PEACH: Weapons and Armor Revision

[NRSASD]

So I decided to overhaul the 5E Weapons and Armor tables in the Player's Handbook to give a bit more depth for weapon-centric characters. The idea being that it should incentivize using more than one weapon while avoiding having any "trap" options. It also should be very mechanically simple and easy to use.

With those goals in mind, I decided to implement "resilience" values for armor. This is functionally identical to the Heavy Armor Master feat, with the slight difference being that resilience is inherent in the armor and can be overcome with the new antiarmor property, while Heavy Armor Master remains unaffected. Heavy Armor Master and resilience values do stack.

Additionally, I will be tweaking a fair number of the monsters in the Monster Manual to have resistance against a specific form of damage, but not others; skeletons (piercing), jellies (slashing), and beholders (bludgeoning) being prime examples.

Finally, we don't use the encumbrance system. Thus there are no weight values listed.

With all that being said, and bearing in mind that this system is NOT designed to be mixed with unmodified 5E without the aforementioned tweaks, what do you think? Anything seem exceptionally strong or underpowered? Under or over priced? Thank you in advance for your constructive criticism!

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets...it?usp=sharing

[AdAstra]

Just a few early critiques before a more thorough review Welp nevermind, fell right into that rabbithole. Overall, a commendable goal and interesting concepts.

-The buckler seems kinda pointless except to prevent Dex martials from doing sword-and-board as well with only 8 Str. Considering how low Str high Dex martials in Breastplates and Studded Leather already have -2 AC and worse resilience compared to ones in half or fullplate, I think this might be a bit excessive. -3 AC, on top of a dramatically narrowed weapon selection (two-handed weapons are limited to the Longsword and Q-staff only, making them pretty much objectively worse than sword-and-board since the dueling fighting style exists) makes a low Str frontliner a pretty nonviable option. Maybe that's intended, but it constricts the available concepts by quite a bit. -2 AC seems like more than enough to offset the advantages of Dex.

-The Breastplate and Half-plate only have resistance to slashing for some reason? Like, they're materially and structurally like plate, and if less coverage would negate piercing or bludgeoning resistance, why would it not negate slashing?

-There's no real reason for Str-based characters to use longswords since for them Battleaxes and Warhammers are objectively better. Also not really sure why battleaxes would be antiarmor. Not a problem balance-wise but kinda odd. Overall there's not really any reason to use a longsword unless you're a Dex character that needs a slashing weapon, and a scimitar's basically just as good for that too.

-Many weapons use "dx +1" as a damage value. This doesn't really have much value over just stepping them up a die size, since on average they have the same effect. All this does is reduce the potential variance slightly. Overall it just seems like an unnecessary complication.

-The Yklwa is still basically a better spear, and runs into the issue of a simple weapon being nearly as strong as martial weapons. Not really any reason for it to exist, either, since you can easily refluff a spear into a similar weapon.

-The War Spear, Great Axe, Great Mace and Broadsword don't have any advantage over any other weapons. They're just worse polearms (worse Longswords in the Broadsword's case). The war spear and great mace are even 10 gp more expensive, to add insult to injury. The greataxe is 5 gp more.

Along the same vein, why would the Battleaxe, Mace, and Warhammer be anti-armor, but the Greataxe, Great Mace, and Maul not be? Doesn't make much sense for the larger counterparts of anti-armor weapons to be worse at dealing with armor than the smaller ones.

-Composite weapons are kinda hilariously fragile, far more so than they would be in real life. I would recommend making it either gradual degradation or temporary. Honestly, having weapons susceptible to environmental effects seems unnecessarily annoying, and also not a very good balancing factor.

-This is more of a historical gripe than a gameplay one, but rapiers aren't really anti-armor weapons. They're heftier swords than most give them credit for, but they're far from ideal for armor

-Really, this is a problem that extends to a lot of the list. Rapiers and Battleaxes get to be anti-armor, but Halberds and Lucerne Hammers(!) don't? There's a balancing factor there, since the Polearms are already at the high end of the power curve for weapons, but it seems more than a little ridiculous. Maybe reduce the Anti-Armor Polearms' damage to a d10? That also gives them some more variety than just damage type.

-Even though the Blackjack's save DC is going to be pretty low, it's a devastating effect. Even 2 rounds of not being able to do anything is basically a death sentence in combat. My recommendation for a similar concept would be to have it work like the Sleep spell. Give it a high damage die, and if the total roll is higher than the target's current hitpoints they're knocked unconscious and are stable (thus waking up with 1 hp after 1d4 hours). Otherwise, they either take no damage or a trivial amount.
This makes it stronger for rogues (which I would assume would be the intended users), and more geared toward nonlethal surprise attacks on fairly weak targets. The existing one is better for a character that has lots of attacks, to force the maximum number of saves, and rogues are kinda the opposite of that.

[Bjarkmundur]

You mentioned giving more depth and level the playing field for the weapons. Well giving more depth without increasing complexity is a tricky one, but I think you got a good system going. The best part is the precedent for adding +1 to weapon dice. This means if your players learn through playtesting that one weapon is better than the other, you can just errata a -1 to its weapon dice and call it a day. The same could be done with underrepresented weapons, just give them a +1 boost.

Adding all these various keywords certainly adds depth, so you got that part OK.

I would love a more detailed explanation on your design goals and perceived problems, as well as the steps you took to reach them. Learning how you tackled this problem step-by-step provides a lot if insight that might help others better understand where you are coming from. There are a million-and-one ways to increase the depth and balance of a weapons system, so the more information we have the better we can decide whether this exact overhaul is best suited for your needs or whether additional tweaks should be made.

This falls in line with AdAstra's comment. There needs to be a clear step-by-step on how you layer your weapon statistics, so we don't get all these discrepancies between similar weapons.

I love the slashing resilience added to the mail armors. Very thematically!

[Composer99]

I'm more of a fan of the existing table, but as far as re-works of the weapon and armour table goes, this one does a fine job, I think, of mostly staying in line with the 5e design aesthetic. It's a solid option for folks who want more granularity and crunchiness with their gear, without the problems that, say, the bloated 3.5/PF gear tables possess.

I don't have any in-depth remarks, but two things did jump out at me:

Saving Throw DCs
I don't really see why the saving throw DCs for the blackjack and whip shouldn't be 8 + proficiency bonus + relevant ability modifier. I'm not aware of (or have forgotten) any features that player characters use with DCs that don't follow that pattern.

Parrying Dagger
I'm afraid to say that this weapon's special rule is nonfunctional as written. First of all, "engaged in melee" is not an existing, defined term of art in 5e. What is it meant to be taken to mean? "You are close enough to another creature that either it is within your reach, or you are within its", or perhaps more simply, "You and another creature are within 5 feet of one another"? That leads us to the second problem, which is: what happens when you are "engaged in melee" with more than one creature? Which creature shall be the one against whom you, the wielder of this dagger, adds 1 to your AC, and how do you decide?

I feel like this wording might be cleaner:

At the start of any turn in which you are wielding this weapon, choose a creature you can see. Until your next turn, you gain a +1 bonus to your Armour Class against melee attacks made by the target.

If you want to restrict this to weapon attacks, you could adjust "melee attacks" to "melee weapon attacks". If you want "engaged in melee" to be more restrictive, you could tack on, "as long as it is within 5 feet of you" to the end of the sentence.

[NRSASD]

Just a few early critiques before a more thorough review Welp nevermind, fell right into that rabbithole. Overall, a commendable goal and interesting concepts.

Thank you for the kind words and the thoroughness of your review! Much appreciated

-The buckler seems kinda pointless except to prevent Dex martials from doing sword-and-board as well with only 8 Str. Considering how low Str high Dex martials in Breastplates and Studded Leather already have -2 AC and worse resilience compared to ones in half or fullplate, I think this might be a bit excessive. -3 AC, on top of a dramatically narrowed weapon selection (two-handed weapons are limited to the Longsword and Q-staff only, making them pretty much objectively worse than sword-and-board since the dueling fighting style exists) makes a low Str frontliner a pretty nonviable option. Maybe that's intended, but it constricts the available concepts by quite a bit. -2 AC seems like more than enough to offset the advantages of Dex.

When you put it like that, I completely agree. The buckler is a remnant of an idea I had, but the parrying dagger fills that niche nicely. Scraped.

-The Breastplate and Half-plate only have resistance to slashing for some reason? Like, they're materially and structurally like plate, and if less coverage would negate piercing or bludgeoning resistance, why would it not negate slashing?

Fair enough. I struggled over whether or not the Breastplate should have resilience. What do you think of the armor changes now?

-There's no real reason for Str-based characters to use longswords since for them Battleaxes and Warhammers are objectively better. Also not really sure why battleaxes would be antiarmor. Not a problem balance-wise but kinda odd. Overall there's not really any reason to use a longsword unless you're a Dex character that needs a slashing weapon, and a scimitar's basically just as good for that too.

