I'm recently back into the GM seat after an absence of about 20 years. I've GM'd D&D (multiple ed.), Shadowrun, Earthdawn, and a few other systems. I'm not a great GM, but I'm OK.
In my current D&D 5e campaign, I [mistakenly, I now believe] let a player take a Tunnel Fighter with a Polearm Master Feat. He and the rest of the party are currently 3rd level. I'm having a problem balancing the combat. Any creature of the appropriate power level for the party's CR is unable to get through this zone of death the tunnel fighter creates. He literally can attack twice anywhere in a 625 sq ft area without action, bonus action, or reaction cost, for a total potential damage of 1d10+1d4+8. As a GM, I'm getting frustrated that I can't make the combat powerful enough to establish the tension without having to employ creatures that can one-shot most of the party. Even if I were willing to do that, it's almost impossible to do without sacrificing the overall story immersion (what is a red dragon doing in this tavern?!). I could use advice, if you wouldn't mind.
Fighting Style: Tunnel Fighter (Class: Fighter 1): You excel at defending narrow passages, doorways, and other tight spaces. As a bonus action, you can enter a defensive stance that lasts until the start of your next turn. While in your defensive stance, you can make opportunity attacks without using your reaction, and you can use your reaction to make a melee attack against a creature that moves more than 5ft while within your reach.
Polearm Master (Feat: Human Racial): You can keep your enemies at bay with reach weapons. You gain the following benefits: 1) When you take the Attack action and attack with only a glaive, halberd, or quarterstaff, you can use a bonus action to make a melee attack with the opposite end of the weapon. This attack uses the same ability modifier as the primary weapon. The weapon’s damage die for this attack is a d4, and the attack deals bludgeoning damage. 2) While you are wielding a glaive, halberd, pike, or quarterstaff, other creatures provoke an opportunity attack from you when they enter the reach you have with that weapon.
Part of your problem is not applying the rules properly.
When you take the Attack action and attack with only a glaive, halberd, or quarterstaff, you can use a bonus action to make a melee attack with the opposite end of the weapon.
While in your defensive stance, you can make opportunity attacks without using your reaction, and you can use your reaction to make a melee attack against a creature that moves more than 5ft while within your reach.
The Tunnel Fighter style allows you to make a melee attack,not take the Attack action. So it would NOT allow the fighter to make two attacks when using the Fighting Style. In addition, an opportunity attack is NOT an attack action - so in neither of these cases can the first portion of the polearm master feat come into play. That is only for when they take the Attack ACTION on their turn.
However yes, they are able to spend their bonus action to make semi-endless opportunity attacks, and the range for those opportunity attacks is 10ft, not 5ft. The solution to this? Have more ranged creatures in your combat. Have them aim to take out the Fighter from a distance. Use spells that knock creatures prone, and then let your skirmishers and tanks move past the Fighter while they are prone.
I'm not sure where you've gotten the 625 sq ft area though. The fighter's area is 10ft around them with the Polearm Master feat, and IF they use their bonus action to take the defensive stance they can do multiple attacks (not attack actions) between their turn and the next.
If they want this boon every turn, sure, they can spend their BA. That gives them endless opportunity attacks IF enemies decide to move through the Fighter's 10ft. space. They can't use Second Wind if they do. If they have BAs from Battle Master? Can't use those. BAs from any items? Nope. So why not have the fighter waste their BA, and have the enemies not activate these features? Why are the enemies inviting these attacks constantly? Your monsters can be smarter than that.
I totally get your frustration about a player min/max optimizing their character, I had a player once take the find familiar ritual (owl) specifically so they could scout and never be ambushed.
I wanted so badly to "beat" my intelligent player's decision to thwart any attempt at surprising them, I tried to outwit him by having his owl killed, captured or dispelled. Then he'd just redo the ritual or dismiss the familiar... Instead I rewarded him with finding things like the one time the owl spotted a broken down wagon train, they avoided the "obvious trap" and learned later that the food for the nearby town's festival was stolen as the caravan delivering it was looted by nearby monsters which in turn also killed all the guards and merchants...the players had to then explain why they avoided it.... There was also this one time they avoided an obvious ambush...that's it...the scouting worked like it was supposed to, the players were happy, the game moved forward.
