The main benefit of TWF is the picture of my little halfling fighter/rogue being a whirling dervish of shortswords, despite the reduced overall damage. My DM gave me the Dual Wielder feat as a freebie, just to make up for the opportunity cost of losing the BA.
I might sound stupid but why are dex builds so much better than strength? Strength has better weapons and armour. I mean elven accuracy sharpshooter samurai is pretty mean but so is GWM samurai.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
When you thought you knew about spellcasting - you played a warlock
Why are most bard colleges a pain to type? I mean bard college of valor, compare to champion or evoker. Same goes for sacred oaths: paladin oath of devotion. That's even worse.
I don't think WoCE were very creative with the rogue and ranger subclass titles. I mean ranger archeotype? Roguish archeotype? Bro! Fighters are better but still is somewhat unsatisfying compare to a monastatic tradition or sacred oath.
I might sound stupid but why are dex builds so much better than strength? Strength has better weapons and armour. I mean elven accuracy sharpshooter samurai is pretty mean but so is GWM samurai.
Dexterity factors into AC with most non heavy armor calculations, dex saves (one of the three most common saves), initiative, and stealth, acrobatics, and sleight of hand. If attacking with dexterity, that's just one more thing that's added in and dexterity has better options for ranged attacks.
Strength factors into AC with heavy armor calculations (by eliminating the speed penalty for not having the right amount of strength), str saves (the most common of the lesser saves) and athletics. Strength does have the higher weapon damage, but the difference between a 2d6 (7 average damage) and a 1d8 (4.5 average damage) is 2.5 average damage. Going with a heavy crossbow (1d10, 5.5 average damage) is only a difference of 1.5 average damage. The javelin is the best thrown weapon for range with a 30/120 range, which is the same as a hand crossbow. Meanwhile, the heavy crossbow is 100/400 and the longbow is a 150/600 range. Dueling fighting style (adds two points of damage) and a shield (+2 AC) can be used with a rapier while great weapon fighting style (reroll 1s and 2s on damage rolls and keep the result, the effect is variable based on the number of dice rolled, the type of dice used, and whether a 1 or 2 is actually rolled; but it maxes at +1.333 average damage on 2d6 weapons) OR defensive fighting (+1 AC) are the closest options for heavy fighting and it's an either/or proposition. The archery fighting style doesn't boost damage directly, but does increase accuracy by 2 (an increase of 10% on a d20 roll) and pairs nicely with sharpshooter's power attack.
GWM and sharpshooter both have the same power attack. GWM has a conditional bonus action trigger (reduce a target to 0 or get a crit) while sharpshooter allows you to make the long range attack without disadvantage and removes all but full cover from consideration.
Strength gives marginally more power while dexterity gives earlier strike opportunities (through higher initiative bonuses and increased range, while allowing for better defensive abilities (outside of a sword and board heavy armor character). You have to do a lot more picking and choosing with a strength character than you do with a dexterity character.
Edit: getting back to the topic of dual wielders, strength based fighters might have the edge do to the 1 AC edge from heavy armor and the 1 average damage edge when going with dual wielder feat (longsword versus rapier) or the hand axe also having a throwing range as a 1d6 weapon versus choosing between the shortsword (1d6 melee only) or the dagger (1d4, has thrown property) as a dexterity dual wielder. Since either can effectively use a Whip, there's no difference for reach weapons.
I might sound stupid but why are dex builds so much better than strength? Strength has better weapons and armour. I mean elven accuracy sharpshooter samurai is pretty mean but so is GWM samurai.
Dexterity factors into AC with most non heavy armor calculations, dex saves (one of the three most common saves), initiative, and stealth, acrobatics, and sleight of hand. If attacking with dexterity, that's just one more thing that's added in and dexterity has better options for ranged attacks.
Strength factors into AC with heavy armor calculations (by eliminating the speed penalty for not having the right amount of strength), str saves (the most common of the lesser saves) and athletics. Strength does have the higher weapon damage, but the difference between a 2d6 (7 average damage) and a 1d8 (4.5 average damage) is 2.5 average damage. Going with a heavy crossbow (1d10, 5.5 average damage) is only a difference of 1.5 average damage. The javelin is the best thrown weapon for range with a 30/120 range, which is the same as a hand crossbow. Meanwhile, the heavy crossbow is 100/400 and the longbow is a 150/600 range. Dueling fighting style (adds two points of damage) and a shield (+2 AC) can be used with a rapier while great weapon fighting style (reroll 1s and 2s on damage rolls and keep the result, the effect is variable based on the number of dice rolled, the type of dice used, and whether a 1 or 2 is actually rolled; but it maxes at +1.333 average damage on 2d6 weapons) OR defensive fighting (+1 AC) are the closest options for heavy fighting and it's an either/or proposition. The archery fighting style doesn't boost damage directly, but does increase accuracy by 2 (an increase of 10% on a d20 roll) and pairs nicely with sharpshooter's power attack.
