Pretty sure both club and greatclub are in the category of "not meant to be used by PCs"
If they're not meant to be used by PCs, why are they taking up space in the Player's Handbook?
Well...
Because that's where the stats for those things are found. Easier and more efficient to have all the stats for weapons in one book, instead of having a table just for players and then a separate one just for DMs in two different books.
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Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities .-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-. An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more. Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
Sure, but that isn't really a problem though? Polearm master is already a powerful feat and you can achieve the wanted effect if you combine with sentinel.
Just giving base weapons more stuff because it would be nice isn't good game design, it's just power creep.
not certain I agree with this.
I mean, D&D has never been able to satisfy everyone with how they set up weapons, so this is a pretty standard argument, but it usually isn't "because it would be nice", it is because the weapons are different, and they are different because in real world situations they had a reason to exist and purpose in those shapes, form, and uses.
And for some people those differences make things more fun, and give the game they are in greater verisimilitude, improving immersion and empowering the core fantasy.
Good game design seeks to do exactly those things. Poor game design interferes with such things. The reason they opted to simplify was that there were a gazillion weapons who varied only a little from each other mechanically -- but they probably didn't do a lot of interrogating of the underlying concepts for those weapons, and odds are pretty good a lot of the made the same general mistakes that most folks make (and by most, I mean the vast and overwhelming majority of folks).
As an example, a Pike is a hammer polearm. But most folks -- including several in this thread -- think of it as a piercing weapon because a Pike has a pointy thing on the side opposite the hammer, and fantasy books have talked about how the pikemen would punch holes in the armor of enemies, and blah blah
and so folks who have never held a pike, let alone tried to use one, let alone trained in using one, are going to do the blind men describing an elephant thing.
That will feed into the game design. It doesn't fit the ethos of 5e to say "I use my pike to crush their skull" and then say "i use my pike to pierce through the armor" because the game doesn't approach combat in that way. But giving a Pike a bit of versatility (bludgeoning damage, piercing damage) dos fit the ethos and design strategy.
That isn't power creep, that's following the purpose of the tool and incorporating it into the rules.
40 freaking years of these arguments, and the end result is always going to be "what works for your tables" -- but that isn't poor game design or power creep either, and power creep is not the same as "not good" design -- some designs seek power creep (they call it advancement, after all).
I agree, the examples you mention are not power creep. They are pretty simple reflavors though. I don't think any DM with any level of experience would object to swapping out damage type as part of a reflavoring, seeing as it rarely matters at all.
What I'm talking about is all the suggestions about giving a "brace" property to spears, "disarm" property to a swordbreaker and I even think I saw one adding a bonus attack somewhere. At that point, we are just adding stuff that can be done with feats and class features to base weapons AKA power creep.
Sure, but that isn't really a problem though? Polearm master is already a powerful feat and you can achieve the wanted effect if you combine with sentinel.
Just giving base weapons more stuff because it would be nice isn't good game design, it's just power creep.
It isn't 'just giving' though. It is an actual spear strategy. And to use it, the enemy has to actually be charging you.
It is giving, since it would be available to anyone. It can already be done with features, in other words training, why would it suddenly be free?
Well, the great club is a step up from the Club, which does d4, and is less powerful than the 2d6 maul. So, I would say it fits that pattern.
The club isn't a versatile weapon, it's a light weapon. In general:
Base is 1d6 for simple, 1d8 for martial
-1 die type if light (thus, club 1d4)
-1 die type if reach
+1 die type if versatile in 2H
+2 die types if 2H heavy (and 1d12 and 2d6 are valued the same).
Other features don't seem to much affect damage.
Size. It is missing from your formula.
A dagger is simple. A sword is melee. Size is a factor across the board (Mauls are just big hammers, hand axe to battle axe, etc).
good try, though ;)
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Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities .-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-. An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more. Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
No it isn't. To the degree size matters, it's covered by whether the weapon is Light or Heavy.
Ah, so you are using the club is a light and a great club is a heavy then.
Except that falls apart for light hammer and maul, light hammer and pike, all the swords (since they start at Dagger).
It's a rough guideline, for sure, but it doesn't explain the actual outcomes.
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Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities .-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-. An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more. Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
Except that falls apart for light hammer and maul, light hammer and pike, all the swords (since they start at Dagger).
Light Hammer: it's a Simple weapon (d6 base) that is Light (change to d4).
Maul: it's a Martial weapon (d8 base) that is Heavy and Two-Handed (change to d12 or 2d6).