The answer here is counter intuitive: Let them have their cake and eat them...
The player clearly wanted to take advantage of a situation that is quite common, dungeon passages are narrow and doors are plentiful. Congratulations your specialty shines like the proverbial beacon of hope and the party is going to thank you for it, until it doesn't. As mentioned earlier, change up the groupings of monsters so that there are a few more ranged units, make your creatures more tactical, use creatures that have the disengage ability, etc. There's also something else to take into account: why are you only ever fighting in doorways? There's a great big world out there with trees, lakes, boats, roads, magma, and the likes, why not move combat out of the dark dungeons and get a tan.
Also, don't know if anyone mentioned this, but make sure you are doing opportunity attacks correctly. An opportunity attack is only provoked when they move out of your reach.
Thank you for the feedback, MellieDM. It's all great information, particularly the difference between "Melee Attack" and "Attack Action". Regarding your question about the 625 sq ft: The fighter stands in his own 5' space. With his glaive (or any applicable reach weapon), he can affect two squares (10 ft) to any side, giving him an area of influence of 5 spaces by 5 spaces (25' by 25') with the fighter occupying the center space, equaling 625 sq ft., right?
Thank you for the feedback, MellieDM. It's all great information, particularly the difference between "Melee Attack" and "Attack Action". Regarding your question about the 625 sq ft: The fighter stands in his own 5' space. With his glaive (or any applicable reach weapon), he can affect two squares (10 ft) to any side, giving him an area of influence of 5 spaces by 5 spaces (25' by 25') with the fighter occupying the center space, equaling 625 sq ft., right?
Ah, so you don't use the optional rule for Diagonal movement as described with the Dungeon Masters Guide? I personally prefer it because it isn't too complicated to understand and solves the above problem regarding unrealistic amounts of reach and range.
Because ultimately "Reach" follows the same rules as movement and range when it comes to calculating which squares can and cannot be hit by a creature. I'm not sure what the Code of Conduct is regarding copying snippets of a Rule book, so I'll just paraphrase the Optional Rule:
When measuring range, movement or reach on a grid, the first diagonal square counts as 5 feet of range, the second diagonal square counts as 10 feet. This pattern alternates back and forth for each diagonal after that.
What this means in your case is the Fighter's reach would not include the four "corners" of the 5 space by 5 space square. Which results in an actual 500 sq ft "reach". I removed the 25 sq ft reach that the fighter occupies himself since an enemy cannot occupy the same space as you.
Also, you could pull the whole "Read as Intended" interpretation of the Tunnel Fighter's fighting style and not allow him to enter defensive stances if he is not "defending narrow passages, doorways, and other tight spaces." So include combats in wide open areas that limit his ability to utilize the Tunnel Fighter's fighting style. Now don't do this too often, since that could frustrate him and ask "well why am I even a Tunnel Fighter if I can't even use my subclass's features?", but it would allow other party members to shine in combat.
Furthermore, I always include caveat's when allowing Unearthed Arcana content with my players. I let them know they can use Unearthed Arcana, but it is subject to change if:
I feel it is too powerful that it is making it too difficult to balance combats
A new Unearthed Arcana comes out tweaking the subclass you are using.
Obviously that might be too late for you since you've already allowed it and I doubt you included those restrictions. You could also just pull him aside and talk to him about the Tunnel Fighter archetype and how you feel it may be causing a party imbalance. I doubt the player is doing it intentionally.
Is it just me, but where the heck does Tunnel Fighter come from? I think I own all the everything on this site and it isn't here anywhere. I assume that it is UA or homebrew, so you are currently involved in playtesting that feature and you have just discovered that it fails when combined with the Polearm feat (and that feat does have a habit of breaking things). If all this is the case then you the DM giveth and you the DM taketh away. Explain to the player that this combo is clearly broken and cannot continue. Allow them to choose any other feat or fighting style to replace one of these, or else declare that the two features do not work in combination: change the text of Tunnel Fighter to read "While in your defensive stance, you can make opportunity attacks against any hostile creature that you can see that moves out of your reach without using your reaction, and you can..."
This should satisfy someone who isn't being a min-max jerk, as the only other viable option is a continuous arms race between DM and player, and that will be hell for the other players in the party who will find themselves facing creatures well beyond their own abilities.
