new feat - Improvised Weapon Fighting

[Jarlax]

sailors, rouges and bards are the kind of occupations that see a lot of bar fights, when there isnt a weapon on hand the nearest bar stool will do. For the experianced barfighter there is a new feat.


Improvised Weapon Fighting [GENERAL]
Prerequisite: Base attack bonus +1
Benefit: you are proficient at fighting with any improvised weapons.
Normal: when using an improvised weapon you take a –4 penalty
Special: other general feats cannot affect an improvised weapon, feats like power attack, point blank shot and weapon focus cannot be used with a improvised weapon.

Medium-Size Rock = Mace, Light
Tree Branch/ Stool Leg = Club
Long pipe/ pool stick = Quarterstaff
Pool Darts = Dart
Kitchen knives/ cleavers = Dagger or short sword (depending on length)/ handaxe

sorry about the lack of a table, couldnt get one to copy, paste in from frontpage.

a power attack with a wooden chair would just smash the chair in your hands. and although proficient with a thown bottle you are not familiar enough with the weapon to achive a point blank shot.

comments and questions are much apreciated

[Spuddly]

This is already in the core rulebooks.

[Jarlax]

This is already in the core rulebooks.

what is the feat called? i re-read the feats section of the Players handbook and couldnt find a feat like this.

[idksocrates]

its not in a core rulebook. maybe in a fluff book. even so, a single feat shouldn't give you proficiency with all improvised weapons. Maybe it reduces the penalties to -2.

Then again, improvised weapons aren't as good as the actual weapons. What is the penalty for using an improvised weapon? It breaks on a natural 1?

[SpiderBrigade]

Spuddly, I'm curious what you mean as well. I know the Drunken Master PrC from Complete Warrior gets an ability that does this, but that's neither a feat nor is it strictly speaking "core."

Checking the (admittedly not always 100% reliable) Crystal Keep feat index, I can't find anything like this as a feat.

I'd say the rules described aren't overpowered, although you might want to create a chart of common improvised weapon types, since the RAW are pretty vague about this.

If you allow the use of Complete Warrior in your campaign, I'd think about not using this feat, since it steals a little of the Drunken Master's unique flavor.

[Spuddly]

There's no improvised weapon feat in the 3.0 players handbook?

[Jarlax]

i belive your thinking of teh rule that improvised weapons can be used at a -4 penalty from equiptment section.

i was trying to write the feat without too much text but i think a table of example weapons is definately in order.

as for the drunken master, i have examined that power now i know about it. the major differance bettween this feat and the drunken master is the drunken master is definately more jackie chan style, using the weapon as an extention of their unarmed attack keeping all their other feat to use with it.

i will design this feat more toward the bar fight concept now.

[Spuddly]

Damn, what have I been smoking? ???

[SolusTempus]

Looks nice, so why not expand it. Possibly as fighter bonus feats.

Improved improvised weapon fighting
Prerequisites: Improvised weapon fighting, Base attack bonus +3
Benefit: You do not take penalties for using an improvised weapon, and you can use other feats with an improvised weapon (power attack, point blank shot, ect)

Improvised weapon focus
Prerequisites: Improved Improvised Weapon Fighting
Benefit: You get +1 to attack rolls with a selected improved weapon (Ex: chair or tankard)
Special: You can take this feat more than once, it's effects do not stack.

Improvised Weapon Specialization
Prerequisites: Improvised Weapon Focus
Benefit: You get a +1 to damage with selected improvised weapon.
Special: You may take this feat more than once, it's effects do not stack.

Amusing: I think so.
Usefull: Probably not unless you plan on being in places where normal weapons aren't at hand.

[Jarlax]

Looks nice, so why not expand it. Possibly as fighter bonus feats.

Amusing: I think so.
Usefull: Probably not unless you plan on being in places where normal weapons aren't at hand.

i will definately think about expanding it, but my main goal is to not let it be as good as using a regular weapon because that will lead to PC abuse. it has its place, in situations where PC's are seperated from their weapons or dont have an effective weapon on hand, PC's wont mind swaping from their weapon focused greatsword +2 to a rusty metal pole if the monster is immune to slashing damage.

like the first paragraph describes, i see a lot of rouges and bards using this, a helpful feat for underworld dealings that require people to come unarmed, or for escaping to local prison after a lound night on the town.

[Spuddly]

Well, you can make it so improvised weapons do less damage than real weapons. Treat all similar improvised weapons in a size category as 1 die smaller than they are. So an improvised torch/barstool/2x4 would be a 1d4 weapon rather than a 1d6 club.