Pike: it's a Martial weapon (d8 base) that is Heavy and Two-Handed (change to d12) and has reach (change to d10).
Dagger: it's a Simple weapon (d6 base) that is Light (change to d4)
Shortsword/Scimitar: it's a Martial weapon (d8 base) that is Light (change to d6)
Longsword: it's a Martial weapon (d8 base) that is Versatile (becomes d10 with 2 hands).
Greatsword: it's a Martial weapon (d8 base) that is Heavy and Two-Handed (change to d12 or 2d6).
Not quite.
The stated shift was Light and Heavy, you used classification here.
Size, then changes the classification -- simple to martial, perhaps, but you argued light and heavy, and the point was that didn't hold up.
I will grant you that size was included through the use of Simple and Martial, though. Therefore, I concede that you included size, albeit as a function of type, not weight.
Minorly related: your set up still fails -- A Hand Axe is a Light, Simple weapon that does d6. Under your system, a handaxe should be a d4 (like a light hammer). But that's niggling on my part.
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Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities .-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-. An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more. Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
I have an idea for a weapon replacement system that describes weapons using three classifiers: Size, Skill, Type.
Size is tiny, small, medium, large, huge. A creature's size is what determines what weapons they can use 2-handed, one-handed, or dual-handed. Skill is simple or martial. Type is bludgeoning, piercing, slashing. Some properties are limited (e.g. only piercing weapons can have finesse).
The damage die or dice is based on size and skill. Simple weapons: Tiny 1d4, Small 1d6, Medium 1d8, Large 1d10, Huge 1d12 (always a single die, giving a wide spread of values). Martial weapons: Tiny 1d6, Small 1d8 or 2d4, Medium 1d10 or 1d4+1d6, Large 1d12 or 2d6, Huge 2d8 or 4d4 (option of multiple dice, for more consistent values).
For example, what the game currently calls a longsword, we would call a medium martial slashing weapon. It could also be a tulwar, a falchion, a light glaive, a scimitar, or a katana - what we call it doesn't actually matter.
Except that falls apart for light hammer and maul, light hammer and pike, all the swords (since they start at Dagger).
Light Hammer: it's a Simple weapon (d6 base) that is Light (change to d4).
Maul: it's a Martial weapon (d8 base) that is Heavy and Two-Handed (change to d12 or 2d6).
Pike: it's a Martial weapon (d8 base) that is Heavy and Two-Handed (change to d12) and has reach (change to d10).
Dagger: it's a Simple weapon (d6 base) that is Light (change to d4)
Shortsword/Scimitar: it's a Martial weapon (d8 base) that is Light (change to d6)
Longsword: it's a Martial weapon (d8 base) that is Versatile (becomes d10 with 2 hands).
Greatsword: it's a Martial weapon (d8 base) that is Heavy and Two-Handed (change to d12 or 2d6).
Not quite.
The stated shift was Light and Heavy, you used classification here.
Size, then changes the classification -- simple to martial, perhaps, but you argued light and heavy, and the point was that didn't hold up.
I will grant you that size was included through the use of Simple and Martial, though. Therefore, I concede that you included size, albeit as a function of type, not weight.
Minorly related: your set up still fails -- A Hand Axe is a Light, Simple weapon that does d6. Under your system, a handaxe should be a d4 (like a light hammer). But that's niggling on my part.
Yes, the Handaxe is one of the outliers from the pattern. It should, to fit, either have a d4 damage die or be a Martial weapon (it’s essentially a scimitar with the Thrown property instead of Finesse).
The other outliers, off the top of my head, were the Great Club (extrapolating the pattern that simple weapons use the next smaller damage die from their martial equivalents), the Whip (would be a d6 under Pantagruel’s system: martial d8, reduced to d6 by having Reach), the Net and the Trident. Interestingly, 1D&D has resolved two of those: the Net is now adventuring gear, rather than a weapon, and the Trident has been boosted to have the stats that one expects a Martial Versatile weapon to have.
Oops: I’ve just noticed that the Great Club isn’t Heavy (at least, not in the UA version).That makes it the only non-Heavy, non-Versatile, 2-Handed weapon. That’s probably why it doesn’t fit the pattern.
Except 5e has been keeping combat simple, and so it's unlikely they'll create a whole series of rules to quantify what constitutes "charging" and how one braces for that charge.
