This is a situation where, no matter which you choose, there will be times you wish you had gone with the other, and times you are glad for the one you have. My advice would be to just pick one, and don’t think about it/regret your decision.
I know there will always be situations where the other would be better but was looking for anything I was missing comparing the two or if there was some solid argument for one or the other. Or even if there was another half feat (str) that fits echo knight.
Well then I’d say: moving people 5 ‘ can actually be pretty powerful for the party. There’s the obvious of knocking the enemy off a ledge or into any other kind of environmental hazard, but you can also force them out of the way if they’re blocking a doorway or narrow hallway, or push them away from the wizard, or other squishy. Or force them into a position that better allows the rogue to get a sneak attack. And you can move after or between attacks, so knock them back with the first hit, step up and hit them again, now they’re still next to you, and positioned where you want them.
As for slasher, you can stop someone who’s trying to run away, you can slow them down if they’re trying to get past you to the rest of of the party. You can make them stay in the spike growth or entangle area longer. In really any difficult terrain, slowing them down by 10 feet is kind of slowing them by 20 feet.
I'm a big fan of the hunting-trap, caltrops-bag-of-20 and ball-bearings-bag-of-1-000. If you can spread some of these around you can use crusher in attempts to reduce speed (to zero with the hunting trap) by bashing them into the hazards. Do you have casters able and willing to put up a bonfire or cloud of daggers? Do you have anything like a portable hole? Readying to bash something back into spike growth might also be fun.
With slasher you can guarantee the reduction in speed but, if you just wanted to stop them from getting away, you might grapple. If their intention was to kite you, why did they get so close?
With equipment hazards, you may be able to place opponents in situations where they can't, on their turn, hit back.
A hit with slasher will place an opponent at attack disadvantage.
A hit with crusher into a space with a hunting trap may lock an opponent so that their action would be needed to attempt escape.
I don't know about all y'all guys, but I can't stand these feats. Weapon dependent. Sure, you get crusher or slasher, only for your DM to hand you a flame tongue rapier. Greeaaat.....
I'd go with something a lot more versatile. That's why I like skill expert. Skills are always handy dandy, no matter the weapon, and you still have a +1 into -any- stat you want. You wanna lean into battle field control? Push and shove and grapple with expertise in athletics.
I like Skill Expert also, but usually for expertise in Perception. To me, that tends to be the "king" of ability checks.
I hadn't really thought of expertise in Athletics for better push, shove and grapple. Would be best with Shield Master feat imo, but I have never been high on that feat. With expertise it would look a lot better imo. Especially if your DM allows you to shove between attacks ala Jeremy Crawford RAI.
Fellow Echo Knight here! I liked the idea of weapon specific feats myself as well. For myself, I had sentinel already. So I chose crusher to move people around and hope for the critical hit to give myself and hopefully my team some advantage.
I don't know about all y'all guys, but I can't stand these feats. Weapon dependent. Sure, you get crusher or slasher, only for your DM to hand you a flame tongue rapier. Greeaaat.....
I'd go with something a lot more versatile. That's why I like skill expert. Skills are always handy dandy, no matter the weapon, and you still have a +1 into -any- stat you want. You wanna lean into battle field control? Push and shove and grapple with expertise in athletics.
Shove and grapple are more restrictive in that they require your action. You also can't use that flame tongue rapier in the action that you use to shove or grapple. Sure, fighters get action surge and 5th level martials get an extra attack but you're still giving up one of your attacks for that battlefield control lean. Depending on the campaign you may be able to trade that flame tongue rapier or use it and, as needed, use your shield or flame tongue sword hilt as an improvised weapon.
I agree with the value of perception with skill expert though, with a by name paladin, intimidation, deception or persuasion with the right DM might provide other versatile possibilities for battlefield control.
I don't know about all y'all guys, but I can't stand these feats. Weapon dependent. Sure, you get crusher or slasher, only for your DM to hand you a flame tongue rapier. Greeaaat.....