I want to differentiate battle axes from broadswords, since the broadsword's only virtue is its cheapness (compared to a longsword or a battleaxe). How does it look now?

-Many weapons use "dx +1" as a damage value. This doesn't really have much value over just stepping them up a die size, since on average they have the same effect. All this does is reduce the potential variance slightly. Overall it just seems like an unnecessary complication.

Eh, you're right about the statistical difference. As my players are not super math-inclined on average, I'm hoping this will give them enough to consider it an interesting option. Even though it is very small, it does help flesh out whether your character prefers reliable damage or big hits and misses.

-The Yklwa is still basically a better spear, and runs into the issue of a simple weapon being nearly as strong as martial weapons. Not really any reason for it to exist, either, since you can easily refluff a spear into a similar weapon.

Yeah, I agree. Removing it.

-The War Spear, Great Axe, Great Mace and Broadsword don't have any advantage over any other weapons. They're just worse polearms (worse Longswords in the Broadsword's case). The war spear and great mace are even 10 gp more expensive, to add insult to injury. The greataxe is 5 gp more.

That's what I get for writing in prices at 1am :P. Should be more equitable now.

Along the same vein, why would the Battleaxe, Mace, and Warhammer be anti-armor, but the Greataxe, Great Mace, and Maul not be? Doesn't make much sense for the larger counterparts of anti-armor weapons to be worse at dealing with armor than the smaller ones.

How's this?

-Composite weapons are kinda hilariously fragile, far more so than they would be in real life. I would recommend making it either gradual degradation or temporary. Honestly, having weapons susceptible to environmental effects seems unnecessarily annoying, and also not a very good balancing factor.

Yeah, I concur. Tweaking it. How does it look now?

-This is more of a historical gripe than a gameplay one, but rapiers aren't really anti-armor weapons. They're heftier swords than most give them credit for, but they're far from ideal for armor.

This is what I think of when I think of D&D rapiers; the kind of swords that would be carried by Spanish Tercio blocks. I imagine they were quite decent as anti-armor weapons in the same way stilettos were, by exploiting gaps rather than going through. While I very well could be wrong, I do still want a large-ish anti-armor finesse weapon. If not rapiers, what should that be?

-Really, this is a problem that extends to a lot of the list. Rapiers and Battleaxes get to be anti-armor, but Halberds and Lucerne Hammers(!) don't? There's a balancing factor there, since the Polearms are already at the high end of the power curve for weapons, but it seems more than a little ridiculous. Maybe reduce the Anti-Armor Polearms' damage to a d10? That also gives them some more variety than just damage type.

I've added the "Bulky" property to the list and revised all of the polearms. How do they look now?

-Even though the Blackjack's save DC is going to be pretty low, it's a devastating effect. Even 2 rounds of not being able to do anything is basically a death sentence in combat. My recommendation for a similar concept would be to have it work like the Sleep spell. Give it a high damage die, and if the total roll is higher than the target's current hitpoints they're knocked unconscious and are stable (thus waking up with 1 hp after 1d4 hours). Otherwise, they either take no damage or a trivial amount.
This makes it stronger for rogues (which I would assume would be the intended users), and more geared toward nonlethal surprise attacks on fairly weak targets. The existing one is better for a character that has lots of attacks, to force the maximum number of saves, and rogues are kinda the opposite of that.

I like that idea, especially since it scales with sneak attack, but I do want to give blackjacks the chance to be effective in the hands of a swarm of kobolds. Additionally, the blackjack should disable someone pretty thoroughly only briefly, so that the players have only a couple moments to tie up the guard/move the body/etc. This also restricts its effectiveness to being a weapon only useful on solo guards, since an incapacitated guard will be back upright quickly if they have comrades nearby to protect them. How does it look now?

You mentioned giving more depth and level the playing field for the weapons. Well giving more depth without increasing complexity is a tricky one, but I think you got a good system going. The best part is the precedent for adding +1 to weapon dice. This means if your players learn through playtesting that one weapon is better than the other, you can just errata a -1 to its weapon dice and call it a day. The same could be done with underrepresented weapons, just give them a +1 boost.

Thanks for the kind words! It's something I saw in 2nd AD&D a lot, and while many things from that era don't translate well, I felt like this was a missed opportunity.

Adding all these various keywords certainly adds depth, so you got that part OK.

Thanks!

I would love a more detailed explanation on your design goals and perceived problems, as well as the steps you took to reach them. Learning how you tackled this problem step-by-step provides a lot if insight that might help others better understand where you are coming from. There are a million-and-one ways to increase the depth and balance of a weapons system, so the more information we have the better we can decide whether this exact overhaul is best suited for your needs or whether additional tweaks should be made.

This falls in line with AdAstra's comment. There needs to be a clear step-by-step on how you layer your weapon statistics, so we don't get all these discrepancies between similar weapons.

Long story short, but as a 5E DM I've noticed almost all my players, fighters and sorcerers alike, pick a weapon and stick with it throughout the campaign. There's nothing wrong with that, but I remember back in the days of 2nd AD&D that my fighter frequently carried 4 or 5 weapons on a regular basis. Maybe our DM was cruel, but your primary weapon would be the optimal weapon for the job only 55% of the time. The rest of the time, you wanted to have bludgeoning weapons, throwing weapons, or polearms on hand because getting up close and personal with the beasties was a bad idea.

My Goal: I'm trying to come up with a way that encourages players to carry a variety of weapons, thereby giving weapon-centric characters another avenue to express their personality, in the same way spellcasters express themselves through spell choice.

The biggest perceived problem I've run into deciding what exactly the antiarmor property does. It needs to exist, to differentiate between a spear and a war pick, but how does it counteract the resilience values? Is skipping the resilience values too strong? Does that negate the purpose of weapon damage types?

I love the slashing resilience added to the mail armors. Very thematically!

Thanks! I've always felt this is something D&D has been lacking.

I'm more of a fan of the existing table, but as far as re-works of the weapon and armour table goes, this one does a fine job, I think, of mostly staying in line with the 5e design aesthetic. It's a solid option for folks who want more granularity and crunchiness with their gear, without the problems that, say, the bloated 3.5/PF gear tables possess.

Thanks! I've always recoiled in horror from the concept of weapons having "expanded crit ranges".

Saving Throw DCs
I don't really see why the saving throw DCs for the blackjack and whip shouldn't be 8 + proficiency bonus + relevant ability modifier. I'm not aware of (or have forgotten) any features that player characters use with DCs that don't follow that pattern.

I want these weapon options to be useful, but strictly inferior to class-given abilities. Since some of them grant similar abilities to ones classes already possess, I don't want to outshine those.

Parrying Dagger
I'm afraid to say that this weapon's special rule is nonfunctional as written. First of all, "engaged in melee" is not an existing, defined term of art in 5e. What is it meant to be taken to mean? "You are close enough to another creature that either it is within your reach, or you are within its", or perhaps more simply, "You and another creature are within 5 feet of one another"? That leads us to the second problem, which is: what happens when you are "engaged in melee" with more than one creature? Which creature shall be the one against whom you, the wielder of this dagger, adds 1 to your AC, and how do you decide?

I feel like this wording might be cleaner:

At the start of any turn in which you are wielding this weapon, choose a creature you can see. Until your next turn, you gain a +1 bonus to your Armour Class against melee attacks made by the target.

If you want to restrict this to weapon attacks, you could adjust "melee attacks" to "melee weapon attacks". If you want "engaged in melee" to be more restrictive, you could tack on, "as long as it is within 5 feet of you" to the end of the sentence.

Beautiful! I'm stealing that verbatim if you don't mind.

[AdAstra]

Sorry that these aren't really in any order, and there may be some critiques that I forgot.

-I noticed the buckler's still there. If I were to make a recommendation, it would be to remove it, then either remove the shield's Str requirement or have the parrying dagger give a straight +1 to AC

-The Bulky property is in the weird situation of making absolutely perfect sense and being really annoying to adjudicate. Things like how much space on each side the wielder needs, what actually blocks the polearm, etc. Does an Ancient Red Dragon entirely encompassing your space give disadvantage? What about eight goblins in a 5-foot high room? I just don't see any clear way of determining which areas are good and which impose disadvantage without really complicated wording.

I agree, the rapier is kinda the only finesse anti-armor weapon other than the stiletto, so it probably needs to stay.

-The new Blackjack runs into the problem of having a really punishing save for higher-level rogues. A 19th level rogue with 20 Dex can force a DC 25 Con save, and even if they make it they still take nearly full sneak attack damage since it's only 3 less damage on average than a rapier.

