Precision Attack

[Mr. Wonderful]

Hi all, in our long-lasting 5e campaign I am playing the tank in a party of glass cannons. It's my job to stand in front of the biggest, baddest monster in every encounter and encourage it to feast on my tasty hit points, rather than, say, the sorcerer's.

As a self-respecting Battle Master I took the Precision Attack maneuver. Thing is, I have *never* used it. Not once. In 2+ years of playing the character (we halve experience gain because we like epic campaigns.) Anyway, not once. Nada. Never.

I found that I much prefer Menacing Attack for the extra damage + potential Frightened condition. But I've also used (in descending order) Riposte, Disarming Attack, Evasive Footwork, Parry (though not since 4th level) and Maneuvering Attack. As the party lacks a rogue or other alpha striker I haven't used Commander's Strike, but I can see the benefits. I recently took Rally and I can see that being useful under very specific circumstances.

And that's why I took Precision Attack - because while the circumstances it can be used in are very, very specific, when they come up you want to have it.

What are those circumstances? When your opponent is very close to going down but has some HUGE strike brewing up and your dice betray you. So you are in fear of Dragon's breath. Disintegrate. A spell caster concentrating on Cloudkill or worse. A mindflayer dining on someone's frontal lobe. But I haven't seen any of these yet.

Have you?

[Corran]

Precision is better for dpr fighters. Wont do you much good if you are striking for d8+5, but it's another story if you are hitting for 2d6+15 (GWM) or for d8+15 (sharpshooter). Particularly good for battlemasters who multiclass heavily into rogues (same holds for riposte and sentinel) as well.

[Misterwhisper]

Precision was by far the most used ability I used, but I was not a tank.

Menacing came in a class second.

Adding more to hit when you know you only missed by 1 or 2 is amazing

[Akal Saris]

I'm currently playing a battlemaster 14/barbarian 2 in a long-running game, and I too have never, ever used Precision. I've also never used the maneuver from UA that gives a bonus to init/stealth, though I had 1 occasion where I wanted to use it but was out of maneuvers at the time.

[No brains]

I suppose that if you ever acquire some poison, an arrow of slaying, or some other consumable shot, precision attack is a good way to make it count.

[Dork_Forge]

Precision Attack is most valuable if you're using Great Weapon Master or Sharp Shooter, otherwise the most use it would get is against high AC opponents when you party is struggling to make damage stick. I think the issue is that since you have a party of casters, debuffs and save based damage is probably not an issue or you're just not coming across anything with a particularly high AC.

I do find not using Riposte more a little odd, are you choosing to tank that damage instead to use your dice on offensive maneuvers, or are you just not taking a lot of damage to begin with?

[Yakk]

Precision attack turns a miss into a hit.

If you have worked out enemy AC, whenever you miss by 1 use it. Or even up to 4 or 5.

1d8 damage is small compared to 1d8+8 (+1 longsword dueling style), 3d6+7 (flaming shortsword) or 4d6+15 (flaming greatsword).

The key is that you decide to use it after you roll, so you have a pretty good idea how far off hitting it is.

Riposte is similar; burn a BM die for an extra attack. But it is less efficient, as you cannot nearly guarantee the attack hits like with precision.

Menacing and similar require the target fail a save.

[Deathtongue]

What are those circumstances? When your opponent is very close to going down but has some HUGE strike brewing up and your dice betray you. So you are in fear of Dragon's breath. Disintegrate. A spell caster concentrating on Cloudkill or worse. A mindflayer dining on someone's frontal lobe. But I haven't seen any of these yet.

Have you?It doesn't have to be that dramatic. I've had plenty of instances where my friends or I took out an enemy with, say, a critical-hit Smite or a Fireball and the DM was like 'aw, it only had 3 hp left'. Imagine if, especially in a game like 5E D&D where it's pretty hard to get your hit-rate up to 99-99%, someone had just manage to squeak in that little bit of extra damage before my opponent's turn came up. Imagine if such a thing was consistent. It adds up!