I'd go with something a lot more versatile. That's why I like skill expert. Skills are always handy dandy, no matter the weapon, and you still have a +1 into -any- stat you want. You wanna lean into battle field control? Push and shove and grapple with expertise in athletics.
Shove and grapple are more restrictive in that they require your action. You also can't use that flame tongue rapier in the action that you use to shove or grapple. Sure, fighters get action surge and 5th level martials get an extra attack but you're still giving up one of your attacks for that battlefield control lean. Depending on the campaign you may be able to trade that flame tongue rapier or use it and, as needed, use your shield or flame tongue sword hilt as an improvised weapon.
I agree with the value of perception with skill expert though, with a by name paladin, intimidation, deception or persuasion with the right DM might provide other versatile possibilities for battlefield control.
Don't want to grapple? Then don't. What I listed is an example, and a given option for what you may be able to do with expertise in athletics. The point remains, as you've exemplified, that there's a wide array of skills to take advantage of.
Now, if battle field control is needed, it can be surmised that damage isn't the first priority. Nothing wrong with using an action to do what must be done. I personally have trouble seeing how much more value either crusher or slasher have in providing control. Reduced speed? On a target that's in melee? Simply push a target 5ft? Not as valuable as imposing the prone condition and grappling to keep them in that condition, I'd argue. Expertise in athletics isn't just used for grappling either, as I'm sure you know just how common athletics checks are in general.
Point being, skill expert is the better half feat, it doesn't depend on the campaign setting or how generous your DM feels.
You can knock them back on the last attack and on the next turn if they enter melee with you again you get your AoO for a whole other attack. Also keeps them off the backline which I find the most valuable part of playiing Echo Knight myself.
Plus it gives you the chance to use heavier damage option when the time comes at the loss of using crusher but it might be worth it to keep the damage up.
I don't know about all y'all guys, but I can't stand these feats. Weapon dependent. Sure, you get crusher or slasher, only for your DM to hand you a flame tongue rapier. Greeaaat.....
I'd go with something a lot more versatile. That's why I like skill expert. Skills are always handy dandy, no matter the weapon, and you still have a +1 into -any- stat you want. You wanna lean into battle field control? Push and shove and grapple with expertise in athletics.
I see your point, but personally I like them just because they make your weapon choice matter. Now someone with a long sword and a war hammer actually play differently. These feats are about the only thing that makes a different type of bps damage matter.
Also, I have an idea I’ll never play for a thrown weapon fighter who takes crusher and slasher and carries around light hammers and hand axes. Won’t do much damage, but crazy good battlefield control as you move people around and/or slow them down in a 20 foot radius.
Crusher feels a little more consistently useful to me. Being able to position an enemy slightly feels like it could be useful more often than hitting the enemy's movement speed, as they're already disincentized to move away lest they take an attack of opportunity.
And the advantage on attack rolls on a target from your whole party feels more useful than an enemy getting disadvantage on theirs, because action econemy wise that could buff a lot more attacks than slasher would nerf unless the rest of your party uses spells or something with a saving throw instead. And if the enemy is a caster they might not do an attack roll anyway, etc.
That is not to say slasher isn't a good feat. It's good and it has situations where it would be really useful. I just think crusher edges it out personally.
Specifically for the Echo Knight, Slasher seems taylor made.
One of the main ideas of your echo is to be sort of a "ranged melee" attack, an attack by proxy. It also acts as a modest damage sponge that you can recreate every turn. Slasher does two things that sync really well with your echo.
1. Reduce enemy movement by 10 feet. There is no save. Throw the echo in the big-bad's face and attack it. The big-bad now need to get to you, otherwise he's effectively destroying your echo over and over, and doing nothing to you. Taking 10 feet of movement away makes it that much harder for the enemy to get to you.
2. On a crit, it has disadvantage on all attacks. A wonderful debuff, and it works against all of their attacks on their turn if they have mult-attack. A good chance they won't be able to destroy your echo on their turn if that happens.