Judging by the Charger feat, "an enemy who moves at least 10ft in a straight line before attacking you" seems like a workable trigger for a Brace ability.
Sorry to Revivify this thread, but I’d been pondering a bit more the near absence of Simple Finesse weapons (other than the Dagger). Is that an oversight or is it deliberate? My guess, if it is deliberate, is that since most classes without Martial weapon access tend also to lack heavy armour training/proficiency, Dexterity is a more appealing stat than Strength. Thus, having more Finesse options would render many of the other options suboptimal.
However, I did have an idea for including more Simple Finesse options. As the likely damage die for a single-handed Simple weapon without the Light property is d6, I realised that a one-handed Piercing Simple Finesse weapon would be a shortsword which had lost the Light property. Therefore, to avoid a proliferation of subtly different weapons, I imagined a system of the Handaxe, Scimitar and Shortsword becoming Simple Weapons but without Light. They would then gain a rule that “If you have proficiency with Martial weapons, this weapon gains the Light property while you wield it.” Am I overthinking this and should I instead go to bed now?
I think it's fine as-is. If you actually want to be using a weapon (vs casting a spell), then you'd almost certainly already have proficiency with finesse-capable martial weapons.
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Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
I'd say the lack of more than one Simple Finesse weapon makes sense. The idea behind a Finesse weapon is that you're making more careful and precise strikes as opposed to emphasizing striking power. Thus it's not something people will be able to as readily imitate with the largely tool-based Simple Weapons, you'd need a more thorough background in combat.
At our campaign, we are in the process of adding a rope-dart. We haven't finalised the rules for it.
It all started with a +1 knife that pc bound to some rope for reach and retraction. Later is has been brought to a smith to forge it into the final product.. a 15 ft rope with on one end a weight and on the other hand a dart. Pc can choose which end to use for an attack (blunt or piercing).
We haven't decided whether it will be considered a ranged or melee weapon. Also we haven't figured out if/what feature should complement is..
i mean, come on, wizards, can't we at least get a bohemian earspoon? honestly.
EDIT: Wow, that resolution is horrible, but the original image is technically a non-animated GIF, so I had to work a magic trick as it was just to get the thing to show up.
Sabres are missing. They're in the rules, under rapier for some daft reason, when scimitar would fit better, but there is no option in the Character Builder for either Sabre or Saber.
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The club isn't a versatile weapon, it's a light weapon. In general:
Other features don't seem to much affect damage.
Well...
Because that's where the stats for those things are found. Easier and more efficient to have all the stats for weapons in one book, instead of having a table just for players and then a separate one just for DMs in two different books.
Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities
.-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-.
An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more.
Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
I agree, the examples you mention are not power creep. They are pretty simple reflavors though. I don't think any DM with any level of experience would object to swapping out damage type as part of a reflavoring, seeing as it rarely matters at all.
What I'm talking about is all the suggestions about giving a "brace" property to spears, "disarm" property to a swordbreaker and I even think I saw one adding a bonus attack somewhere. At that point, we are just adding stuff that can be done with feats and class features to base weapons AKA power creep.
It is giving, since it would be available to anyone. It can already be done with features, in other words training, why would it suddenly be free?
Size. It is missing from your formula.
A dagger is simple. A sword is melee. Size is a factor across the board (Mauls are just big hammers, hand axe to battle axe, etc).
good try, though ;)
Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities
.-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-.
An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more.
Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
No it isn't. To the degree size matters, it's covered by whether the weapon is Light or Heavy.
Ah, so you are using the club is a light and a great club is a heavy then.
Except that falls apart for light hammer and maul, light hammer and pike, all the swords (since they start at Dagger).
It's a rough guideline, for sure, but it doesn't explain the actual outcomes.
Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities
.-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-.
An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more.
Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
I like how missing elements to the weapons table comes up on this board periodically ;)
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
Not quite.
The stated shift was Light and Heavy, you used classification here.
Size, then changes the classification -- simple to martial, perhaps, but you argued light and heavy, and the point was that didn't hold up.
I will grant you that size was included through the use of Simple and Martial, though. Therefore, I concede that you included size, albeit as a function of type, not weight.
Minorly related: your set up still fails -- A Hand Axe is a Light, Simple weapon that does d6. Under your system, a handaxe should be a d4 (like a light hammer). But that's niggling on my part.
Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities
.-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-.
An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more.
Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
Yes, I used classification, because that's all that matters -- which options from Heavy, Light, Martial, Reach, Simple, and Versatile the weapon has.
