OneDND Fighting Styles Proposal

[ZRN]

This is a proposal for the OneDND playtest.

In the previous playtest they released the various PHB fighting styles as a special subclass of feat that the appropriate classes (ranger and presumably fighter and paladin) get to choose from at low levels, but that ALL warrior-group classes (fighter, monk, barbarian) can also choose to take as their first-level feat or as a later feat. (The content of the fighting styles is otherwise unchanged from the 2014 PHB.)

It strikes me, first off, that these are terrible feats. They're boring and mostly not even that good. Rather than broadening your options they serve mostly to restrict you to certain weapon types. And if you're a fighter, come on, which weapon you attack with is one of relatively few choices you get to make round-by-round. Or it should be, except that your level 1 class feature punishes you for using anything other than your primary type of weapon.

When you look at these feats, all except Defense, Protection, and Archery boil down to +x to damage. Archery is frankly a bit overpowered and illogical; why is it easier to hit a guy from 100 feet away with an arrow than it is to hit him with an ax? As for the others, TWF starts out better than Dueling but is worse by level 5ish, while GWF is both worse than Dueling AND more time-consuming.

Proposal: Replace Dueling, Archery, TWF, GWF, and Thrown Weapon Fighting with Fighting Style: Offense, which is a flat +2 damage from weapon attacks. Also get rid of Savage Attacker, which tries to do the same thing but is kind of a trap option. Then, add in a couple other options from other books (like Blind Fighting) or new stuff (a non-OP Tunnel Fighter?) to round out the options.

Any downsides I'm not seeing?

[Gignere]

This is a proposal for the OneDND playtest.

In the previous playtest they released the various PHB fighting styles as a special subclass of feat that the appropriate classes (ranger and presumably fighter and paladin) get to choose from at low levels, but that ALL warrior-group classes (fighter, monk, barbarian) can also choose to take as their first-level feat or as a later feat. (The content of the fighting styles is otherwise unchanged from the 2014 PHB.)

It strikes me, first off, that these are terrible feats. They're boring and mostly not even that good. Rather than broadening your options they serve mostly to restrict you to certain weapon types. And if you're a fighter, come on, which weapon you attack with is one of relatively few choices you get to make round-by-round. Or it should be, except that your level 1 class feature punishes you for using anything other than your primary type of weapon.

When you look at these feats, all except Defense, Protection, and Archery boil down to +x to damage. Archery is frankly a bit overpowered and illogical; why is it easier to hit a guy from 100 feet away with an arrow than it is to hit him with an ax? As for the others, TWF starts out better than Dueling but is worse by level 5ish, while GWF is both worse than Dueling AND more time-consuming.

Proposal: Replace Dueling, Archery, TWF, GWF, and Thrown Weapon Fighting with Fighting Style: Offense, which is a flat +2 damage from weapon attacks. Also get rid of Savage Attacker, which tries to do the same thing but is kind of a trap option. Then, add in a couple other options from other books (like Blind Fighting) or new stuff (a non-OP Tunnel Fighter?) to round out the options.

Any downsides I'm not seeing?

One of your complaints was that the fighting style feats were boring so let’s replace it with something even more boring?

Also they rolled the blindfighting style into another feat in D&Done that’s why it’s not a fighting style feat anymore.

[ZRN]

One of your complaints was that the fighting style feats were boring so let’s replace it with something even more boring?

I'm replacing it with something exactly the same level of boring as Dueling, but which will encourage a more varied (and therefore fun) playstyle because you're not losing out on damage if you, say, shoot a bad guy with an arrow or throw a dagger at him instead of stabbing him with a rapier.

A secondary proposal would be to get rid of the whole concept of "fighting styles" because they are so boring, but if we're stuck with them, they at least should be actively restrictive.


Also they rolled the blindfighting style into another feat in D&Done that’s why it’s not a fighting style feat anymore.

Didn't notice that with blindfighting. Cool!

[animorte]

A secondary proposal would be to get rid of the whole concept of "fighting styles" because they are so boring, but if we're stuck with them, they at least should be actively restrictive.
I like your idea. A couple basic fighting styles, but the Battlemaster Maneuvers should be a martial thing in general, more akin to fighting styles.