A side note: Pick up Sentinel to be a real pain in the ***
Specifically for the Echo Knight, Slasher seems taylor made.
One of the main ideas of your echo is to be sort of a "ranged melee" attack, an attack by proxy. It also acts as a modest damage sponge that you can recreate every turn. Slasher does two things that sync really well with your echo.
1. Reduce enemy movement by 10 feet. There is no save. Throw the echo in the big-bad's face and attack it. The big-bad now need to get to you, otherwise he's effectively destroying your echo over and over, and doing nothing to you. Taking 10 feet of movement away makes it that much harder for the enemy to get to you.
2. On a crit, it has disadvantage on all attacks. A wonderful debuff, and it works against all of their attacks on their turn if they have mult-attack. A good chance they won't be able to destroy your echo on their turn if that happens.
A side note: Pick up Sentinel to be a real pain in the ***
+1 to sentinel... Makes area control so much better
What weapons are you using? Are you a DEX fighter? Cause if so slasher is the way to go, as there are no finesse wepaons that deal bludgeoning damage. Also can I bring up peircer? The raw damage boost is nice, and with a pike, PAM and GWM is powerful.
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.
What weapons are you using? Are you a DEX fighter? Cause if so slasher is the way to go, as there are no finesse wepaons that deal bludgeoning damage. Also can I bring up peircer? The raw damage boost is nice, and with a pike, PAM and GWM is powerful.
Pike doesn’t work with PAM by RAW. If it should is a different question, but it doesn’t. Spear does, though, and it gets you the piercing damage.
What weapons are you using? Are you a DEX fighter? Cause if so slasher is the way to go, as there are no finesse wepaons that deal bludgeoning damage. Also can I bring up peircer? The raw damage boost is nice, and with a pike, PAM and GWM is powerful.
Pike doesn’t work with PAM by RAW. If it should is a different question, but it doesn’t. Spear does, though, and it gets you the piercing damage.
A pike should work for the opportunity attack when approaching, but not the reverse weapon attack with the haft, not by RAW, but common sense. A pike should also have a "set" property or some such that increases the damage if something moves up to you. The reach should be more than 10 ft, probably 15 ft or more depending on the pike. A pike isn't really a 1v1 weapon, either though. It's a weapon that you use in a military formation, together with a whole bunch of other people, who also have pikes. Oh well, DnD isn't a reality simulator. :)
PAM reverse weapon attack makes much more sense with the glaive and halberd. Both of those forms of polearms fighting styles used staff fighting techniques and forms.
What weapons are you using? Are you a DEX fighter? Cause if so slasher is the way to go, as there are no finesse wepaons that deal bludgeoning damage. Also can I bring up peircer? The raw damage boost is nice, and with a pike, PAM and GWM is powerful.
Pike doesn’t work with PAM by RAW. If it should is a different question, but it doesn’t. Spear does, though, and it gets you the piercing damage.
A pike should work for the opportunity attack when approaching, but not the reverse weapon attack with the haft, not by RAW, but common sense. A pike should also have a "set" property or some such that increases the damage if something moves up to you. The reach should be more than 10 ft, probably 15 ft or more depending on the pike. A pike isn't really a 1v1 weapon, either though. It's a weapon that you use in a military formation, together with a whole bunch of other people, who also have pikes. Oh well, DnD isn't a reality simulator. :)
PAM reverse weapon attack makes much more sense with the glaive and halberd. Both of those forms of polearms fighting styles used staff fighting techniques and forms.
Oh yeah. I remember you don't get the BA attack with a pike.
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.
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I have a chance to swap out a feat on my Echo Knight (only lvl 3) and am weighing the options between slasher or Crusher.
Pros for Crusher:
Battlefield control is always good
The on crit rider is fantastic and makes it great when the team is trying to burn off a single foe
Cons for crusher:
5ft a turn is not a lot in the grand scheme of things and rough to use constantly when I am trying to hold the most attention.