I have an idea for a weapon replacement system that describes weapons using three classifiers: Size, Skill, Type.
Size is tiny, small, medium, large, huge. A creature's size is what determines what weapons they can use 2-handed, one-handed, or dual-handed.
Skill is simple or martial.
Type is bludgeoning, piercing, slashing. Some properties are limited (e.g. only piercing weapons can have finesse).
The damage die or dice is based on size and skill.
Simple weapons: Tiny 1d4, Small 1d6, Medium 1d8, Large 1d10, Huge 1d12 (always a single die, giving a wide spread of values).
Martial weapons: Tiny 1d6, Small 1d8 or 2d4, Medium 1d10 or 1d4+1d6, Large 1d12 or 2d6, Huge 2d8 or 4d4 (option of multiple dice, for more consistent values).
For example, what the game currently calls a longsword, we would call a medium martial slashing weapon. It could also be a tulwar, a falchion, a light glaive, a scimitar, or a katana - what we call it doesn't actually matter.
Next 5E game I run, I'm going to test it out.
Yes, the Handaxe is one of the outliers from the pattern. It should, to fit, either have a d4 damage die or be a Martial weapon (it’s essentially a scimitar with the Thrown property instead of Finesse).
The other outliers, off the top of my head, were the Great Club (extrapolating the pattern that simple weapons use the next smaller damage die from their martial equivalents), the Whip (would be a d6 under Pantagruel’s system: martial d8, reduced to d6 by having Reach), the Net and the Trident. Interestingly, 1D&D has resolved two of those: the Net is now adventuring gear, rather than a weapon, and the Trident has been boosted to have the stats that one expects a Martial Versatile weapon to have.
Oops: I’ve just noticed that the Great Club isn’t Heavy (at least, not in the UA version).That makes it the only non-Heavy, non-Versatile, 2-Handed weapon. That’s probably why it doesn’t fit the pattern.
Judging by the Charger feat, "an enemy who moves at least 10ft in a straight line before attacking you" seems like a workable trigger for a Brace ability.
Sorry to Revivify this thread, but I’d been pondering a bit more the near absence of Simple Finesse weapons (other than the Dagger). Is that an oversight or is it deliberate? My guess, if it is deliberate, is that since most classes without Martial weapon access tend also to lack heavy armour training/proficiency, Dexterity is a more appealing stat than Strength. Thus, having more Finesse options would render many of the other options suboptimal.
However, I did have an idea for including more Simple Finesse options. As the likely damage die for a single-handed Simple weapon without the Light property is d6, I realised that a one-handed Piercing Simple Finesse weapon would be a shortsword which had lost the Light property. Therefore, to avoid a proliferation of subtly different weapons, I imagined a system of the Handaxe, Scimitar and Shortsword becoming Simple Weapons but without Light. They would then gain a rule that “If you have proficiency with Martial weapons, this weapon gains the Light property while you wield it.” Am I overthinking this and should I instead go to bed now?
I think it's fine as-is. If you actually want to be using a weapon (vs casting a spell), then you'd almost certainly already have proficiency with finesse-capable martial weapons.
Find your own truth, choose your enemies carefully, and never deal with a dragon.
"Canon" is what's factual to D&D lore. "Cannon" is what you're going to be shot with if you keep getting the word wrong.
I'd say the lack of more than one Simple Finesse weapon makes sense. The idea behind a Finesse weapon is that you're making more careful and precise strikes as opposed to emphasizing striking power. Thus it's not something people will be able to as readily imitate with the largely tool-based Simple Weapons, you'd need a more thorough background in combat.
At our campaign, we are in the process of adding a rope-dart. We haven't finalised the rules for it.
It all started with a +1 knife that pc bound to some rope for reach and retraction. Later is has been brought to a smith to forge it into the final product.. a 15 ft rope with on one end a weight and on the other hand a dart. Pc can choose which end to use for an attack (blunt or piercing).
We haven't decided whether it will be considered a ranged or melee weapon. Also we haven't figured out if/what feature should complement is..
i mean, come on, wizards, can't we at least get a bohemian earspoon

? honestly.
EDIT: Wow, that resolution is horrible, but the original image is technically a non-animated GIF, so I had to work a magic trick as it was just to get the thing to show up.
Medium humanoid (human), lawful neutral
Sabres are missing.
They're in the rules, under rapier for some daft reason, when scimitar would fit better, but there is no option in the Character Builder for either Sabre or Saber.