[Lalliman]

Rather than broadening your options they serve mostly to restrict you to certain weapon types. And if you're a fighter, come on, which weapon you attack with is one of relatively few choices you get to make round-by-round. Or it should be, except that your level 1 class feature punishes you for using anything other than your primary type of weapon.
I find it odd that you think of fighting styles as limiting choice instead of offering choice. Yes, a character without a fighting style has more options in terms of which weapon they use turn-to-turn than a character with a fighting style. But those choices aren't very meaningful. Aside from the choice between melee and ranged weapons, weapons are so mechanically interchangeable that there's rarely any reason to use one weapon during one battle and a different weapon during the next.

On the other hand, the benefit of fighting styles is that they offer character customization. If you envision your character as favouring a bow (e.g. Legolas), then surely you want the system to mechanically reinforce that. Claiming that they favour a bow doesn't hold any water if they're exactly as capable with a rapier. So the different offensive fighting styles offer options for character customization, and fusing them would take those options away.

That's not to say that the current fighting styles are doing that job very well. They let you specialise in the general styles of weapon wielding (two-handed weapon, weapon and shield, dual-wielding), but I'm more interested in specialising in types of weapons. Not individual weapons, but groups, like swords or axes. So that if you want to play Gimli, his preference for axes can actually be mechanically reinforced, instead of being purely aesthetic. It would also have the benefit of applying to ranged attacks with thrown axes as well, thus offering more turn-to-turn flexibility than e.g. Duelling Style.

[paladinn]

Something even a little more "basic" that the fighting styles.. Tasha's sidekick Warrior class has an option at L1 for a "Martial Role." Either you get a +2 on all attack roles (Attacker) Or you can use your reaction to impose disadvantage on one attack role against someone besides you (Defender).

Are either of those something that could be folded in? +2 to hit is pretty good at L1, and it's before your proficiency bonus (so +4!).

Not exciting, but pretty good at L1.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Personally, I think that the Fighter (especially) should, instead of having to pick a fighting style, get all of them depending on what weapon he's wielding. A STR fighter who picks up a bow can get the compensating accuracy benefit despite not having super-high DEX. A DEX fighter with a greatsword can get <something better than what we have now>. And then they should be built on further.

Other martials can get their choice of one.

But the OneD&D concept of "well, we'll just let you have access to this feat you then need to spend a valuable resource on so you get what you'd get for free in 5e" is just plain stupid.

[Dr.Samurai]

Personally, I think that the Fighter (especially) should, instead of having to pick a fighting style, get all of them depending on what weapon he's wielding. A STR fighter who picks up a bow can get the compensating accuracy benefit despite not having super-high DEX. A DEX fighter with a greatsword can get <something better than what we have now>. And then they should be built on further.

Other martials can get their choice of one.

But the OneD&D concept of "well, we'll just let you have access to this feat you then need to spend a valuable resource on so you get what you'd get for free in 5e" is just plain stupid.
Agreed!

The fighter should have these benefits with any weapon group they pick.

To differentiate from the fighter, I can see the Barbarian having access to a more limited list like unarmed fighting, grappling/shoving, two-handed weapons, and/or versatile weapons.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Agreed!

The fighter should have these benefits with any weapon group they pick.

To differentiate from the fighter, I can see the Barbarian having access to a more limited list like unarmed fighting, grappling/shoving, two-handed weapons, and/or versatile weapons.

Yeah.

Personally, I see the identity of the fighter best as "weapon master". Even beyond any specialization, a fighter should be able to kill you with a teacup. Maybe a little less efficiently than with a flaming greatsword, but to a fighter everything should be a weapon. This also adds possibilities like treating words as a weapon (for social scenarios). Or weaponizing the terrain for exploring.

[Dr.Samurai]

Yeah.