Also, have an improvised weapon have a 25% chance of breaking after every chance. A barstool was never made to withstand kncking people around.

An improvised weapon would typically be vastly inferior to one's normal weapon, as it wouldn't be magical.

[SolusTempus]

i will definately think about expanding it, but my main goal is to not let it be as good as using a regular weapon because that will lead to PC abuse. it has its place, in situations where PC's are seperated from their weapons or dont have an effective weapon on hand, PC's wont mind swaping from their weapon focused greatsword +2 to a rusty metal pole if the monster is immune to slashing damage.

like the first paragraph describes, i see a lot of rouges and bards using this, a helpful feat for underworld dealings that require people to come unarmed, or for escaping to local prison after a lound night on the town.

It takes alot of feats to get nearly as good with a rusty metal pole/cat/signpost/whathaveyou as a properly manufactured weapon, and unless you're in a realy freaky campaign you can't get chairs and stuff enchanted. Unless you're doing a commedy campaign there aren't going to be +2 flaming adimantium barstools. Also, I'd make them fighter feets because they're combat skills, and any fighter who maybe spends alot of time in bars looking for contracts or is a bodyguard wanting to not look menacing, or maybe for some reason particularly likes bashing people over the head with whatever is handy out in the woods. An Improv. weapon fighter is going to like beign prepared without looking like it. Improved weapon fighting: because you never know when you're going to need to be prepared.

As for chances to break, It should depend on what you're using. A chair or bottle, yes; a crowbar or metal tankard, not likely.

[Grey Watcher]

As for chances to break, It should depend on what you're using. A chair or bottle, yes; a crowbar or metal tankard, not likely.

Well, even if they don't smash to pieces like a barstool, a tankard (probably not a crowbar, though) could becom become dented, bent, or otherwise warped into such condition that it's useless. And, granted, there's nothing tough enough in the human body to break a crowbar, but if you hit something toughter, like a golem, I can very easily see a crowbar bending.

[DeathQuaker]

IMC, I just count Improvised Weapons as an "Exotic Weapon Proficiency" and leave it at that.

Damage would be 1d3 -1 to 1d6 - 1 in most cases, since they're not designed to do damage; I'd probably determine damage on a case by case basis depending on what the person was wielding.

[Jarlax]

i will try to come up with a way for weapons to break, but i also dont want PC's breaking their Improv quaterstaff after 4 rounds and having to go off and find yet another big stick to replace it in combat.

my rule does not say anything about spells not affecting improv weapons. and i considered it at first but decided to offset the fact you cant use feats on imrpov weapons you should be able to gain damage and to hit bonuses from enchantments. which is why im considering breaking improv weapons, to balance the fact you can cast temporary spells on then, but perminant spell on a weapon that could possibly break would be waste or gold and XP.

[heretic]

Complete Warrior has rules about improvised weapon damage and some extras about like a bonus to bull rush with a table, etc. The damage is based off weight. I think a proficiency feat should grant a -2 penalty rather than a -4 because the things are clearly not meant to be whacking stuff.

Edit: I would probably only let NPCs have it who are involved in repeated bar fights, like bouncers.

[The_Werebear]

I would let everyone have it. In fact, I would probably do something like that and just be a fighter with no weapons who grabed whatever was near for the fun of it.

Jackie Chan style fighting is fun!

[Nikolai_II]

I might allow Improved Unarmed Strike to work for this sort of simple improvised weapons.

[Randomman413]

On the breaking on a natural 1 thing, it might be a bit more realistic to factor in maybe 1D4 damage to the weapon (including its hardness or whatever it is thats like DR on weapons and objects) on every attack. that way, you can't go arond beating people with the glass tankard forever. eventually, it will run out of (what is it? hardness? object hp?) whatever it is, and break. unlike the metal pole, which will take a whoooole lot of use before you smash it over that last head.

just my 2 cp, anyways.

[The_Werebear]

What about having it stand a break chance on miss? And the amount of chances it has is equal to hardness.

So, say you have something with hardness 2, and you swing at someone. You miss them and hit the table beside them. You also fail the save. The item is at 1 hardness now

You swing again, this time, it is deflected off his armor. You roll again, but this time beat the DC, and the item it still at one.

The third time you hit, so there is no need to roll

The fourth swing, you miss and fail the save. The weapon deflects off your opponent's armor and cracks/shatters/disintigrates/explodes. You are now sans weapon.