-One big thing I forgot to mention with the costs. Cost is really not a great idea for balancing weapons against each other since they're so much cheaper than armor. I'm pretty sure you could buy the entire arsenal for less than the price of a set of full-plate. 10 gp is almost never going to make a significant difference in people's decision making, and will literally always be worth paying for things like more damage. The Bulky property, as weird as it is, definitely alleviates that though. Polearms become situationally better, occasionally useless. The broadsword though, just ends up as a worse version of an already mediocre weapon (The only real utility of the longsword is doing the job of multiple weapons less well, but most characters will just carry more weapons, like this system is explicitly encouraging players to do)

[Bjarkmundur]

This is what I think of when I think of D&D rapiers; the kind of swords that would be carried by Spanish Tercio blocks. I imagine they were quite decent as anti-armor weapons in the same way stilettos were, by exploiting gaps rather than going through. While I very well could be wrong, I do still want a large-ish anti-armor finesse weapon. If not rapiers, what should that be?

I think it's an arming sword, but for fantasy reason we just call the entire weapon group of 'long pointy swords' rapiers..

My Goal: I'm trying to come up with a way that encourages players to carry a variety of weapons.

Now we're talking!

This sounds more of a monster issue than a player issue. Try this.

Monster Variety
Each monster the players face gain a resistance to weapon damage based off it's highest ability score.

High Constitution: Slashing Resistance.
High Strength: Bludgeoning Resistance.
High Dexterity: Piercing Resistance.

This does not apply if the monster already has one or more of these resistances.

This could be extended to players, but I recommend applying it only to monsters. You could upgrade these to immunities at a certain CR threshold.
Now, suddenly, even with even the simplest of weapon systems, you have a reason to use multiple weapons.

The biggest perceived problem I've run into deciding what exactly the antiarmor property does. It needs to exist.

Does it?

Spoiler: Applied Force

Show

I mean, if you want to go waaayyyy too crunchy you could add a mechanic called 'applied force'.

Full-Plate - Force: 15
Can only be damaged by weapons with a force threshold of 15, and a wielder with at least 15 strength score.

Each armor has a threshold; a resistance to all attacks that don't exert enough force if an attack is under that threshold.
Weapons are only effective against that armor if they can handle that amount of force without breaking.
Attacks with strong enough weapons are only effective if the attacker is strong enough to exert the required amount of force.

Spears have a force threshold of 13.
War Picks have a force threshold of 18.

I don't think it needs to exist, due to how damage is already abstract in 5e. You're better off creating something abstract that FEELS right, not something that reads right. But that's just my opinion.

[NRSASD]

Sorry that these aren't really in any order, and there may be some critiques that I forgot.

-I noticed the buckler's still there. If I were to make a recommendation, it would be to remove it, then either remove the shield's Str requirement or have the parrying dagger give a straight +1 to AC

Oops! Removed. Str requirement for shield dropped. Should I drop the Str requirement for half-plate as well? Maybe all armors?

-The Bulky property is in the weird situation of making absolutely perfect sense and being really annoying to adjudicate. Things like how much space on each side the wielder needs, what actually blocks the polearm, etc. Does an Ancient Red Dragon entirely encompassing your space give disadvantage? What about eight goblins in a 5-foot high room? I just don't see any clear way of determining which areas are good and which impose disadvantage without really complicated wording.

Yeah. Really I just want it to require that you have clearance 5ft above you and 5ft to one side, where "clearance" is defined as empty. No hostile, no allies, nada. Not sure if I should allow tiny creatures to be considered as occupying space for clearance purposes.

-The new Blackjack runs into the problem of having a really punishing save for higher-level rogues. A 19th level rogue with 20 Dex can force a DC 25 Con save, and even if they make it they still take nearly full sneak attack damage since it's only 3 less damage on average than a rapier.

How's it now? I don't mind a lvl 19 rogue absolutely clobbering people if they have surprise, because they should. We just don't want it to be unintentionally viable in direct confrontation. The only way blackjack-ing in direct confrontation should work is with a ton of attacks.

-One big thing I forgot to mention with the costs. Cost is really not a great idea for balancing weapons against each other since they're so much cheaper than armor. I'm pretty sure you could buy the entire arsenal for less than the price of a set of full-plate. 10 gp is almost never going to make a significant difference in people's decision making, and will literally always be worth paying for things like more damage. The Bulky property, as weird as it is, definitely alleviates that though. Polearms become situationally better, occasionally useless. The broadsword though, just ends up as a worse version of an already mediocre weapon (The only real utility of the longsword is doing the job of multiple weapons less well, but most characters will just carry more weapons, like this system is explicitly encouraging players to do)

This is explicitly only true in my campaigns, but wealth is pretty rare. It would be unusual for a 5th level character to be able to afford platemail, and since I have rules for masterwork weapons (+1 to hit, +1 damage at 20x the normal cost), odds are pretty good cost is going to factor into their equations. That said, any other solutions for balancing the weapons?

I think it's an arming sword, but for fantasy reason we just call the entire weapon group of 'long pointy swords' rapiers..

You're probably right haha. I thought arming swords were a bit shorter and fatter than that, (being a fast, one-handed, double edged cutting sword), but I freely admit I'm not up to date on my sword terminology.

Now we're talking!

This sounds more of a monster issue than a player issue. Try this.

Monster Variety
Each monster the players face gain a resistance to weapon damage based off it's highest ability score.

High Constitution: Slashing Resistance.
High Strength: Bludgeoning Resistance.
High Dexterity: Piercing Resistance.

This does not apply if the monster already has one or more of these resistances.

This could be extended to players, but I recommend applying it only to monsters. You could upgrade these to immunities at a certain CR threshold.

Yep! I'm already doing that, as mentioned in the opening post. Less based on stats though, more based on monster design. Piercing weapons and skeletons is a recipe for ineffectual stabbing.

Now, suddenly, even with even the simplest of weapon systems, you have a reason to use multiple weapons.

That weapon system is elegant, simple, flexible, and utterly soulless haha. While I appreciate the quality of its craft, I have to say I'm taking a hard pass on anything that describes a weapon as a platform stacked with templates. I gave 3.5/Pathfinder a huuuuuuuge miss for that specific reason.

Does it?

Spoiler: Applied Force

Show

I mean, if you want to go waaayyyy too crunchy you could add a mechanic called 'applied force'.

Full-Plate - Force: 15
Can only be damaged by weapons with a force threshold of 15, and a wielder with at least 15 strength score.

Each armor has a threshold; a resistance to all attacks that don't exert enough force if an attack is under that threshold.
Weapons are only effective against that armor if they can handle that amount of force without breaking.
Attacks with strong enough weapons are only effective if the attacker is strong enough to exert the required amount of force.

Spears have a force threshold of 13.
War Picks have a force threshold of 18.

I don't think it needs to exist, due to how damage is already abstract in 5e. You're better off creating something abstract that FEELS right, not something that reads right. But that's just my opinion.

Fair point! I do think there needs to be some differentiation, but maybe I'm overthinking it. Ironically, this needs further thought to see if I'm overthinking it :P.

Question for you: Should I strengthen the longsword? How about the broadsword? If so, how?

Thanks you two for all your help! I really feel like this is improving the quality of the table.

[AdAstra]

Oops! Removed. Str requirement for shield dropped. Should I drop the Str requirement for half-plate as well? Maybe all armors?


Yeah. Really I just want it to require that you have clearance 5ft above you and 5ft to one side, where "clearance" is defined as empty. No hostile, no allies, nada. Not sure if I should allow tiny creatures to be considered as occupying space for clearance purposes.



How's it now? I don't mind a lvl 19 rogue absolutely clobbering people if they have surprise, because they should. We just don't want it to be unintentionally viable in direct confrontation. The only way blackjack-ing in direct confrontation should work is with a ton of attacks.



This is explicitly only true in my campaigns, but wealth is pretty rare. It would be unusual for a 5th level character to be able to afford platemail, and since I have rules for masterwork weapons (+1 to hit, +1 damage at 20x the normal cost), odds are pretty good cost is going to factor into their equations. That said, any other solutions for balancing the weapons?



You're probably right haha. I thought arming swords were a bit shorter and fatter than that, (being a fast, one-handed, double edged cutting sword), but I freely admit I'm not up to date on my sword terminology.




Yep! I'm already doing that, as mentioned in the opening post. Less based on stats though, more based on monster design. Piercing weapons and skeletons is a recipe for ineffectual stabbing.



That weapon system is elegant, simple, flexible, and utterly soulless haha. While I appreciate the quality of its craft, I have to say I'm taking a hard pass on anything that describes a weapon as a platform stacked with templates. I gave 3.5/Pathfinder a huuuuuuuge miss for that specific reason.



Fair point! I do think there needs to be some differentiation, but maybe I'm overthinking it. Ironically, this needs further thought to see if I'm overthinking it :P.

Question for you: Should I strengthen the longsword? How about the broadsword? If so, how?

Thanks you two for all your help! I really feel like this is improving the quality of the table.