Pros for slasher:
Being able to reduce movement speed of things fighting my echo locks them down better I feel (-10 on turn and -10 on reaction can really slow foes)
The crit rider is more defensive oriented and could keep my echo up longer or spare damage to my team.
Cons for slasher:
Feels like it is only at peak usefulness when fighting multiple foes and keeping them separate.
It doesn't "feel" like it make my character more powerful only more defensive.
This is a situation where, no matter which you choose, there will be times you wish you had gone with the other, and times you are glad for the one you have. My advice would be to just pick one, and don’t think about it/regret your decision.
I know there will always be situations where the other would be better but was looking for anything I was missing comparing the two or if there was some solid argument for one or the other. Or even if there was another half feat (str) that fits echo knight.
Well then I’d say: moving people 5 ‘ can actually be pretty powerful for the party. There’s the obvious of knocking the enemy off a ledge or into any other kind of environmental hazard, but you can also force them out of the way if they’re blocking a doorway or narrow hallway, or push them away from the wizard, or other squishy. Or force them into a position that better allows the rogue to get a sneak attack. And you can move after or between attacks, so knock them back with the first hit, step up and hit them again, now they’re still next to you, and positioned where you want them.
As for slasher, you can stop someone who’s trying to run away, you can slow them down if they’re trying to get past you to the rest of of the party. You can make them stay in the spike growth or entangle area longer. In really any difficult terrain, slowing them down by 10 feet is kind of slowing them by 20 feet.
I'm a big fan of the hunting-trap, caltrops-bag-of-20 and ball-bearings-bag-of-1-000. If you can spread some of these around you can use crusher in attempts to reduce speed (to zero with the hunting trap) by bashing them into the hazards. Do you have casters able and willing to put up a bonfire or cloud of daggers? Do you have anything like a portable hole? Readying to bash something back into spike growth might also be fun.
With slasher you can guarantee the reduction in speed but, if you just wanted to stop them from getting away, you might grapple. If their intention was to kite you, why did they get so close?
With equipment hazards, you may be able to place opponents in situations where they can't, on their turn, hit back.
A hit with slasher will place an opponent at attack disadvantage.
A hit with crusher into a space with a hunting trap may lock an opponent so that their action would be needed to attempt escape.
I don't know about all y'all guys, but I can't stand these feats. Weapon dependent. Sure, you get crusher or slasher, only for your DM to hand you a flame tongue rapier. Greeaaat.....
I'd go with something a lot more versatile. That's why I like skill expert. Skills are always handy dandy, no matter the weapon, and you still have a +1 into -any- stat you want. You wanna lean into battle field control? Push and shove and grapple with expertise in athletics.
I like Skill Expert also, but usually for expertise in Perception. To me, that tends to be the "king" of ability checks.
I hadn't really thought of expertise in Athletics for better push, shove and grapple. Would be best with Shield Master feat imo, but I have never been high on that feat. With expertise it would look a lot better imo. Especially if your DM allows you to shove between attacks ala Jeremy Crawford RAI.
Fellow Echo Knight here! I liked the idea of weapon specific feats myself as well. For myself, I had sentinel already. So I chose crusher to move people around and hope for the critical hit to give myself and hopefully my team some advantage.
Waterdeep: Dragon Heist - DM
Storm King's Thunder - Level 12 Firbolg Shepard Druid, Galindan
Homebrewed Campaign - Level 6 Echo Knight/Level 2 Barbarian, Astra
Shove and grapple are more restrictive in that they require your action. You also can't use that flame tongue rapier in the action that you use to shove or grapple. Sure, fighters get action surge and 5th level martials get an extra attack but you're still giving up one of your attacks for that battlefield control lean. Depending on the campaign you may be able to trade that flame tongue rapier or use it and, as needed, use your shield or flame tongue sword hilt as an improvised weapon.
I agree with the value of perception with skill expert though, with a by name paladin, intimidation, deception or persuasion with the right DM might provide other versatile possibilities for battlefield control.