Personally, I see the identity of the fighter best as "weapon master". Even beyond any specialization, a fighter should be able to kill you with a teacup. Maybe a little less efficiently than with a flaming greatsword, but to a fighter everything should be a weapon. This also adds possibilities like treating words as a weapon (for social scenarios). Or weaponizing the terrain for exploring.
Confirmed, Riddick is a fighter...

https://y.yarn.co/3ff83f64-267c-4d54-8a6a-5bd1cf3f0cd8_text.gif

[PhoenixPhyre]

Confirmed, Riddick is a fighter...

https://y.yarn.co/3ff83f64-267c-4d54-8a6a-5bd1cf3f0cd8_text.gif

Sounds about right. An adaptable survivor who can weaponize anything he gets his hands on, mostly through training and experience. Not a hulked-out raging beast (barbarian) or a conduit for primal or divine forces (ranger and paladin), and not so much for sneaky-business as a core MO (although he can sneak if needed).

[Sorinth]

I have a feeling with OneDnD the Monk and Barbarian might get a Fighting Style as part of their base class, and I would expect the FS to be reviewed in more detail once they release the Warrior group stuff. They likely just put the basics there for Ranger but I wouldn't expect it to be "finished". I'm actually quite curious how TWF will work with the Monk, because moving TWF attack into the Attack Action would be amazing on a Monk who can then still attack with MA/FoB as their bonus action.

I don't have a problem with the FS making you specialize with certain weapon types since not everyone is going to want to be a versatile change weapons every round type. That said there's certainly room for making a FS that is made for people who do switch up weapons. And overall I wouldn't complain if FS were boosted a bit to be less static bonuses and actually helped define a playstyle (Replacing certain feats along the way). For Archery specifically I assume the expectation was that firing into melee would often result in the target having half-cover (+2 AC) so the FS was there to sort of counteract that. But they should probably just have the FS ignore half-cover and have SS do something completely different.

[PhoenixPhyre]

For Archery specifically I assume the expectation was that firing into melee would often result in the target having half-cover (+2 AC) so the FS was there to sort of counteract that. But they should probably just have the FS ignore half-cover and have SS do something completely different.

Ignoring cover is monumentally stupid and a core part of why ranged tends to win white-room discussions. It should do something else entirely. And that bullet point of SS should just get axed.

Now if there were baseline rules about potentially hitting allies when shooting into melee and the FS nullified that particular part (ie so instead of options being <miss> - <hit cover> - <hit target> it became just <miss> - <hit>), that might make sense. But +2 accuracy, stacking with everything else? Yeah, no.

[ZRN]

Yeah.

Personally, I see the identity of the fighter best as "weapon master". Even beyond any specialization, a fighter should be able to kill you with a teacup. Maybe a little less efficiently than with a flaming greatsword, but to a fighter everything should be a weapon.

Agreed. And that's kind of what my proposal is doing, minus the extra step of having to figure out which pseudofeat applies to which weapon; you get +2 damage with ANY weapon. OR, you pick another equally useful option. +1 AC is already quite good. Something like the 4e fighter (or 5e cavalier) mark would be another nice option to give you more "stickiness." And so on.

[Sorinth]

Ignoring cover is monumentally stupid and a core part of why ranged tends to win white-room discussions. It should do something else entirely. And that bullet point of SS should just get axed.

Now if there were baseline rules about potentially hitting allies when shooting into melee and the FS nullified that particular part (ie so instead of options being <miss> - <hit cover> - <hit target> it became just <miss> - <hit>), that might make sense. But +2 accuracy, stacking with everything else? Yeah, no.

Like I said it's just my guess as to why it's the way it is. At the end of the day if that was the design intent they should have just done it rather then a flat +2 to hit. Also they shouldn't really care too much about whether something wins white-room discussions.

[Kane0]

I think i'd prefer fighting styles that weren't based on what weapon you used, more how you fight and not so much what you fight with. Blind fighting I thought was a great example of this, and to a lesser extent interception. That sort of thing could be expanded on for other styles like making your reach difficult terrain, or giving you a bonus for attacking from above your target, or bonuses for fighting a single enemy 1v1.

[Witty Username]

Yeah.

Personally, I see the identity of the fighter best as "weapon master". Even beyond any specialization, a fighter should be able to kill you with a teacup. Maybe a little less efficiently than with a flaming greatsword, but to a fighter everything should be a weapon. This also adds possibilities like treating words as a weapon (for social scenarios). Or weaponizing the terrain for exploring.

So, like the wizard of martials?

Just weapons instead of spells.