-I think the Str requirements for heavy armor make decent sense and serve a balancing function (can't use em if you dump Str). As for half-plate... I would definitely say that if you remove the Str req, you should also drop the AC by 1. The extra AC potential and resilience is pretty much the only benefit to Str other than initiating grapples, so you can't erode that too much. I like having Dex be the flexible option that's a little weaker in a straight brawl, so the current armor table works fine for me.

-The new blackjack should be fine I think. I'm just not really a fan of how it's effectively a save-or-be-disabled-long-enough-for-the-party-to-easily-kill-you. Maybe if they take damage again they wake up? That way you can't use it to effectively get two rounds+ of free attacks, and it's restricted more to actual knockouts. Also I just realized that there's no size limit on what you can knock out with it. Kinda seems weird to be able to cold **** a Brontosaurus.

- That might cause issues due to the disparity between armor and weapon prices. If you restrict cash enough that players have to choose between a lucerne hammer and a maul, they definitely will not have enough for a set of splint mail. Since armor progression is necessary for Str characters to keep their AC lead over Dex, you're stuck choosing whether to make your players unable to afford better armor at all, or be able to buy every weapon in the arsenal pretty easily.

-The least-painful-at-player-end way to balance the weapons is to try and balance the actual quantity and quality of traits. The problem is that that's the most painful thing to do as a designer. For example, with the longsword, maybe lean into that versatility? (note: this probably wouldn't be practical for most weapons, but the longsword is a pretty iconic weapon). While wielded two-handed, give it anti-armor and the ability to deal bludgeoning damage, too (to represent half-swording and Mordhau techniques, can give a better explanation if required). That way, you really can use it for everything. It will never excel, but it's the perfect complement to shore up the weaknesses of other weapons without carrying an arsenal on your back.

-For more variety in the table, you could add a "reliable" trait, or some similar name, where you roll the damage die twice and pick the higher result? That boosts the average a bit (slightly less than +1 for 1d6 rolled twice) and makes it very unlikely to roll low.

-The lack of encumbrance is commendable, but it also means your players can literally do just that, kinda making less specialized weapons pointless. This is easily solved however if you enforce a reasonable amount of weaponry that can be carried. Don't even have to use encumbrance, just make sure no one's toting four polearms.

-The Halberd, Maul, Rapier, Whip, and Battleaxe seem slightly on the strong end, especially the Maul, but not significantly so. It won't make much difference pretty sure. I'd be more concerned about some of the weaker options, like the Greataxe being just a worse Maul at half-price. I'm not sure if some of the "cheaper" options actually make all that much sense to be cheaper. Like, why would a broadsword be cheaper than a battleaxe or a warhammer? This is purely a versimillitude issue though, not a balance one.

[NRSASD]

-I think the Str requirements for heavy armor make decent sense and serve a balancing function (can't use em if you dump Str). As for half-plate... I would definitely say that if you remove the Str req, you should also drop the AC by 1. The extra AC potential and resilience is pretty much the only benefit to Str other than initiating grapples, so you can't erode that too much. I like having Dex be the flexible option that's a little weaker in a straight brawl, so the current armor table works fine for me.

Cool. Half-Plate supports that pretty solidly, so yeah. It'll stay as is.

-The new blackjack should be fine I think. I'm just not really a fan of how it's effectively a save-or-be-disabled-long-enough-for-the-party-to-easily-kill-you. Maybe if they take damage again they wake up? That way you can't use it to effectively get two rounds+ of free attacks, and it's restricted more to actual knockouts. Also I just realized that there's no size limit on what you can knock out with it. Kinda seems weird to be able to cold **** a Brontosaurus.

It actually does specify that it only works on humanoids, size large and smaller. My hope is that the save is easy enough (Adv on save, 4+prof+str or dex) that the party will have to swarm a single target to make it viable. If they do that, they're exposing themselves to other opponents.

Disclaimer/Expanded Thoughts: As far as I can tell, solo opponents in 5E D&D are pretty much screwed. Just straight up, because action economy and player characters are so powerful. I ran Curse of Strahd, and against 8 11th characters I threw in 2 fire elementals, a lich, a deathknight, and made Strahd a CR 22, and that was about fair. So the party having to focus their fire to activate the stun on a single target will have the same effect if they focused their fire normally: the target dies in a round or two.

That's my take on it at least.

- That might cause issues due to the disparity between armor and weapon prices. If you restrict cash enough that players have to choose between a lucerne hammer and a maul, they definitely will not have enough for a set of splint mail. Since armor progression is necessary for Str characters to keep their AC lead over Dex, you're stuck choosing whether to make your players unable to afford better armor at all, or be able to buy every weapon in the arsenal pretty easily.

Less that and more they'll have to choose what weapons they want to get masterwork vs heavy armor. I can get a cheaper masterwork weapon and heavier armor, or a nicer masterwork and lighter armor. This is only true til about 6th-7th level. By that point they'll be getting enough magic gear they'll just be rounding out their arsenal with masterworks, at least in theory.

-The least-painful-at-player-end way to balance the weapons is to try and balance the actual quantity and quality of traits. The problem is that that's the most painful thing to do as a designer. For example, with the longsword, maybe lean into that versatility? (note: this probably wouldn't be practical for most weapons, but the longsword is a pretty iconic weapon). While wielded two-handed, give it anti-armor and the ability to deal bludgeoning damage, too (to represent half-swording and Mordhau techniques, can give a better explanation if required). That way, you really can use it for everything. It will never excel, but it's the perfect complement to shore up the weaknesses of other weapons without carrying an arsenal on your back.

Hmmmmm... I wouldn't go so far as to give it anti-armor (for balance reasons; for verisimilitude I totally should), but bludgeoning I could see happening... The only downside is that if we give longswords bludgeoning I'd feel obligated to extend that to Estocs and Greatswords... Which makes them both quite similar.

Note: I decided to up the damage slightly instead.

-For more variety in the table, you could add a "reliable" trait, or some similar name, where you roll the damage die twice and pick the higher result? That boosts the average a bit (slightly less than +1 for 1d6 rolled twice) and makes it very unlikely to roll low.

I like that! I'll give it to the broadsword and up the price slightly. It makes the weapon both quite popular but not super good.

-The lack of encumbrance is commendable, but it also means your players can literally do just that, kinda making less specialized weapons pointless. This is easily solved however if you enforce a reasonable amount of weaponry that can be carried. Don't even have to use encumbrance, just make sure no one's toting four polearms.

Yep, that's why we don't use encumbrance. They agree not to be ridiculous and abuse the system, I don't make them do math :P.

-The Halberd, Maul, Rapier, Whip, and Battleaxe seem slightly on the strong end, especially the Maul, but not significantly so. It won't make much difference pretty sure. I'd be more concerned about some of the weaker options, like the Greataxe being just a worse Maul at half-price. I'm not sure if some of the "cheaper" options actually make all that much sense to be cheaper. Like, why would a broadsword be cheaper than a battleaxe or a warhammer? This is purely a versimillitude issue though, not a balance one.

Yeah, I feel you. Why is a broadsword cheaper than the others? Balance haha. I've revised the Greataxe, Warspear, Longsword, Battleaxe, Broadsword, Trident. Any others seem weaker or out of line?

[AdAstra]

I just now realized the Lance only works when mounted on a Large Beast specifically. That seems a little restrictive. No Wyvern knights or Mammoth chargers? Maybe any Large or larger creature would be better.

The table's looking very good, though I'm not sure if the Longsword has to be 1d8+1. 2d4 is probably sufficient, considering its multiple damage types and finesse, to bring it in line. Either that or give it straight 1d8 with Reliable, but that'll push its average damage higher than the battleaxe.

Now the Trident is even better than the Battleaxe where piercing resilience and resistance don't come into play, while being throwable and cheaper. Straight 2d4 damage should probably also be fine for that one, otherwise it's pretty overtuned.

I will point out that giving the Broadsword Reliable boosts it's damage by slightly more than 1 on average, meaning it'll do more average damage than the Battleaxe. That's not appropriate for a cheap weapon, so I'd either boost the price or reign it back to where it was. Weapons that make sense (thematically and power-wise) to use the Reliable trait are probably the Shortsword (slightly less damage than a scimitar, but more damage types and trends closer to average), and maybe the Lucerne Hammer and/or Pole Axe (changing the damage die to 1d8 for slightly higher, and significantly more reliable average damage overall). Possibly other weapons too, though I'd have to review the list. I'd recommend using a dice probability site like Rumkin or something to get a good idea of Reliable's effect (or I could give a breakdown later) on average damage, though. We'll also have to look very carefully at how it would affect Great Weapon Fighting Style. I'm assuming for now that you first apply GWF to all dice, then choose the highest, but that might be too strong, so I'll check some more later, and it may be best to cut it for now.