I'm not saying that Precision Attack is the end-all/be-all of Battlemaster Maneuvers. I haven't played with more than 4 levels of Battlemaster, but I blew 80-90% of my Maneuver dice on Menacing Attack and Disarming Attack. If I ever got to play with UA stuff, my 3 maneuvers would be Menacing Attack, Snipe, and Brace. But it's definitely a worthy maneuver that I would recommend to any newbie or veteran BM getting, unlike, say, Goading Attack.

[Chronos]

You never plan to use Precision Attack. Remember, you make the decision to use it or not after you see your d20 roll. If you roll a 17, save the die, because you probably hit anyway. If you roll a 2, don't bother, because the die probably won't be enough to save you. Where you use it is when you would have missed, but but a few points more would have given you a hit. Which should mean about 15% of all attack rolls you make (if by "a few points more" we mean "3": As your superiority die gets larger, that range will expand). This might be a bit iffy on the first round of combat, when you don't know what you need (but should be able to estimate, based on what kind of armor your enemy is wearing, or how thick their scales are, etc.), but if you know that last round you hit with a 14 and missed with an 11, and you rolled a 10 this time, you've got a pretty good idea.

Since you only use it when you need it, a little goes a long way, and you can afford to use it pretty freely when it does come up: It doesn't need to be an absolutely essential do-or-die roll.

[da newt]

How much damage do you do per attack and what is your to hit bonus? As has been mentioned, using Precision whenever you miss by 1-3 (D8), 1-4 (D10), 1-5 (D12) is very beneficial especially if you do significant damage per hit. Of course if you are a spear and shield PAM w/ 3 attacks per action, action surge and a BA every round, what difference does one miss or hit really make - you kill things with tons of paper cuts ...

Also, when you use Menacing you know you'll add the superiority roll to damage, but there is a save for the fear affect and even witha fail, it only lasts one round (which is still great, but not like the spell) ...

[Guy Lombard-O]

It's a little meta-gamey, but I can see using it when you roll an attack against a caster target, and the DM says "He casts Shield". This basically tells you that you were about to hit and that you need something in the range of +1-5 more on the die to land the blow. So it's quite likely a good time to gamble a maneuver die.

Hitting is better than missing. Precision attack changes misses into hits.

[Deathtongue]

Also, when you use Menacing you know you'll add the superiority roll to damage, but there is a save for the fear affect ...And this is where my perspective of only playing BM in the low levels shows. Having a fear option that is usable several times on a short rest at low level rules. It's also probably why I think so highly of Disarming Attack, because a lot of threatening encounters hold something I don't want them to be holding.

I imagine I'd rate Precision Attack more at higher levels, where it'd be quite plausible to be ganking someone for 1d8+1d10+16 damage.

[Joe the Rat]

In general, Precision is good if you know you are in a definitive, gotta hit situation, and the dice hate you.
But this is also why we have Inspiration. If you play with Inspiration, this can sub in for rare must-hit misses. If the dice still hate you... well apparently Fate has something to say.
But like others have pointed out, if you have a hit penalty for high damage, precision is essential. In your case, I'd see about swapping it out if the DM is willing.

It's semi-redundant, but it might be worth swapping in Goading. But I like being able to intersperse "run away, and suck while you are at it" with "I'm the only one you won't suck at targeting". A mechanical incentive to pick you over the squishies.

[Chronos]

Just for the record, fear doesn't mean running away.

[Mr. Wonderful]

Precision Attack is most valuable if you're using Great Weapon Master or Sharp Shooter, otherwise the most use it would get is against high AC opponents when you party is struggling to make damage stick. I think the issue is that since you have a party of casters, debuffs and save based damage is probably not an issue or you're just not coming across anything with a particularly high AC.

I do find not using Riposte more a little odd, are you choosing to tank that damage instead to use your dice on offensive maneuvers, or are you just not taking a lot of damage to begin with?

Riposte allows an attack as a reaction if the attacker misses you with a melee attack.

I have used Parry when the party was at low levels. Nowadays (10th level) the healers keep a careful eye on me as they really like having the tank standing up.