As always with Unearthed Arcana material, please be aware that it is play test material and, as with this fighting style, was deemed unsuitable for inclusion in published books.
The combination with Polearm Master seems to be especially problematic due to the following line in the tunnel fighter style:
you can use your reaction to make a melee attack against a creature that moves more than 5 feet while within your reach.
Honestly though, that is once per round.
You can have 4 monsters move up to attack the character and only the first of those monsters will be subject to the reaction attack (and it's just a single attack).
Are the other characters all hiding just behind the fighter in a tight group, so they are in his "zone of defense"? Throw some area effect spells at them.
Don't punish the fighter every fight - let their combination work well when the situation should dictate it and they are actually trying to hold an area to prevent monsters from bursting through - as others have mentioned, excepting the one reaction per round, the attack of opportunity only triggers when monsters LEAVE the reach of the character and a monster taking the disengage action can thwart that.
The real issue with the combo is this from the feat "While you are wielding a glaive, halberd, pike, or quarterstaff, other creatures provoke an opportunity attack from you when they enter your reach" combined with the unlimited opportunity attacks from Tunnel Fighter (without using your reaction). This means every single creature that tries to approach or pass the fighter takes a hit, plus the fighters actual reaction chosen against any one of them - and that is just on the monsters' turns. In any tunnel less than 25ft wide, this guy is a whirlwind of a glaive slicing up infinite small enemies as they arrive. Even against a strong creature he gets two opportunity strikes before the monster even reaches close range. The amount of effort needed to choose exactly the perfect enemies to counter that combo is ridiculous.
The text I suggest adding to Tunnel Fighter at least breaks the unlimited source of opportunity attacks on approaching enemies without otherwise affecting the published feat.
I have been a DM a couple of times mostly being taught by my friend. What I find is helpful in Balancing the Combat is getting a certain type of monster and the amount of players is equal to the number of monsters there is.
(I would make the creatures challenge rating 1 level higher than the highest level player)
Sorry if this is a bit confusing but I tried to put it in simple words...
The real issue with the combo is this from the feat "While you are wielding a glaive, halberd, pike, or quarterstaff, other creatures provoke an opportunity attack from you when they enter your reach" combined with the unlimited opportunity attacks from Tunnel Fighter (without using your reaction).
Ah, I'd missed that - seems a clear case of these two features being extremely incompatible for game balance and there's a need to discuss with the player concerned and modify how tunnel fighter works.
Alright here's the flow of the class and feat, broken down for emphasis on each of the particular points that have made this thread possible.
Polearm Master:
When you take the Attack action and attack with only a glaive, halberd, or quarterstaff, you can use a bonus action to make a melee attack with the opposite end of the weapon.
While you are wielding a glaive, halberd, pike, or quarterstaff, other creatures provoke an opportunity attack from you when they enter your reach.
Tunnel Fighter:
As a bonus action, you can enter a defensive stance that lasts until the start of your next turn.
While in your defensive stance, you can make opportunity attacks without using your reaction,
and you can use your reaction to make a melee attack against a creature that moves more than 5 feet while within your reach.
PHB 195 Opportunity Attacks:
You can make an opportunity attack when a hostile creature that you can see moves out of your reach. To make the opportunity attack, you use your reaction to make one melee attack against the provoking creature. The attack interrupts the provoking creature’s movement, occurring right before the creature leaves your reach.
Problem 1: Other creatures provoke an opportunity attack from you when they enter your reach. + While in your defensive stance, you can make opportunity attacks without using your reaction.
How I see it works:
A creature enters the 10 ft threat range of the player and Polearm Master triggers and the player rolls to hit because of the granted Opportunity Attack. An attack roll is made and the reaction is used for that turn. Any other creature can enter the threat range after and Polearm Master will trigger. Because you have used your reaction for the turn, no OA can be taken.
The player enters Defensive Stance. The reaction is still available due to Tunnel Fighter. Any other creature can enter the threat range and will in turn trigger Polearm Master. Because you are in Defensive Stance the Tunnel Fighter ability allows you to take an OA on each creature that enters the threat range.
Solution: You have one OA, a creature can enter your threat range once. Ranged attackers and spell casters never have to enter threat range. Outdoor encounters don't have doors/tunnels. Blink, phasing, burrowing, and sneak attack come to mind for ways around this.