The Greatsword hasn't become any stronger to match competing options, and it wasn't a super-strong contender before. The Maul offers armor piercing, while the Great Axe and War Spear give greater damage. Not really sure how to fix it, but right now it's only good for small-sized characters who want a two-handed weapon. Maybe that's the weapon that could have all three damage types, with the maul being restricted to bludgeoning only? I don't want to overstate the problem though, since with GWF 2d6 and 1d12+1 actually average the same. So for characters with that style, the main problem is the Maul being basically the same weapon but with armor piercing. I wouldn't want to reduce the Maul's damage though, so I think greater damage type versatility should be enough to make the Greatsword work (if you make Greatswords capable of all damage types while Mauls stay the same, then Mauls are better against Platemail and Greatswords are better against creatures that are resistant to everything but piercing).

EDIT: I ought to clarify that, despite me constantly tearing it up, your weapon and armor tables have remained very usable from the beginning, getting more so over time, and they'll do well at encouraging the sort of gameplay you and your players want. I don't want my nitpicks to imply that the table requires drastic change, I'm just trying to help tap some elements into a better place.

[Breccia]

Have you considered making Armor Piercing a numeric value, not all/nothing? It could give more flexibility. A light crossbow given 2 or 3 points would penetrate chain, but not plate.

Also, I'd be sorely tempted to have magic and resilience play off each other. Something along the lines of "all magic armor has 1 resil/plus" and "all magic weapons bypass 1 resil/plus". Or maybe simpler, "all AntiArmor and all Resil fails against a magic item of higher plus".

This opens up a lot of options for monsters, too. Be sure to have scaled hides with resil and fangs with AntiArmor!

[NRSASD]

I just now realized the Lance only works when mounted on a Large Beast specifically. That seems a little restrictive. No Wyvern knights or Mammoth chargers? Maybe any Large or larger creature would be better.

Oops! That was my original intent. Fixed!

The table's looking very good, though I'm not sure if the Longsword has to be 1d8+1. 2d4 is probably sufficient, considering its multiple damage types and finesse, to bring it in line. Either that or give it straight 1d8 with Reliable, but that'll push its average damage higher than the battleaxe.

It feels so wrong, making a longsword be 2d4. But you're right, done.

Now the Trident is even better than the Battleaxe where piercing resilience and resistance don't come into play, while being throwable and cheaper. Straight 2d4 damage should probably also be fine for that one, otherwise it's pretty overtuned.

Agreed, fixed!

I will point out that giving the Broadsword Reliable boosts it's damage by slightly more than 1 on average, meaning it'll do more average damage than the Battleaxe. That's not appropriate for a cheap weapon, so I'd either boost the price or reign it back to where it was. Weapons that make sense (thematically and power-wise) to use the Reliable trait are probably the Shortsword (slightly less damage than a scimitar, but more damage types and trends closer to average), and maybe the Lucerne Hammer and/or Pole Axe (changing the damage die to 1d8 for slightly higher, and significantly more reliable average damage overall). Possibly other weapons too, though I'd have to review the list. I'd recommend using a dice probability site like Rumkin or something to get a good idea of Reliable's effect (or I could give a breakdown later) on average damage, though. We'll also have to look very carefully at how it would affect Great Weapon Fighting Style. I'm assuming for now that you first apply GWF to all dice, then choose the highest, but that might be too strong, so I'll check some more later, and it may be best to cut it for now.

How does the broadsword look now? Going for the dependable damage.

The Greatsword hasn't become any stronger to match competing options, and it wasn't a super-strong contender before. The Maul offers armor piercing, while the Great Axe and War Spear give greater damage. Not really sure how to fix it, but right now it's only good for small-sized characters who want a two-handed weapon. Maybe that's the weapon that could have all three damage types, with the maul being restricted to bludgeoning only? I don't want to overstate the problem though, since with GWF 2d6 and 1d12+1 actually average the same. So for characters with that style, the main problem is the Maul being basically the same weapon but with armor piercing. I wouldn't want to reduce the Maul's damage though, so I think greater damage type versatility should be enough to make the Greatsword work (if you make Greatswords capable of all damage types while Mauls stay the same, then Mauls are better against Platemail and Greatswords are better against creatures that are resistant to everything but piercing).

I'm not sure I'm happy with this, as I don't want an all purpose weapon... (since damage type is more important to fighting monsters) but I'm willing to try it. How's the Greatsword now?

EDIT: I ought to clarify that, despite me constantly tearing it up, your weapon and armor tables have remained very usable from the beginning, getting more so over time, and they'll do well at encouraging the sort of gameplay you and your players want. I don't want my nitpicks to imply that the table requires drastic change, I'm just trying to help tap some elements into a better place.

Thanks! I really appreciate your help on this. It's making the table a lot better with each iteration.

Have you considered making Armor Piercing a numeric value, not all/nothing? It could give more flexibility. A light crossbow given 2 or 3 points would penetrate chain, but not plate.

Also, I'd be sorely tempted to have magic and resilience play off each other. Something along the lines of "all magic armor has 1 resil/plus" and "all magic weapons bypass 1 resil/plus". Or maybe simpler, "all AntiArmor and all Resil fails against a magic item of higher plus".

This opens up a lot of options for monsters, too. Be sure to have scaled hides with resil and fangs with AntiArmor!

I'm trying to keep it simple, so I don't want to make the antiarmor property any more complicated than it already is. That said, I am quite curious about how magic should interact with the resilience/antiarmor system. I may adopt that antiarmor/resilience is defeated by higher plus magic... after further thought.

Yep! Lots of monsters have antiarmor properties. They won't have resilience though (except in specific cases), but they will have resistances to a damage type typically

[AdAstra]

This is really looking good!

-The broadsword's probably still too close to Battleaxe damage for comfort. 1d4+2 with Reliable will have only a touch more damage than a Longsword (5.13 vs. 5 respectively), but will also have stupidly low variance. That's probably too reliable, but from an average damage perspective that's a good place. Super reliable damage, oh-so-slightly higher average than a longsword, but not finesse, can't do piercing, and has worse crits.

I would also probably raise the price to something closer to the Battleaxe, since it's no longer really in the space of "dirt-cheap weapon that sacrifices performance for cost", and it never really made a ton of sense from a manufacturing standpoint. Plus for that role there are still weapons like Javelins and Throwing Axes.

-That is one thing I kinda noticed just now. Javelins do more damage than spears do one-handed. It makes sense balance-wise, but it feels like the sorta thing that might raise eyebrows. It's definitely not worth changing numbers around, that's for sure.

-The Greatsword seems like it should work well. It's not the best at anything, but it's capable of doing full damage to everything except Full Plate and stuff resistant to all physical damage. That seems like a good niche to have, especially for characters that really do just want to have one or two weapons.
I'm not really sure what purpose the Heavy property serves here, tbh. I can't see anything broken in allowing small races to use it, especially since it lacks Finesse. It won't be crippling to small characters (especially since they can do just as much damage using versatile weapons in two hands), but it just seems like an unnecessary restriction.

-Liking the Lucerne Hammer! Makes sense, is mechanically sound, though thinking about Reliable more I realized I hadn't considered how it interacts with crits, and that it could probably use less ambiguous wording.
One way of doing it could be "when this weapon deals damage, roll an additional die of the weapon's type, then remove the lowest roll". This would (or at least should, maybe it can be interpreted differently) mean that on a crit, you would roll 3 dice and subtract the lowest. Seems the most convenient way, but you might want other ways of doing it, like having players roll 4 dice and remove the lowest two, in which case another wording would have to be figured out.

[Fnissalot]

I didn't see the buckler before it was removed but at my table, the buckler is: as a reaction when you are attacked, until the start of your turn you have +2 AC against that attacker. It doesn't stack with shields and doesn't need to be donned to use.

It has worked fine as an option to the shield spell, shield, and defensive duelist.

[NRSASD]

This is really looking good!

Thanks! I couldn't have done it without your and everyone else's help!

-The broadsword's probably still too close to Battleaxe damage for comfort. 1d4+2 with Reliable will have only a touch more damage than a Longsword (5.13 vs. 5 respectively), but will also have stupidly low variance. That's probably too reliable, but from an average damage perspective that's a good place. Super reliable damage, oh-so-slightly higher average than a longsword, but not finesse, can't do piercing, and has worse crits.

I would also probably raise the price to something closer to the Battleaxe, since it's no longer really in the space of "dirt-cheap weapon that sacrifices performance for cost", and it never really made a ton of sense from a manufacturing standpoint. Plus for that role there are still weapons like Javelins and Throwing Axes.

So here's a thought, since I've been mulling over whether or not Reliable as written is a little too strong. How about we make it a weaker, one-handed version of Great Weapon Fighting? Instead of just advantage on damage, how about this : If you roll a 1 on your damage die, you may reroll it. You must abide by the second result.