On a related note, Lucky as a feat saved just for crits and important saves works really well for a tank.

[Mr. Wonderful]

Just for the record, fear doesn't mean running away.

No, but it does apply the Frightened condition to the target which means disadvantage on attacks. There is room for interpretation on whether or not that condition applies to just the Battlemaster or the party as a whole*, but a blown Wisdom save can save a whole lot of damage heading the BM's direction.


*if you're aware of errata please let me know

[Dork_Forge]

Riposte allows an attack as a reaction if the attacker misses you with a melee attack.

I have used Parry when the party was at low levels. Nowadays (10th level) the healers keep a careful eye on me as they really like having the tank standing up.

On a related note, Lucky as a feat saved just for crits and important saves works really well for a tank.

My bad, I was thinking about Parry when I wrote that! What do you mean saving Lucky for crits? Do you mean just using it to crit fish?

[prabe]

My bad, I was thinking about Parry when I wrote that! What do you mean saving Lucky for crits? Do you mean just using it to crit fish?

Since he's drawing fire and less-focused on doing damage, I'm guessing he's using Lucky to radically reduce the number of times he's critted--but if I'm wrong I'm willing and eager to be corrected. I'm DMing a rogue/ranger with the feat who has done this at least twice (and he faces probably a good deal fewer attacks than the OP's fighter).

[WaroftheCrans]

No, but it does apply the Frightened condition to the target which means disadvantage on attacks. There is room for interpretation on whether or not that condition applies to just the Battlemaster or the party as a whole*, but a blown Wisdom save can save a whole lot of damage heading the BM's direction.


*if you're aware of errata please let me know

It shouldn't really matter if it's the Battlemaster of the whole party, as it's disadvantage based on you being within line of sight. Who cares if it's against you or not, so long as it can still see you, it has disadvantage.

[Chronos]

A creature who is frightened of you has disadvantage on all of its attack and ability rolls, as long as it can see you. It's not just for rolls targeting you. It's a good condition to impose; I was just pointing out that it does not mean "run away, and suck while doing it", like Joe the Rat suggested.

[Specter]

You could literally use all your dice in Precision Strike every time and it would still be worth it.

[Joe the Rat]

No, but it does apply the Frightened condition to the target which means disadvantage on attacks. There is room for interpretation on whether or not that condition applies to just the Battlemaster or the party as a whole*, but a blown Wisdom save can save a whole lot of damage heading the BM's direction.


*if you're aware of errata please let me know

Yeah, I am a bit guilty of hyperbole. "Come no closer and suck if you can see me" is a bit more specific:
- You can't willingly get closer to the source of the fear
- You have disadvantage on all ability checks and attack rolls while the source of your fear is within line of sight.

But to the room for interpretation:
1. The maneuver specifies the target is frightened of you. The lack of a proper second person plural in English is a weakness, but they are usually good about specifying "additional creatures" in those types of effects.
2. Frightened is a condition - it does not say attacks or ability checks against the source of fear, so it applies to all applicable rolls by the afflicted.

[Mr. Wonderful]

Since he's drawing fire and less-focused on doing damage, I'm guessing he's using Lucky to radically reduce the number of times he's critted--but if I'm wrong I'm willing and eager to be corrected. I'm DMing a rogue/ranger with the feat who has done this at least twice (and he faces probably a good deal fewer attacks than the OP's fighter).

Exactly this. As a pure tank my character is focused entirely on defense. At 10th level he has plate, a +1 shield and defensive fighting style for a base AC of 22 covering fighter HP. Add to that a minor buff or two, like Bless for saves or Shield of Faith for AC and you've got a very durable tank. (Our party is a big believer in Bless during every combat.)

The one vulnerability is bad luck, either in the form of a blown save or a critical hit from the BBEG. Indomitable + Lucky helps a lot, and for saves I'll employ the feats when its likely to be "save or suck" - rarely damage.

If you enjoy picking up a fistful of damage dice this character concept isn't what you're looking for, but I like it a lot. It's kind of fun to watch all the glass cannons wait for you to make your move to stand between them and danger - that's leadership I guess.