Problem 2: While in your defensive stance, you can make opportunity attacks without using your reaction. + While in your defensive stance, you can use your reaction to make a melee attack against a creature that moves more than 5 feet while within your reach.
How I see it works:
A creature moves around you to flank, moving 10 ft. around, but not away, from you. The player is not in a Defensive Stance so nothing happens.
The player is in a Defensive Stance. You are granted an Opportunity Attack due to Tunnel Fighter. You do not lose your reaction due to Tunnel Fighter.
The creature continues to move around you. You do not get another OA on that creature. You can get an OA against any other creature which moves more than 5 ft. while in your reach.
A creature moves 5 ft. away from you, you are not granted an Opportunity Attack as it is still in range of your attacks.
Defensive Stance does not alter this.
A creature moves 10 ft. away from you. You are not granted an Opportunity Attack as it is still in range of your attacks.
The player has taken a Defensive Stance. You are granted an OA because of Tunnel Fighter. The reaction for the turn is not used and any other OA event may trigger.
The creature continues to move after the OA. You are not granted another OA since the trigger has already been fulfilled for that creature.
A creature moves more than 10 ft. away from you. You are granted an Opportunity Attack as the creature has attempted to leave your threat range. No additional OA is granted because you are not in a Defensive Stance.
The player has taken a Defensive Stance. You are granted an OA from Tunnel Fighter for moving more than 5 ft. and an additional OA from trying leave your threat range.
Solution: A creature can maneuver in 5 ft. increments, negating the second problem in full until it attempts to leave the player's threat range. Ranged attackers and spell casters never have to enter threat range. Outdoor encounters don't have doors/tunnels. Fly-by, disengage, blink, phasing, and burrowing come to mind for ways around this.
Problem 3: When you take the Attack action and attack with only a glaive, halberd, or quarterstaff, you can use a bonus action to make a melee attack with the opposite end of the weapon.
Solution: This is not a problem as it only allows for the Attack action to trigger this, Opportunity Attacks are a separate action.
I am not a rules lawyer, I don't argue points at the table, but I do like to min/max my characters and break the game when I can. The way I see this player's build there really isn't anything game breaking.
Solution: A creature can maneuver in 5 ft. increments, negating the second problem in full until it attempts to leave the player's threat range. Ranged attackers and spell casters never have to enter threat range. Outdoor encounters don't have doors/tunnels. Fly-by, disengage, blink, phasing, and burrowing come to mind for ways around this.
The Five-Foot Step rule isn't in 5e. Now granted you could always house rule it back in, but it isn't a core rule. That being said, one solution is to use rogues that have Cunning Action to disengage, which prevents Opportunity Attacks all together. That being said, that can be countered if the Fighter gets the bright idea of taking the Sentinel feat
Solution: A creature can maneuver in 5 ft. increments, negating the second problem in full until it attempts to leave the player's threat range. Ranged attackers and spell casters never have to enter threat range. Outdoor encounters don't have doors/tunnels. Fly-by, disengage, blink, phasing, and burrowing come to mind for ways around this.
The Five-Foot Step rule isn't in 5e. Now granted you could always house rule it back in, but it isn't a core rule. That being said, one solution is to use rogues that have Cunning Action to disengage, which prevents Opportunity Attacks all together. That being said, that can be countered if the Fighter gets the bright idea of taking the Sentinel feat
You're absolutely correct it's not a rule, however it is possible to break your movements up as you see fit during your turn. With this it may be inferred that a player/creature could potentially choose to only use 5 ft. of it's movement during their turn.
The problem is this character has infinite attacks that a large number of enemies can't do much against. When this character is in their defensive stance they are granted one free attack against every single creature that either enters or leaves their rather large reach zone. If the other players are standing inside or behind that zone then they are all covered by this protection. The point of Tunnel Fighter is that you block a corridor by not letting anyone get through your zone without an opportunity attack, it is not designed to hit monsters that are targeting the Tunnel Fighter themself in melee. The point of Polearm Master is that you get one reaction strike against an enemy as it approaches, but this is reliant on reactions being a limited supply. The combination of the two results in attacks on everything that wants to get close, not even past the Tunnel Fighter. That is unprecedented. It clearly breaks the action economy and the monster choice for the DM is suddenly very restricted (against a level 3 party) such that the OP has felt the need to appeal to this forum for help. We are attempting to give advice, and mine is that if a player has used a combination of optional and non-published rules to break the game and make it harder for everyone except themselves to have fun, then you as DM are within your rights to revoke or amend what was granted.
