[3.5] Weapon focus -> specialization -> mastery worth it?

[Flatulous]

Hi all.

I've never played a fighter in 3.5 but am about to.

I'm sorely tempted to take these three feat. weapon focus, weapon specialization and weapon mastery (from PHBII).

For +3 to hit and +4 dmg it seems worth it, especially if I'm often sacrificing BAB for Power Attacks.

Any thoughts?

[Keld Denar]

In general, there are a lot better feats that return much more damage. For example, Power Attack + Leap Attack or anything that grants you extra attacks/round.

That said, if a lot of the more readily available sources are banned by your DM, and you are taking MWM, its not terribly bad. Especially if you can get Weapon Spec for free, such as from taking 3+ levels of Pious Templar.

[Masaioh]

Too many feat slots taken up to make it worth it IMO, but your other options really depend on what the DM allows. I'd recommend Lighten Weapon -> Improved Lighten Weapon. Not sure if it's SRD or homebrew, but it's on Netbook of Feats.

[Weezer]

Its all dependent on the books you have available. If you are only using core you might as well take the feat tree, you dont have that many other options, but if you can use non-core books there are other feats that are much better (leap attack, shock trooper, etc...).

[Stormageddon]

If your DM will allow you to retrain those feats to a different weapon ever now and than. The problem with them as writen is that you get focused on one praticular weapon, but what happens when you happen to find a really awesome weapon but not the type you picked?


Another option is Shock trooper allows you to take away from AC rather than BAB for PA.

[Salt_Crow]

If you take a level of Warblade, then you get the flexibility that may or may not make the feat tree a bit less... sucky.

[Eldariel]

It's not horrible. Weapon Supremacy in particular has some really swell abilities like Take 10 on attacks, "Yes, this iterative does hit" & the nice option of completely savaging things grappling you by not being at all limited in your damage capabilities. That said, it's not worth the 6 feats it costs.

Weapon Mastery is still a decent pick; it's +3/+4 for 3 feats - for ranged warriors and dual wielders, that's so hard to come by that it's worth it. Even two-handers can consider it for extra PA returns (if they somehow end up with extra feats, though that's usually a result of not trying enough). Especially ranged types love it though due to the 20' range increment increase in RWM (can often as much as triple a thrower's increment single-handedly, and increases bow's maximum range considerably).


If you somehow were able to pick up a crapton of feats, they'd be pretty good. They aren't worth the feat cost, but the effect of Weapon Supremacy is pretty useful so yeah, if you find yourself with too many feats (such as if it's only Core + PHBII and you are dead-set on playing a straight Fighter), go ahead.

[T.G. Oskar]

Generally, the slight benefit on attack bonus and damage aren't particularly worth the expenditure of feats and levels. It mostly depends on what are you going to do.

If you intend to be full Fighter (something most people around here usually don't recommend, and at times outright ignore of its existence), then the feats might be worthwhile if you intend NOT to change your weapon (or, if you have some ToB but you don't want to use the classes there, Aptitude weapons). If you're going for Weapon Mastery (either Melee or Ranged), make sure you get the feat that goes right after (Slashing Flurry for slashing weapons, don't remember the other two). Those add a bit more utility to the original Weapon Focus branch. Also, get a locked gauntlet (so that the weapon isn't disarmed), make them adamantine (so they aren't sundered), and attempt to get one of those weapons of enough sizes lower so as to turn them into light weapons (so that you can use them while being grappled). The last sentence usually won't come into play much (if ever), but it's better to be safe than to be sorry.

If you don't intend to be a full Fighter (such as multiclassing, being a Warblade, or entering into a prestige class early), then ignore the entire feat chain. The feats wasted far outweigh the benefits provided (you're getting +3 to attack and +4 to damage by sacrificing three feats, which you might use for stuff like Improved Bull Rush and Shock Trooper (for the famous heavy damage build), or Combat Expertise, EWP: Spiked Chain and Improved Trip (for the basics of the chain-tripper build), or Combat Reflexes, Karmic Strike and/or Robilar's Gambit (for best use of attacks of opportunity). Those three are the usually useful builds, and require roughly the same amount of feats that those you'd need from the Weapon Focus feat chain, and grant a much better benefit (increased damage ratio, limited battlefield control and extra attacks) than extra attack and damage.

The Weapon Focus feat chain is best left when you simply have too much feat slots and you've completed your build, or when you're perfectly sure you'll never change weapons. If you change your weapon (and the newer weapon doesn't have Aptitude), your feats go to waste. MWM is roughly a bit more worthwhile, and with the damage-based feat a tad more, but the four feats can be mostly replaced with maneuvers (to the shame of most fighters).