This way it doesn't skew with the averages quite so hard, while thematically doing what one expects: making it harder to fail outright.

I agree, I'll up the price. What do you think of the change to the price or the reworking of Reliable?

-That is one thing I kinda noticed just now. Javelins do more damage than spears do one-handed. It makes sense balance-wise, but it feels like the sorta thing that might raise eyebrows. It's definitely not worth changing numbers around, that's for sure.

Hahaha oops. I think it's good, though I agree, it does raise eyebrows. I'll chalk it up to "Revenge of the Ylkwa" and leave it as is. Maybe I should rename "spear" to "hunting spear" to reinforce the fact that it's a simple weapon?

-The Greatsword seems like it should work well. It's not the best at anything, but it's capable of doing full damage to everything except Full Plate and stuff resistant to all physical damage. That seems like a good niche to have, especially for characters that really do just want to have one or two weapons.
I'm not really sure what purpose the Heavy property serves here, tbh. I can't see anything broken in allowing small races to use it, especially since it lacks Finesse. It won't be crippling to small characters (especially since they can do just as much damage using versatile weapons in two hands), but it just seems like an unnecessary restriction.

Hmmmm... I gotta say, I'm not really a fan of Heavy as a property in general. It just penalizes small characters for no good reason, plus it prevents dwarves from using mauls (which seems wrong). Maybe I should strip it off anything that isn't a polearm or a longbow? I mean, a heavy crossbow is a quintessentially dwarven weapon after all.

-Liking the Lucerne Hammer! Makes sense, is mechanically sound, though thinking about Reliable more I realized I hadn't considered how it interacts with crits, and that it could probably use less ambiguous wording.
One way of doing it could be "when this weapon deals damage, roll an additional die of the weapon's type, then remove the lowest roll". This would (or at least should, maybe it can be interpreted differently) mean that on a crit, you would roll 3 dice and subtract the lowest. Seems the most convenient way, but you might want other ways of doing it, like having players roll 4 dice and remove the lowest two, in which case another wording would have to be figured out.

See my notes above about reworking reliable. I'm thinking if the new version of Reliable works, I'll remove it from the Lucerne hammer and give it either 2d4 or 1d8+1. I'll add reliable to shortsword instead, just to get more use out it.

I didn't see the buckler before it was removed but at my table, the buckler is: as a reaction when you are attacked, until the start of your turn you have +2 AC against that attacker. It doesn't stack with shields and doesn't need to be donned to use.

It has worked fine as an option to the shield spell, shield, and defensive duelist.

That's a really good idea! I think I've done enough damage to the base 5E game for now, but I'll definitely keep that one in my back pocket for further consideration later.

[Zman]

Interesting and fun endeavor. The damage type specific DR definitely captures verisimilitude... but does it come at the cost of being cumbersome? How many time will players forget about the resilience of their armor, or how hard will it be to juggle the damage types and keep them all straight. I am glad to see you are doing all or none with the Resiliency, less granularity, but much easier to manage.

I do have a few concerns and suggestions on my first skim through.

1. Plate- Probably just too good. Not only is its AC better, but now it has amazing Resilience as well. Personally I would have dropped its AC to 17 and let its great resilience make up the difference. I'd probably do the same to Splint mail and give it Bludgeoning resilience too.

2. Light/Medium/Heavy rankings- Why is Half-plate Medium and Chainmail Heavy? Half plate is plate and mail and is essentially chain mail plus armor plates. That seems completely wrong to me.Edited: Disregard, forgot how 5e broke the armors down. Why is Brigadine Heavy and Studded Leather light? They literally refer to the same thing and are definitely not a heavy armor. Edit: Yes, Studded is made-up armor, but the closes armor was probably brigantine which could weight 15ish to 25ish lbs.

3. Immunity to damage- Things like heavy armor grant outright immunity to damage from lowish level threats barring Crits. What if you add an ignore Resilience on Critical hits caveat, that way the Plate fighter is immune to the goblins right up until the moment when one of them jams a dagger through his eye-slits.

4. Weapons- I didn't dig too far into the weapons... but at first glance, do we really want a bludgeoning blow with a Greatsword to do more damage than a Lucern hammer with bludgeoning? Or a Versatile Warhammer? Why do Mauls have Slashing? Might I suggest the Variable trait, essentially an alternative damage type with a reduced damage die ie a Greatsword is Slashing d10+1, Variable(Piercing/Bludgeoning 1d8+1). I see a lot of confusion coming when tryign to figure out what damage type all of these enemies are using and players are using against them. With Variable, unless you roll a smaller die, you know which one it was.


Here is the Weapons and Armor rework I did back when I still ran/played 5e often, you might be able to mine some gems from there. I would definitely look at the Offhand weapon property, bonus action bucklers, and the max dex of Medium armors.

[AdAstra]

-Changes to reliable seem good, though I would not use it for two-handed melee weapons since Great Weapon Fighter renders it redundant. Other than that it should be fine, and a slight enough boost as to be easier to balance. Shortword price also makes sense.

-Removing Heavy from most stuff seems like a good idea, though I will point out Dwarves are medium and thus can still use them.

Also, I feel I could answer at least a couple of Zman's questions

-For half-plate, its classification is no different than in the base game. I'm also not sure how you got the impression that it's metal plates on chain. If anything, half-plate's description corresponds far more to things like Lorica Segmentata and the concept of Munition Armor (mass produced plate with less coverage such as to not require custom-fitting). I think a good deal of this is assuming that similar structural elements will inherently give the same level of protection, when that's clearly not true (thicker and thinner plates, denser chain, greater coverage).

-Brigandine's the same, except in this case studded leather isn't even a real type of armor, and again, already a has a set place on the table that would likely cause confusion if changed. Plus, a brigandine consists of plates riveted to cloth, while Studded Leather uses, well, specifically leather, with what are essentially rivets as the primary metal element.

-Some types of mauls have an axe-like blade at one end. That's more associated with modern mauls though, so I agree there's not really a reason why it should other than balance, which is also questionable since the Maul is the most powerful anti-armor weapon. I don't think it really needs changing, but I also don't think the weapon would suffer much for it.

[Zman]

Also, I feel I could answer at least a couple of Zman's questions

-For half-plate, its classification is no different than in the base game. I'm also not sure how you got the impression that it's metal plates on chain. If anything, half-plate's description corresponds far more to things like Lorica Segmentata and the concept of Munition Armor (mass produced plate with less coverage such as to not require custom-fitting). I think a good deal of this is assuming that similar structural elements will inherently give the same level of protection, when that's clearly not true (thicker and thinner plates, denser chain, greater coverage).

-Brigandine's the same, except in this case studded leather isn't even a real type of armor, and again, already a has a set place on the table that would likely cause confusion if changed. Plus, a brigandine consists of plates riveted to cloth, while Studded Leather uses, well, specifically leather, with what are essentially rivets as the primary metal element.

-Some types of mauls have an axe-like blade at one end. That's more associated with modern mauls though, so I agree there's not really a reason why it should other than balance, which is also questionable since the Maul is the most powerful anti-armor weapon. I don't think it really needs changing, but I also don't think the weapon would suffer much for it.

I forgot how 5e broke the armors down. I'm assuming something similar to Munition arm or a plate and mail mix to fit the bill. I'll argue it's quite heavy and probably should fit the heavy category. I know studded leather is make believe, but arguing that brigantine should be heavy when munition plate is not doesn't sit well with me. It is obvious you know more about armor technology than I do, and I realize I mistakenly remembered what 5e was treating Half Plate like. But, I still don't like brigantine armor's placement as heavy.

I know that modern woodsplitting mauls have a bladed end and that bladed end is less sharp and still would fit the idea of bludgeoning over slashing. I find it very hard to swallow using a modern woodsplitting maul as inspiration for a fantasy maul.

[NRSASD]

Interesting and fun endeavor. The damage type specific DR definitely captures verisimilitude... but does it come at the cost of being cumbersome? How many time will players forget about the resilience of their armor, or how hard will it be to juggle the damage types and keep them all straight. I am glad to see you are doing all or none with the Resiliency, less granularity, but much easier to manage.

Thanks! I don't think it will be too difficult to track, because I already encourage my players to announce their damage type when they roll damage. I've been sneaking in resistant monsters for a while now, so they're used to it.

Yeah, granularity is something I'm more than happy to sacrifice on the altar of ease-of-use. I know that neither I, nor anyone alive today, knows enough about actual, genuine medieval combat to be capable of simulating it accurately with a supercomputer, much less with pen and paper. Knowing that, I'm happy to look at it and go "eh, close enough" and call it a day. That said, I think 5E could have done a better job; hence this forum thread.

1. Plate- Probably just too good. Not only is its AC better, but now it has amazing Resilience as well. Personally I would have dropped its AC to 17 and let its great resilience make up the difference. I'd probably do the same to Splint mail and give it Bludgeoning resilience too.

