Amechra
2023-11-08, 07:04 PM
What's the Idea Here?
One of the things that bothers me a little bit about D&D is how much it overvalues being able to fight unarmed. Like, there are games where having a concealed weapon that can't be taken away from you really is valuable, but D&D generally isn't that kind of game. As a result, though, there are a bunch of feats and things that graciously give you... a d4 unarmed attack (a d6 if they're feeling generous) in a game where most weapons that people actually use deal 1d8 or more. So, what if we just treated them like any other weapon?
...
If you're proficient in martial weapons, you also have some training in unarmed fighting. You get access to the following "weapons" that you can make unarmed strikes with:
Name
Damage
Properties
Masteries
Swift Stance
d6 bludgeoning
Light
Nick
Hard Stance
d6 bludgeoning
Versatile (d8)
Topple
These "weapons" represent different stances and effective striking techniques. Despite that, they work exactly like any other weapon. You have to have limbs free to "wield" them, spend your object interaction to "draw" them, can buff them with spells and class features, and so on and so forth. It's even possible to find them as magical "weapons", in the form of mystical combat techniques.
Tweaking The Monk
Monks are proficient in both Unarmed (Light) and Unarmed (Hard).
Martial Arts now does the following:
You have access to the Mastery properties for Swift Stance and Hard Stance, as well as one other weapon of your choice.
You may use your Dexterity in place of your Strength for the purposes of unarmed strikes and other non-Heavy weapons that you have Mastered.
Once per turn when you use a weapon's Mastery property, you may roll your Martial Arts die and have the attack deal that much additional damage.
Flurry of Blows now does the following:
You may spend 1 ki to take the Attack action as a bonus action. You may only make unarmed strikes during this Attack action.
...
I'm not sure about how to handle Tavern Brawler, since this is mostly off the cuff. The one bit that I'm a bit proud of is turning the Martial Arts die into bonus damage from on Weapon Masteries — it's the kind of feature I'd expect to see on the Battlemaster or whatever if they had actually rebuilt everything from scratch with Weapon Masteries in mind rather than just kludging them loosely on top of existing options.
One of the things that bothers me a little bit about D&D is how much it overvalues being able to fight unarmed. Like, there are games where having a concealed weapon that can't be taken away from you really is valuable, but D&D generally isn't that kind of game. As a result, though, there are a bunch of feats and things that graciously give you... a d4 unarmed attack (a d6 if they're feeling generous) in a game where most weapons that people actually use deal 1d8 or more. So, what if we just treated them like any other weapon?
...
If you're proficient in martial weapons, you also have some training in unarmed fighting. You get access to the following "weapons" that you can make unarmed strikes with:
Name
Damage
Properties
Masteries
Swift Stance
d6 bludgeoning
Light
Nick
Hard Stance
d6 bludgeoning
Versatile (d8)
Topple
These "weapons" represent different stances and effective striking techniques. Despite that, they work exactly like any other weapon. You have to have limbs free to "wield" them, spend your object interaction to "draw" them, can buff them with spells and class features, and so on and so forth. It's even possible to find them as magical "weapons", in the form of mystical combat techniques.
Tweaking The Monk
Monks are proficient in both Unarmed (Light) and Unarmed (Hard).
Martial Arts now does the following:
You have access to the Mastery properties for Swift Stance and Hard Stance, as well as one other weapon of your choice.
You may use your Dexterity in place of your Strength for the purposes of unarmed strikes and other non-Heavy weapons that you have Mastered.
Once per turn when you use a weapon's Mastery property, you may roll your Martial Arts die and have the attack deal that much additional damage.
Flurry of Blows now does the following:
You may spend 1 ki to take the Attack action as a bonus action. You may only make unarmed strikes during this Attack action.
...
I'm not sure about how to handle Tavern Brawler, since this is mostly off the cuff. The one bit that I'm a bit proud of is turning the Martial Arts die into bonus damage from on Weapon Masteries — it's the kind of feature I'd expect to see on the Battlemaster or whatever if they had actually rebuilt everything from scratch with Weapon Masteries in mind rather than just kludging them loosely on top of existing options.