[Keld Denar]

Crushing Blow is the one for Bludgeoning, and is passing fair. Especially since Bludgeoning weapons are awesome in the fact that they qualify as valid targets for the Greater Mighty Wallop spell. It gives +1 hit and +1 damage on all attacks in a round when you hit. Essentially reduces your 1st iterative to -4 instead of -5, and your 2nd iterative to -8 instead of -10. Best when you can combine it with some form of Haste and/or Flurry of Strikes to get more hits at max BAB to make the lower BAB hits have a higher chance of hitting. Go go gadget Gnome Hook Hammer!

Driving Attack is the piercing one, and it blows. You give up ALL of your attacks to make 1 bull rush attack. If you are gonna take a feat to do that, take Knockback instead, as you can still get a full attack in before you punt your foe into oblivion. Its just...miserable. And it doesn't even make sense for most weapons. I'm thinking its intended for spearlike weapons, but what about Piercing weapons like a Spiked Chain...thats just...wierd.

[Eldariel]

And Slashing Flurry is useful once you have sick enough To Hit bonuses to autohit your first iterative on full PA (well, Shock Trooper helps) anyways. For example, if you're a Really Angry Man.

I got about +50 for a core Barbarian 20's attack bonus while raging, which would definitely still be passable at +45. A bit more work (probably spells) and a +60-+70 To Hit would afford full PA while still prolly hitting with the extra attack.


So yeah, it isn't useful very often. -5 is pretty brutal.

[taltamir]

If your DM will allow you to retrain those feats to a different weapon ever now and than. The problem with them as writen is that you get focused on one praticular weapon, but what happens when you happen to find a really awesome weapon but not the type you picked?


Another option is Shock trooper allows you to take away from AC rather than BAB for PA.

sell it and upgrade your own weapon... most weapons suck anyways, there are only a few "good" weapons... and most magical weapons are made of STEEL! STEEL! steel sucks. exotic materials cost peanuts compared to enhancements...

Anyways, if you wanna do some real damage, you need to be wielding a two handed weapon... of those the real choice is between greatsword and greataxe. The greatsword does more damage on average, but the greataxe x3 means that the crits (although rarer) hurt 50% more than a greatsword crit... (on average, assuming you don't roll low the d12)

two handed means 1.5x str bonus, it means that power attack converts 1 attack to 2 damage instead of 1 to 1.

So you would be selling any other weapon anyways.

[The Glyphstone]

Driving Attack is the piercing one, and it blows. You give up ALL of your attacks to make 1 bull rush attack. If you are gonna take a feat to do that, take Knockback instead, as you can still get a full attack in before you punt your foe into oblivion. Its just...miserable. And it doesn't even make sense for most weapons. I'm thinking its intended for spearlike weapons, but what about Piercing weapons like a Spiked Chain...thats just...wierd.

Not debating the misery of the feat, but I can actually see this working with a Spiked Chain - you just have to imagine it like that awesome picture in...one of the Ebberon books, I think? - the one that actually makes a spiked chain look semi-realistic. A Driving Blow with a Spiked Chain is when you use the chain like a huge spiky metal whip and smack your opponent backwards.

[Keld Denar]

+1. After about level 8, no true melee mutt character worth his salt uses a steel weapon. Get Adamantine or Star Metal preferably Dwarvencrafted for maxmimum resistance to sunderage. If DR is REALLY a problem (MORE POWER ATTACK!!!!!!), get Transmuting, rather than carrying a golf-bag full of inferior weapons.

[ericgrau]

As said, stuff like shock trooper gives massive damage without a major drawback. Feats like that are also better than any of the core feats. So if you're playing with enough books, you just take the feats for your build and for your pre-reqs and ubercharge for crazy damage. But, barring all that powergaming, the fighter tree is well worth it.

[Thurbane]

If you want the opinion of someone who isn't an uber-optimizer, I personally think these feats are fine, especially with all the bonus feats that a Fighter gets.

[Shadowbane]

If you can get Combat Brute, Leap Attack, Shock Trooper and Power Attack, then take those, not the Weapon Focus/Specialization/Mastery chain.

[Keld Denar]

Plus, Weapon Focus is a prereq for like, 4/5 full BAB PrCs out there...you probably have to take it at some point....might as well take full advantage of it!

[Flatulous]

Thanks everyone. Lots of good advice.

[Dienekes]

The general rule of thumb when looking at Fighter options is asking yourself, is this feat worth a level or 2 of the special abilities of other classes? Generally Weapon Focus' +1 to attack is considered, no, not worth it at all.