See my response to #3. Based on my tweaks and rationale explained there, I'm happy leaving it as is for now at least.

2. Light/Medium/Heavy rankings- Why is Half-plate Medium and Chainmail Heavy? Half plate is plate and mail and is essentially chain mail plus armor plates. That seems completely wrong to me.Edited: Disregard, forgot how 5e broke the armors down. Why is Brigandine Heavy and Studded Leather light? They literally refer to the same thing and are definitely not a heavy armor. Edit: Yes, Studded is made-up armor, but the closes armor was probably brigantine which could weight 15ish to 25ish lbs.

Long story short, Studded Leather and Brigandine are different things and do different things. Studded leather is (in D&D) the armor of choice for the speedy lightweights of the fighting world. Brigandine is a cheap but effective attempt at plate armor. I've got more to say on the subject, but I'll do so below.

3. Immunity to damage- Things like heavy armor grant outright immunity to damage from lowish level threats barring Crits. What if you add an ignore Resilience on Critical hits caveat, that way the Plate fighter is immune to the goblins right up until the moment when one of them jams a dagger through his eye-slits.

I just realized that I didn't add in that resilience doesn't negate all damage, just reduces it to a minimum of 1. This is important because this allows things like poison to still come off and have an effect. Regarding crits, the raw damage in basically any case is going to overcome the resilience. A crit with a spear does an average of 7 damage, which overwhelms the resilience of even plate. I don't think crits need to skip resilience as well.

From a verisimilitude point of view, this works. Throughout history, small units of heavily armored fighters have been able to defeat many times their number in unarmored combatants. I'm not talking just the Romans versus all their neighbors, but any time police or guard forces stop riots.
With 5E as written, a knight in platemail still has a lot to fear from even a small band of goblins due to how critically important action economy is in 5E. If they can secure advantage, he'll be dead quickly; plate mail or no. Resilience hopefully can counter that inherent advantage, forcing the swarm of enemies to do more interesting things like throw alchemist's fire, blackjack the knight, deploy traps, or use poisoned or antiarmor weapons.

4. Weapons- I didn't dig too far into the weapons... but at first glance, do we really want a bludgeoning blow with a Greatsword to do more damage than a Lucern hammer with bludgeoning? Or a Versatile Warhammer? Why do Mauls have Slashing? Might I suggest the Variable trait, essentially an alternative damage type with a reduced damage die ie a Greatsword is Slashing d10+1, Variable(Piercing/Bludgeoning 1d8+1). I see a lot of confusion coming when tryign to figure out what damage type all of these enemies are using and players are using against them. With Variable, unless you roll a smaller die, you know which one it was.

I've been mulling it over all day, but I think I like that. I'll introduce the "half-swording" trait, which makes a weapon two-handed, reduces the damage die, but makes it bludgeoning damage. What do you guys think?

Here is the Weapons and Armor rework I did back when I still ran/played 5e often, you might be able to mine some gems from there. I would definitely look at the Offhand weapon property, bonus action bucklers, and the max dex of Medium armors.

How very odd. I thought the Light property was the Offhand property, but looking at the Player's Handbook I see it is not. Welp, I like it. Adding Offhanded. Mind if I steal the wording verbatim?
Bucklers I don't see how to add well, so I'm holding off on that for now. That may change, and thanks for the suggestions!
Max Dex of medium armors seems like a small detail, but that kinda messes with the whole concept of what a medium armor is and plays merry hell with the Medium Armor Master feat. I'll leave it as is for now.

As a complete aside, what systems do you play nowadays?

-Changes to reliable seem good, though I would not use it for two-handed melee weapons since Great Weapon Fighter renders it redundant. Other than that it should be fine, and a slight enough boost as to be easier to balance. Shortword price also makes sense.

Excellent. Yes, I'm stripping Reliable from the Lucerne hammer and making it 1d8+1. As a complete aside, are you a personal fan of Lucerne hammers? You've given them quite a lot of love : )

-Removing Heavy from most stuff seems like a good idea, though I will point out Dwarves are medium and thus can still use them.

Are they? Huh. Ah well, we're in agreement on this.

-Some types of mauls have an axe-like blade at one end. That's more associated with modern mauls though, so I agree there's not really a reason why it should other than balance, which is also questionable since the Maul is the most powerful anti-armor weapon. I don't think it really needs changing, but I also don't think the weapon would suffer much for it.

Huh, cool! I didn't know that the definition of maul changed throughout the eras. Learn something new every day.

I forgot how 5e broke the armors down. I'm assuming something similar to Munition arm or a plate and mail mix to fit the bill. I'll argue it's quite heavy and probably should fit the heavy category. I know studded leather is make believe, but arguing that brigantine should be heavy when munition plate is not doesn't sit well with me. It is obvious you know more about armor technology than I do, and I realize I mistakenly remembered what 5e was treating Half Plate like. But, I still don't like brigantine armor's placement as heavy.

Yeah, it's always bothered me that half-plate isn't heavy too. What do you guys think of making the armor hierarchy go lamellar-brigandine-breastplate for medium armor, and splint-halfplate-plate for heavy? Would that be too disruptive to my players (only one of whom has specced into medium armor before)? The stats for said armors would only be tweaked slightly to reflect their new places in the hierarchy, more of a name swap.

I know that modern woodsplitting mauls have a bladed end and that bladed end is less sharp and still would fit the idea of bludgeoning over slashing. I find it very hard to swallow using a modern woodsplitting maul as inspiration for a fantasy maul.

Clearly you haven't sharpened your maul enough :). Real talk though, a wood splitting maul gets into the same tricky area as a modern bullet. It would appear to be one kind of damage, but the forces involved are such that it really functions as bludgeoning. In this case, the fact that it has a blade and presumably cuts things with it (ie it's not a sledgehammer and inflicts different injuries than a sledgehammer would) is enough to keep it as slashing, at least in my book. I see your point and respectfully disagree for the sake of player options.

Question for the Masses:I'm a bit unhappy with comparing poleaxes to halberds. Should I delete poleaxe, strip the antiarmor property from halberds, or boost both lucerne hammers and poleaxes to be on halberd's level?
Update: I'm currently favoring Lucerne Hammer being 2d4+1, Poleaxe being 1d10+1, and Halberd being 1d12. Thoughts?

[Zman]

Thanks! I don't think it will be too difficult to track, because I already encourage my players to announce their damage type when they roll damage. I've been sneaking in resistant monsters for a while now, so they're used to it.

I felt it was a concern worth keeping in mind even if it isn't currently a problem. Glad you've been implementing it as a concept successfully so far.

Yeah, granularity is something I'm more than happy to sacrifice on the altar of ease-of-use. I know that neither I, nor anyone alive today, knows enough about actual, genuine medieval combat to be capable of simulating it accurately with a supercomputer, much less with pen and paper. Knowing that, I'm happy to look at it and go "eh, close enough" and call it a day. That said, I think 5E could have done a better job; hence this forum thread.

Granularity is good, amazing actually, but not when it becomes cumbersome. I wish we did know more about historical medieval combat, it'd make our lives so much easier with our make believe.

See my response to #3. Based on my tweaks and rationale explained there, I'm happy leaving it as is for now at least.

Long story short, Studded Leather and Brigandine are different things and do different things. Studded leather is (in D&D) the armor of choice for the speedy lightweights of the fighting world. Brigandine is a cheap but effective attempt at plate armor. I've got more to say on the subject, but I'll do so below.

From the research I had done, I thought brigandine was somewhere in the neighborhood of 15 to 25lbs. That just doesn't fit with the whole Heavy Armor thing and I see Brigandine and Studded Armor as being one in the same.

I just realized that I didn't add in that resilience doesn't negate all damage, just reduces it to a minimum of 1. This is important because this allows things like poison to still come off and have an effect. Regarding crits, the raw damage in basically any case is going to overcome the resilience. A crit with a spear does an average of 9 damage, which way overwhelms the resilience of even plate. I don't think crits need to skip resilience as well.

From a verisimilitude point of view, this works. Throughout history, small units of heavily armored fighters have been able to defeat many times their number in unarmored combatants. I'm not talking just the Romans versus all their neighbors, but any time police or guard forces stop riots.
With 5E as written, a knight in platemail still has a lot to fear from even a small band of goblins due to how critically important action economy is in 5E. If they can secure advantage, he'll be dead quickly; plate mail or no. Resilience hopefully can counter that inherent advantage, forcing the swarm of enemies to do more interesting things like throw alchemist's fire, blackjack the knight, deploy traps, or use poisoned or antiarmor weapons.