Don't want to grapple? Then don't. What I listed is an example, and a given option for what you may be able to do with expertise in athletics. The point remains, as you've exemplified, that there's a wide array of skills to take advantage of.
Now, if battle field control is needed, it can be surmised that damage isn't the first priority. Nothing wrong with using an action to do what must be done. I personally have trouble seeing how much more value either crusher or slasher have in providing control. Reduced speed? On a target that's in melee? Simply push a target 5ft? Not as valuable as imposing the prone condition and grappling to keep them in that condition, I'd argue. Expertise in athletics isn't just used for grappling either, as I'm sure you know just how common athletics checks are in general.
Point being, skill expert is the better half feat, it doesn't depend on the campaign setting or how generous your DM feels.
I like crusher with PAM and Quarterstaff myself.
You can knock them back on the last attack and on the next turn if they enter melee with you again you get your AoO for a whole other attack. Also keeps them off the backline which I find the most valuable part of playiing Echo Knight myself.
Plus it gives you the chance to use heavier damage option when the time comes at the loss of using crusher but it might be worth it to keep the damage up.
Too bad there isn't a reach bludgeon polearm!
I see your point, but personally I like them just because they make your weapon choice matter. Now someone with a long sword and a war hammer actually play differently. These feats are about the only thing that makes a different type of bps damage matter.
Also, I have an idea I’ll never play for a thrown weapon fighter who takes crusher and slasher and carries around light hammers and hand axes. Won’t do much damage, but crazy good battlefield control as you move people around and/or slow them down in a 20 foot radius.
Crusher feels a little more consistently useful to me. Being able to position an enemy slightly feels like it could be useful more often than hitting the enemy's movement speed, as they're already disincentized to move away lest they take an attack of opportunity.
And the advantage on attack rolls on a target from your whole party feels more useful than an enemy getting disadvantage on theirs, because action econemy wise that could buff a lot more attacks than slasher would nerf unless the rest of your party uses spells or something with a saving throw instead. And if the enemy is a caster they might not do an attack roll anyway, etc.
That is not to say slasher isn't a good feat. It's good and it has situations where it would be really useful. I just think crusher edges it out personally.
Specifically for the Echo Knight, Slasher seems taylor made.
One of the main ideas of your echo is to be sort of a "ranged melee" attack, an attack by proxy. It also acts as a modest damage sponge that you can recreate every turn. Slasher does two things that sync really well with your echo.
1. Reduce enemy movement by 10 feet. There is no save. Throw the echo in the big-bad's face and attack it. The big-bad now need to get to you, otherwise he's effectively destroying your echo over and over, and doing nothing to you. Taking 10 feet of movement away makes it that much harder for the enemy to get to you.
2. On a crit, it has disadvantage on all attacks. A wonderful debuff, and it works against all of their attacks on their turn if they have mult-attack. A good chance they won't be able to destroy your echo on their turn if that happens.
A side note: Pick up Sentinel to be a real pain in the ***
+1 to sentinel... Makes area control so much better
What weapons are you using? Are you a DEX fighter? Cause if so slasher is the way to go, as there are no finesse wepaons that deal bludgeoning damage. Also can I bring up peircer? The raw damage boost is nice, and with a pike, PAM and GWM is powerful.
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.
Pike doesn’t work with PAM by RAW. If it should is a different question, but it doesn’t.
Spear does, though, and it gets you the piercing damage.
A pike should work for the opportunity attack when approaching, but not the reverse weapon attack with the haft, not by RAW, but common sense. A pike should also have a "set" property or some such that increases the damage if something moves up to you. The reach should be more than 10 ft, probably 15 ft or more depending on the pike. A pike isn't really a 1v1 weapon, either though. It's a weapon that you use in a military formation, together with a whole bunch of other people, who also have pikes. Oh well, DnD isn't a reality simulator. :)
PAM reverse weapon attack makes much more sense with the glaive and halberd. Both of those forms of polearms fighting styles used staff fighting techniques and forms.
O
Oh yeah. I remember you don't get the BA attack with a pike.
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.