However, when you're options are limited on what feats you can get there are worse choices out there.

[Flatulous]

One more question. Do you think Power Critical is worth it if you have Improved Critical or a Keen weapon?

[Pharaoh's Fist]

Better to get a Scabbard of Keen Edges.

[Eldariel]

One more question. Do you think Power Critical is worth it if you have Improved Critical or a Keen weapon?

Not really; Power Critical only applies on Confirmations, which really don't need much help to start with (given that you only need a hit to get the Confirmation). Meh; if there were ways to pump Crit Range more, maybe. 15-20/x2 though? Naa.

[ericgrau]

The general rule of thumb when looking at Fighter options is asking yourself, is this feat worth a level or 2 of the special abilities of other classes? Generally Weapon Focus' +1 to attack is considered, no, not worth it at all.

However, when you're options are limited on what feats you can get there are worse choices out there.

You can do far more damage with a fighter with the fighter tree than a ranger with endurance and an animal companion with CR = 1/4 his level. +1 to hit typically means ~7% more damage from more hits. At early levels there are core competitors but at higher levels when you already have a ton of damage nothing in core can beat adding 7% of that damage. But, like I said, the fighter tree just doesn't measure up to the splatbook feats out there when taken in combination. Shadowbane was kind enough to list them.

[RagnaroksChosen]

Technicaly you could get +4 to hit +6 to dmg by i think its 12...

With weapon focus, weapon spec, greater weapon focus, greater weapon spec, melee/ranged weapon mastery.

[Cieyrin]

Better to get a Scabbard of Keen Edges.

The Scabbard is so slow, though, and lasts maybe 1-2 fights, depending on time between encounters. I'd rather have the Keen weapon so I don't have to spend around powering up for a crit that may not happen, anyways.

[9mm]

The first question is what kind of fighter are you planing to play, and for how many levels. In my experience, the numbers don't add up quicly enough or high enough to be worth it over extra combat tricks.

as a fighter you have multiple options:

Gattling gun: load up on archery feats and go to town, pick up splittng as soon as possible to become a one man persion army.

Glass Cannon: most optimizers point this direction with Two handed power attack, with shock trooper, combat brute, ect.

Close Range BattleField controler: This is the hardest one to set up but it works out decently when done right, focus on various combat tricks like tripping, bullrush, and dazing opponents. Focus on keeping people away from the party, and inside the arcanists death fields. See the Gattling Tripper.

Blender: You are a AoO machine, stack up on anything that will grant you AoOs, and as many attacks as possible. See Jack B. Quick.

Avalanche: Trying to stack up as many attacks with tacked on bonuses as you possibly can, Lightning Mace +Aptitude is your friend.

In my experience most Fighters can last till about lv 15 before they MUST either Multiclass or PrC out as you've run out of space to tack on another combat trick through feats (4 feats average)

[ericgrau]

On the matter of the keen enchantment, it usually does much less damage than the other damage enchantments out there. The scabbard as cheaper once you hit high level, but that's a pretty high level. If you're a fighter with a million feats, or even a focused damage dealer from another class, it's best to just take the improved critical feat. Especially if your options are limited to core. Again, if you have splatbooks then splatbook feats trump all.

[Korivan]

Gotta agree with people here. Not only that but for two more feats you can grab greater weapon focus/specialization. Whoo hoo. For a grand total of +2/+4, don't remember with weapon master gives ya. Thats 4 feats devoted to just a little extra attack and damage.

Now if you can somehow grab some extra free feats, sure, grab these if you ran out of everything else. Every plus helps. Other then that, theres just too many other feats that give you more bang for you buck so to speak.

[RagnaroksChosen]

Gotta agree with people here. Not only that but for two more feats you can grab greater weapon focus/specialization. Whoo hoo. For a grand total of +2/+4, don't remember with weapon master gives ya. Thats 4 feats devoted to just a little extra attack and damage.

Now if you can somehow grab some extra free feats, sure, grab these if you ran out of everything else. Every plus helps. Other then that, theres just too many other feats that give you more bang for you buck so to speak.

Mastery gives you +2/+2

So it would be +4/+6

[Akal Saris]

Weapon Mastery is actually pretty solid for an archer or thrown weapons specialist, as they tend to run out of decent feats around 13th level or so, and archers generally need all the damage boosts they can get to compensate for the lack of PA. I also like the simplicity of the feats, so I give them to NPC allies so I don't take forever calculating their attacks.

But for a melee character, there are better options out there.