That does make a difference, reducing it to a minimum of 1. I'm just concerned about how far you've shifted the game in favor of Plate being best. The additional AC combined with the superior Resilience really alters the balance. This definitely is falling into the Gamist vs Realist problem. Yes, Plate was the best armor, but this is a game, and some characters choosing Plate needs to be balanced. With even two or three points of Resiliance, you've largely bridged that gap. By giving Plate even better AC and the ultra high resilience, I think you've pushed it too far.

Right now you have armors with max ACs ranging from 14 to 19, that is just too much stress for 5e's Bound system to handle. IMO that needs to be reconciled, the armors, from a game balance perspective, should end up being able to provide withing a point the same AC when optimized(before any feat). Right now most of those armors on that list will never see the table because they are strictly inferior to others.

I've been mulling it over all day, but I think I like that. I'll introduce the "half-swording" trait, which makes a weapon two-handed, reduces the damage die, but makes it bludgeoning damage. What do you guys think?

Not sure about this one. I like the simpler variable damage modes and dice, half-swording feels like it covers only half that equation. Again, this will fall into that realism vs gamism conundrum.

How very odd. I thought the Light property was the Offhand property, but looking at the Player's Handbook I see it is not. Welp, I like it. Adding Offhanded. Mind if I steal the wording verbatim?
Bucklers I don't see how to add well, so I'm holding off on that for now. That may change, and thanks for the suggestions!

Yeah, something like rapier dagger just doesn't work in 5e and it should. Offhand for the smallest of weapons works well and you are welcome to the language.

IMO +1AC Bucklers that can be equipped for a Bonus action have worked well enough in my games.

Max Dex of medium armors seems like a small detail, but that kinda messes with the whole concept of what a medium armor is and plays merry hell with the Medium Armor Master feat. I'll leave it as is for now.

I covered this earlier, I don't think most of those medium armors that would be modified are negatively impacting balance. Right now, Half Plate and Plate are king, everything else is significantly worse.

As a complete aside, what systems do you play nowadays?

We ran 5e for a couple campaigns that spanned multiple years using my assembled House Rules. We switched to the Pathfinder 2nd Edition Playtest and just ripped out the level scaling to make it bound. Then we moved to a modified Star Wars Revised editions turned into a 3 Action Bound system.

Now, we've been splitting our time between the Star Wars and a system I have been writing and used the last six months of Star Wars playtesting certain features of to great success. Essentially, it is a Classless and Bound system utilizing micro-leveling. Characters level at the end of every session, for fifty sessions, earning more Character Points to spend on whatever they choose. Magic is all flexible casting and has some last airbender style elements, plus Telepathy, Telekinesis, Ki, Physical powers, Life, Death, and Luck. The system has significantly more granularity and verisimilitude than 5e or P2 with an enhanced 3 action system, but is also more streamlined with proficiency gates and plays much, much faster. It makes extensive use of a modified Advantage/Disadvantage system and really minimizes static bonuses and superfluous rolling. It even has a system that streamlines currency and wealth.

Yeah, it's always bothered me that half-plate isn't heavy too. What do you guys think of making the armor hierarchy go lamellar-brigandine-breastplate for medium armor, and splint-halfplate-plate for heavy? Would that be too disruptive to my players (only one of whom has specced into medium armor before)? The stats for said armors would only be tweaked slightly to reflect their new places in the hierarchy, more of a name swap.

That would be much better. Medium Armor is still Medium armor, their speccing should still work.

Clearly you haven't sharpened your maul enough :). Real talk though, a wood splitting maul gets into the same tricky area as a modern bullet. It would appear to be one kind of damage, but the forces involved are such that it really functions as bludgeoning. In this case, the fact that it has a blade and presumably cuts things with it (ie it's not a sledgehammer and inflicts different injuries than a sledgehammer would) is enough to keep it as slashing, at least in my book. I see your point and respectfully disagree for the sake of player options.

I don't know, i've never been worried about cutting myself with a maul... with an axe yes, but never with a maul. Now, my foot has been awefully scared of being crushed, haha.

[AdAstra]

-I just like polearms in general. If anything, halberds and glaives are far more neat to me. Those damage numbers seem fine to me.

-The half-swording property seems unnecessarily complex, but it does the job, and won't come up too often anyway, so it should be fine.

-The general conception of armor in 5e, at least to me, is that light armor is generally flexible full-body coverage meant to reduce the impact of glancing blows, as fitting for an agile character. Medium armors provide fairly hefty protection, but primarily in vital areas, essentially trading coverage for efficiency. Heavy armor is designed to do both, covering everything possible in as much armor as practical for maximum protection. Under that conception, it makes sense for brigandine to be medium, but I find it hard to justify half-plate as being heavy. It's literally stripped-down full-plate, it just feels to me that it should be in a lighter category.

My recommendation? Make brigandine medium armor (probably either 15 or maybe 16 + Dex max 2 with disadvantage to stealth, along with a commensurate change in price), move chainmail to 16 AC again, then put Coat of Plates in either its place or in splint's (Coat of Plates iskinda the same thing as brigandine? The distinction is fuzzy at best, but coat of plates is generally considered to have been part of the transition to both brigandine and plate armor, which more or less coexisted. Brigandine seemed to lean into the flexibility+protection aspect with smaller plates while plate leaned into the, well, plates). One thing's for sure, brigandine was far from just a poor man's armor, often being lavishly decorated and used by nobility even when other options were available (most likely due to aesthetics and flexibility, mind you, and they were almost certainly cheaper than plate before adding on all the chaff), and is a fairly "advanced" armor, being from generally the same era as plate (again, likely for similar reasons of cost and flexibility).

-Don't forget, the weakest options are the armor table were never meant for players in the first place barring a couple exceptions. There's a reason why the game doesn't start you off with padded armor, hide, or ring mail unless you're a barbarian or a druid. Those armors are more for monsters, allies that the PCs have to outfit themselves, or barding for mounts as far as I can tell. Especially if NRSASD is policing the gold, which he intends to, the cheaper options will likely still see use for outfitting the party's allies should they see fit to have such.
I can especially see Hide and Linothorax being useful for peasant militias and scouts/archers respectively. Hide armor being dirt cheap while still offering decent protection, and Linothorax having good piercing resilience, and thus being well-suited for people primarily expecting ranged attacks, and no disadvantage to stealth, as well as seeming like some of the most comfortable armor to wear from an in-character perspective.

[NRSASD]

So after much debating and thought offline, I think we're just about done here.

Lucerne Hammers will do 1d8+2. I was unhappy making a weapon have a damage die of +2, but it makes a beautiful average spread. Lucerne Hammers do 3-10, Poleaxes do 2-11, and Halberds do 1-12, all with an average of 6.5. Changing it to a d8 also works more nicely with the various feats that affect it.

Brigandine will remain unchanged, and here's why. After a lot of research on my part, turns out Brigandine was quite the variable suit of armor. It could be quite light, or it could be even heavier than a full maile hauberk apparently, clocking in at around 12 kg/26 lbs. Additionally, it could be extremely high quality and lovingly crafted by master armorers or bolted together from battle-worn fragments of plate in what is also known as a Coat of Plates. In this particular case, the brigandine I'm envisioning is more like a Coat of Plates than not, but I don't want to confuse the players with the wording. Therefore it will remain known as brigandine.

Half-plate will have its AC lowered by 1 to 16, but otherwise remain unchanged. If you think of it as "chainmail with plate reinforcement" then calling it a medium armor doesn't make sense. If you think of it as something more akin to "Breastplate, but more so" it makes a lot more sense. A good example of this would be the Almain rivet. Calling it half-plate is maddeningly imprecise, but calling it munition plate (which it technically is) would confuse players for no good reason.

Plate will have its AC lowered by 1 to 18. 19 is possibly too good, but for the record my highest AC player was the monk last game.

Still not entirely sure how I want to implement the buckler. Making it a +1 AC shield doesn't make it that attractive, but making it a +2 AC reaction for two-handed weapon users might be too strong. I will probably come back to this later.

Flail is now 1d8 and antiarmor. Morningstar is 1d6+1, antiarmor, reliable.

At long last, any final comments, questions, concerns before I wrap this project up?

Thank you so much for everyone that provided input on this weapon table! I feel like it came out a lot stronger with your help. Thanks once again!

[AdAstra]

I think it's looking good for what you're aiming for!

-The last mechanical thing I can see is the Offhand property. It doesn't appear to really do what you intend, since you can already wield two non-light weapons without penalty in 5e, just not use Two-Weapon Fighting with them. It should probably be worded along the lines of "You can use Two-Weapon Fighting to make an attack with this weapon even if the weapon in your other hand is not Light" or something like that.

[Dienekes]

A bit late to the party. But if you want to differentiate between pollaxes and Lucerne hammers, may I suggest removing Reach from pollaxes, but allow it to do piercing damage as well? It’s whole shtick was that it was basically three weapons wrapped in one, and while they varied in length a lot most surviving examples aren’t really that big. Maybe only Reach on piercing damage attacks? That might be too fiddly.