You're absolutely correct it's not a rule, however it is possible to break your movements up as you see fit during your turn. With this it may be inferred that a player/creature could potentially choose to only use 5 ft. of it's movement during their turn.
Ah, I see what he was say. Yea that would work, though that is still a still a powerful "debuff" on the enemy.
The problem is this character has infinite attacks that a large number of enemies can't do much against. When this character is in their defensive stance they are granted one free attack against every single creature that either enters or leaves their rather large reach zone. If the other players are standing inside or behind that zone then they are all covered by this protection. The point of Tunnel Fighter is that you block a corridor by not letting anyone get through your zone without an opportunity attack, it is not designed to hit monsters that are targeting the Tunnel Fighter themself in melee. The point of Polearm Master is that you get one reaction strike against an enemy as it approaches, but this is reliant on reactions being a limited supply. The combination of the two results in attacks on everything that wants to get close, not even past the Tunnel Fighter. That is unprecedented. It clearly breaks the action economy and the monster choice for the DM is suddenly very restricted (against a level 3 party) such that the OP has felt the need to appeal to this forum for help. We are attempting to give advice, and mine is that if a player has used a combination of optional and non-published rules to break the game and make it harder for everyone except themselves to have fun, then you as DM are within your rights to revoke or amend what was granted.
Agreed. This is a broken combo. There is a reason that Tunnel Fighter was not progressed beyond as rather old UA. Moreover, even if it was a published fighting style, it clearly has caused a problem in the OP's game. I would suggest what others have said and allow the player to choose either the Feat or the fighting style. He shouldn't have both.
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Greetings all,
I'm recently back into the GM seat after an absence of about 20 years. I've GM'd D&D (multiple ed.), Shadowrun, Earthdawn, and a few other systems. I'm not a great GM, but I'm OK.
In my current D&D 5e campaign, I [mistakenly, I now believe] let a player take a Tunnel Fighter with a Polearm Master Feat. He and the rest of the party are currently 3rd level. I'm having a problem balancing the combat. Any creature of the appropriate power level for the party's CR is unable to get through this zone of death the tunnel fighter creates. He literally can attack twice anywhere in a 625 sq ft area without action, bonus action, or reaction cost, for a total potential damage of 1d10+1d4+8. As a GM, I'm getting frustrated that I can't make the combat powerful enough to establish the tension without having to employ creatures that can one-shot most of the party. Even if I were willing to do that, it's almost impossible to do without sacrificing the overall story immersion (what is a red dragon doing in this tavern?!). I could use advice, if you wouldn't mind.
Fighting Style: Tunnel Fighter (Class: Fighter 1): You excel at defending narrow passages, doorways, and other tight spaces. As a bonus action, you can enter a defensive stance that lasts until the start of your next turn. While in your defensive stance, you can make opportunity attacks without using your reaction, and you can use your reaction to make a melee attack against a creature that moves more than 5ft while within your reach.
Part of your problem is not applying the rules properly.
The Tunnel Fighter style allows you to make a melee attack, not take the Attack action. So it would NOT allow the fighter to make two attacks when using the Fighting Style. In addition, an opportunity attack is NOT an attack action - so in neither of these cases can the first portion of the polearm master feat come into play. That is only for when they take the Attack ACTION on their turn.
However yes, they are able to spend their bonus action to make semi-endless opportunity attacks, and the range for those opportunity attacks is 10ft, not 5ft. The solution to this? Have more ranged creatures in your combat. Have them aim to take out the Fighter from a distance. Use spells that knock creatures prone, and then let your skirmishers and tanks move past the Fighter while they are prone.
I'm not sure where you've gotten the 625 sq ft area though. The fighter's area is 10ft around them with the Polearm Master feat, and IF they use their bonus action to take the defensive stance they can do multiple attacks (not attack actions) between their turn and the next.