GWM and sharpshooter both have the same power attack. GWM has a conditional bonus action trigger (reduce a target to 0 or get a crit) while sharpshooter allows you to make the long range attack without disadvantage and removes all but full cover from consideration.
Strength gives marginally more power while dexterity gives earlier strike opportunities (through higher initiative bonuses and increased range, while allowing for better defensive abilities (outside of a sword and board heavy armor character). You have to do a lot more picking and choosing with a strength character than you do with a dexterity character.
Edit: getting back to the topic of dual wielders, strength based fighters might have the edge do to the 1 AC edge from heavy armor and the 1 average damage edge when going with dual wielder feat (longsword versus rapier) or the hand axe also having a throwing range as a 1d6 weapon versus choosing between the shortsword (1d6 melee only) or the dagger (1d4, has thrown property) as a dexterity dual wielder. Since either can effectively use a Whip, there's no difference for reach weapons.
Also with the dueling fighting style you can pretty much eliminate the base weapon damage between the d8 weapon and the 2d6 weapon....
Plus you still get +2 AC since you can use a shield.
Overall STR just doesn't have many huge upsides besides grappling/trip.
That's about the only reason to make a STR build imo...
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
The main benefit of TWF is the picture of my little halfling fighter/rogue being a whirling dervish of shortswords, despite the reduced overall damage. My DM gave me the Dual Wielder feat as a freebie, just to make up for the opportunity cost of losing the BA.
I might sound stupid but why are dex builds so much better than strength? Strength has better weapons and armour. I mean elven accuracy sharpshooter samurai is pretty mean but so is GWM samurai.
When you thought you knew about spellcasting - you played a warlock
Why are most bard colleges a pain to type? I mean bard college of valor, compare to champion or evoker. Same goes for sacred oaths: paladin oath of devotion. That's even worse.
I don't think WoCE were very creative with the rogue and ranger subclass titles. I mean ranger archeotype? Roguish archeotype? Bro! Fighters are better but still is somewhat unsatisfying compare to a monastatic tradition or sacred oath.
Dexterity factors into AC with most non heavy armor calculations, dex saves (one of the three most common saves), initiative, and stealth, acrobatics, and sleight of hand. If attacking with dexterity, that's just one more thing that's added in and dexterity has better options for ranged attacks.
Strength factors into AC with heavy armor calculations (by eliminating the speed penalty for not having the right amount of strength), str saves (the most common of the lesser saves) and athletics. Strength does have the higher weapon damage, but the difference between a 2d6 (7 average damage) and a 1d8 (4.5 average damage) is 2.5 average damage. Going with a heavy crossbow (1d10, 5.5 average damage) is only a difference of 1.5 average damage. The javelin is the best thrown weapon for range with a 30/120 range, which is the same as a hand crossbow. Meanwhile, the heavy crossbow is 100/400 and the longbow is a 150/600 range. Dueling fighting style (adds two points of damage) and a shield (+2 AC) can be used with a rapier while great weapon fighting style (reroll 1s and 2s on damage rolls and keep the result, the effect is variable based on the number of dice rolled, the type of dice used, and whether a 1 or 2 is actually rolled; but it maxes at +1.333 average damage on 2d6 weapons) OR defensive fighting (+1 AC) are the closest options for heavy fighting and it's an either/or proposition. The archery fighting style doesn't boost damage directly, but does increase accuracy by 2 (an increase of 10% on a d20 roll) and pairs nicely with sharpshooter's power attack.
GWM and sharpshooter both have the same power attack. GWM has a conditional bonus action trigger (reduce a target to 0 or get a crit) while sharpshooter allows you to make the long range attack without disadvantage and removes all but full cover from consideration.
Strength gives marginally more power while dexterity gives earlier strike opportunities (through higher initiative bonuses and increased range, while allowing for better defensive abilities (outside of a sword and board heavy armor character). You have to do a lot more picking and choosing with a strength character than you do with a dexterity character.
Edit: getting back to the topic of dual wielders, strength based fighters might have the edge do to the 1 AC edge from heavy armor and the 1 average damage edge when going with dual wielder feat (longsword versus rapier) or the hand axe also having a throwing range as a 1d6 weapon versus choosing between the shortsword (1d6 melee only) or the dagger (1d4, has thrown property) as a dexterity dual wielder. Since either can effectively use a Whip, there's no difference for reach weapons.
Also with the dueling fighting style you can pretty much eliminate the base weapon damage between the d8 weapon and the 2d6 weapon....
Plus you still get +2 AC since you can use a shield.
Overall STR just doesn't have many huge upsides besides grappling/trip.
That's about the only reason to make a STR build imo...