every creature within 10 feet of it also takes 2d6 slashing damage.

**Intention Notes:**

The Path of the Cannonade is intended as a simple enough barbarian subclass, focused on ranged combat in a suitably barbarian-ish way.

The class is intended for actual play, and to be suitably balanced for that purpose. As the only purpose of the subclasses is ranged combat the primary concern is damage output vs other barbarian subclasses.

Weapon Damage

Under normal circumstances the best damage weapon in the game (barring specific critfishing builds) is the greatsword or maul, a 2d6 two handed heavy melee weapon. The Fusillade Gun and Impact cannon will be compared to these weapons as a result.

The following is a damage analysis assuming maxed strength at each level. Hit rate is not considered, as it is identical. Rage damage bonus is considered for the greatsword/maul, as rage is also required to use the Cannonade Weapons.

Greatsword/Maul
| Level| Damage Per Attack |
|:----:|:-------------|
| 1-3 | 12 (7+3+2) |
| 4-7 | 13 (7+4+2)|
| 8 | 14 (7+5+2)|
| 9-15 | 15 (7+5+3) |
| 16-20 | 16 (7+5+4) |

Fusillade Gun
| Level| Damage Per Attack | Comparison |
|:----:|:---------:|:----:|
| 1-3 | 8 (1+3)*2 | 66% |
| 4-7 | 10 (1+4)*2| 76% |
| 8-9 | 12 (1+5)*2| 86% to 80% |
| 10-15 | 14 (2+5)*2 | 93% |
| 16-20 | 14 (2+5)*2 | 88% |

Impact Cannon
| Level| Damage Per Attack | Comparison |
|:----:|:---------:|:----:|
| 1-3 | 10.25 (17.5+3)/2 | 85% |
| 4-7 | 10.75 (17.5+4)/2| 83% |
| 8-9 | 11.25 (17.5+5)/2| 80% to 75% |
| 10-15 | 11.25 (17.5+5)/2 | 75%|
| 16-20 | 11.25 (17.5+5)/2 | 70% |

Shatter Launcher
The damage per attack of the Shatter Launcher is extremely poor, unless additional creatures are caught in the range of the Shatter Blast. Its damage per attack is similar to the maul when one additional enemy is caught within the blast, and superior when two or more are caught. As D&D is absolutely unbalanced when it comes to AoE abilities in general I do not consider this to be an issue.

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Feature Balance

Improved Cannonade

No Improved Cannonade option significantly impacts damage per attack. Manic Attacker improves burst damage in exchange for long-term detriment. Trick Shooter allows attacks on enemies who are unseen, but who have not taken an action to hide.

Cannonade Specialisation

**Rending Fire** provides a bonus previously incorporated into the damage analysis.

**Puncturing Fire** is intended to compensate for the generally poor damage of the Impact cannon following level 10 with a useful team-wide buff. It is intended that armour damaged by the Impact Cannon can be repaired or regrown over a long rest.

**Rolling Fire** cements the Shatter Launcher as a powerful AoE weapon, but does not improve its single-target abilities.

Masterful Cannonade

Masterful Cannonade, as the subclass' capstone ability, is intended to be on par with other path capstones, the most notorious of which is the immortality of the zealot.

**Suppression** allows you to force an enemy to make up to four DC 11 wisdom saves per turn. This makes each save one third less likely to fail than a save imposed by a caster of this level (DC 18).

**Impalement** is a relatively weak skill of this tier, in order to counteract the more powerful Puncturing Fire, being only really of use against Huge creatures and above. It is however strong in specific situations, and is extremely powerful against paralysed enemies.

**Devastation** is, fittingly, a devastating ability in the right circumstances. Large hordes of weak enemies can be destroyed, and low powered summons can be turned into mobile exlosives.

Fitting Into a World

At first glance fitting some of the weapons listed here may be difficult. I could not presume to know every world, but I believe that the Cannonade Weapons can be fitted into the majority of settings.

The Fusillade Gun, for example, is most easily represented by a gatling gun. Other weapons do exist however. A device similar to the chinese Cho Ku No, the repeating crossbow, could with a little imagination serve as a perfect rapid firing weapon. Settings which have advanced to gunpowder technology but not automatic weapons could possibly make puckle guns, repeating gunpowder weapons of the Napoleonic era. Worlds in the normal D&D cosmology could have experimental gnomish weapons, or treasures of the Giff, the insane gun-toting mercenary hippos.

Acquire Cannnonade

I would recommend making all Cannonade weapons have a base price of around 500 gp, with magic cannonade weapons costing the normal price for a magic item of their tier on top of that. Acquiring a second Cannonade weapon should not be necessary, but may be desired.

I would not recommend allowing the existence of any magical Fusillade Guns with on-hit effects, including +X weapons. Cannonade barbarians will eventually require magical damage like all other martials, and I recommend giving them ammunition which simply does magic damage.