If they want this boon every turn, sure, they can spend their BA. That gives them endless opportunity attacks IF enemies decide to move through the Fighter's 10ft. space. They can't use Second Wind if they do. If they have BAs from Battle Master? Can't use those. BAs from any items? Nope. So why not have the fighter waste their BA, and have the enemies not activate these features? Why are the enemies inviting these attacks constantly? Your monsters can be smarter than that.
Lots of goblins. Or anyone who can take disengage as a bonus action so they don't take opportunity attacks based on movement.
I totally get your frustration about a player min/max optimizing their character, I had a player once take the find familiar ritual (owl) specifically so they could scout and never be ambushed.
I wanted so badly to "beat" my intelligent player's decision to thwart any attempt at surprising them, I tried to outwit him by having his owl killed, captured or dispelled. Then he'd just redo the ritual or dismiss the familiar... Instead I rewarded him with finding things like the one time the owl spotted a broken down wagon train, they avoided the "obvious trap" and learned later that the food for the nearby town's festival was stolen as the caravan delivering it was looted by nearby monsters which in turn also killed all the guards and merchants...the players had to then explain why they avoided it.... There was also this one time they avoided an obvious ambush...that's it...the scouting worked like it was supposed to, the players were happy, the game moved forward.
The answer here is counter intuitive: Let them have their cake and eat them...
The player clearly wanted to take advantage of a situation that is quite common, dungeon passages are narrow and doors are plentiful. Congratulations your specialty shines like the proverbial beacon of hope and the party is going to thank you for it, until it doesn't. As mentioned earlier, change up the groupings of monsters so that there are a few more ranged units, make your creatures more tactical, use creatures that have the disengage ability, etc. There's also something else to take into account: why are you only ever fighting in doorways? There's a great big world out there with trees, lakes, boats, roads, magma, and the likes, why not move combat out of the dark dungeons and get a tan.
Yep:
- fight in an open space instead of a hallway
- goblins etc.
- archers + ranged attacks
Also, don't know if anyone mentioned this, but make sure you are doing opportunity attacks correctly. An opportunity attack is only provoked when they move out of your reach.
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Thank you for the feedback, MellieDM. It's all great information, particularly the difference between "Melee Attack" and "Attack Action". Regarding your question about the 625 sq ft: The fighter stands in his own 5' space. With his glaive (or any applicable reach weapon), he can affect two squares (10 ft) to any side, giving him an area of influence of 5 spaces by 5 spaces (25' by 25') with the fighter occupying the center space, equaling 625 sq ft., right?
When measuring range, movement or reach on a grid, the first diagonal square counts as 5 feet of range, the second diagonal square counts as 10 feet. This pattern alternates back and forth for each diagonal after that.
What this means in your case is the Fighter's reach would not include the four "corners" of the 5 space by 5 space square. Which results in an actual 500 sq ft "reach". I removed the 25 sq ft reach that the fighter occupies himself since an enemy cannot occupy the same space as you.
Obviously that might be too late for you since you've already allowed it and I doubt you included those restrictions. You could also just pull him aside and talk to him about the Tunnel Fighter archetype and how you feel it may be causing a party imbalance. I doubt the player is doing it intentionally.
Is it just me, but where the heck does Tunnel Fighter come from? I think I own all the everything on this site and it isn't here anywhere. I assume that it is UA or homebrew, so you are currently involved in playtesting that feature and you have just discovered that it fails when combined with the Polearm feat (and that feat does have a habit of breaking things). If all this is the case then you the DM giveth and you the DM taketh away. Explain to the player that this combo is clearly broken and cannot continue. Allow them to choose any other feat or fighting style to replace one of these, or else declare that the two features do not work in combination: change the text of Tunnel Fighter to read "While in your defensive stance, you can make opportunity attacks against any hostile creature that you can see that moves out of your reach without using your reaction, and you can..."
This should satisfy someone who isn't being a min-max jerk, as the only other viable option is a continuous arms race between DM and player, and that will be hell for the other players in the party who will find themselves facing creatures well beyond their own abilities.
It looks that someone wrote about it 3 years ago
https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/72261/tunnel-fighter-polearm-master-indefinite-attacks-of-opportunity
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D&D Beyond FoundersThere's a lot of good ideas in this thread. :)
As reference, here's where Tunnel Fighter is from (Unearthed Arcana from 2015):
https://media.wizards.com/2015/downloads/dnd/02_UA_Underdark_Characters.pdf
As always with Unearthed Arcana material, please be aware that it is play test material and, as with this fighting style, was deemed unsuitable for inclusion in published books.
The combination with Polearm Master seems to be especially problematic due to the following line in the tunnel fighter style:
Honestly though, that is once per round.
You can have 4 monsters move up to attack the character and only the first of those monsters will be subject to the reaction attack (and it's just a single attack).
Are the other characters all hiding just behind the fighter in a tight group, so they are in his "zone of defense"? Throw some area effect spells at them.
Don't punish the fighter every fight - let their combination work well when the situation should dictate it and they are actually trying to hold an area to prevent monsters from bursting through - as others have mentioned, excepting the one reaction per round, the attack of opportunity only triggers when monsters LEAVE the reach of the character and a monster taking the disengage action can thwart that.
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If you need help with homebrew, please post on the homebrew forums, where multiple staff and moderators can read your post and help you!
"We got this, no problem! I'll take the twenty on the left - you guys handle the one on the right!"🔊
The real issue with the combo is this from the feat "While you are wielding a glaive, halberd, pike, or quarterstaff, other creatures provoke an opportunity attack from you when they enter your reach" combined with the unlimited opportunity attacks from Tunnel Fighter (without using your reaction). This means every single creature that tries to approach or pass the fighter takes a hit, plus the fighters actual reaction chosen against any one of them - and that is just on the monsters' turns. In any tunnel less than 25ft wide, this guy is a whirlwind of a glaive slicing up infinite small enemies as they arrive. Even against a strong creature he gets two opportunity strikes before the monster even reaches close range. The amount of effort needed to choose exactly the perfect enemies to counter that combo is ridiculous.
The text I suggest adding to Tunnel Fighter at least breaks the unlimited source of opportunity attacks on approaching enemies without otherwise affecting the published feat.
I have been a DM a couple of times mostly being taught by my friend. What I find is helpful in Balancing the Combat is getting a certain type of monster and the amount of players is equal to the number of monsters there is.
(I would make the creatures challenge rating 1 level higher than the highest level player)
Sorry if this is a bit confusing but I tried to put it in simple words...
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D&D Beyond FoundersPun-loving nerd | Faith Elisabeth Lilley | She/Her/Hers | Profile art by Becca Golins
If you need help with homebrew, please post on the homebrew forums, where multiple staff and moderators can read your post and help you!
"We got this, no problem! I'll take the twenty on the left - you guys handle the one on the right!"🔊
Alright here's the flow of the class and feat, broken down for emphasis on each of the particular points that have made this thread possible.
PHB 195 Opportunity Attacks:
You can make an opportunity attack when a hostile creature that you can see moves out of your reach. To make the opportunity attack, you use your reaction to make one melee attack against the provoking creature. The attack interrupts the provoking creature’s movement, occurring right before the creature leaves your reach.
Problem 1: Other creatures provoke an opportunity attack from you when they enter your reach. + While in your defensive stance, you can make opportunity attacks without using your reaction.
How I see it works:
Solution: You have one OA, a creature can enter your threat range once. Ranged attackers and spell casters never have to enter threat range. Outdoor encounters don't have doors/tunnels. Blink, phasing, burrowing, and sneak attack come to mind for ways around this.
Problem 2: While in your defensive stance, you can make opportunity attacks without using your reaction. + While in your defensive stance, you can use your reaction to make a melee attack against a creature that moves more than 5 feet while within your reach.
How I see it works:
Solution: A creature can maneuver in 5 ft. increments, negating the second problem in full until it attempts to leave the player's threat range. Ranged attackers and spell casters never have to enter threat range. Outdoor encounters don't have doors/tunnels. Fly-by, disengage, blink, phasing, and burrowing come to mind for ways around this.
Problem 3: When you take the Attack action and attack with only a glaive, halberd, or quarterstaff, you can use a bonus action to make a melee attack with the opposite end of the weapon.
Solution: This is not a problem as it only allows for the Attack action to trigger this, Opportunity Attacks are a separate action.
I am not a rules lawyer, I don't argue points at the table, but I do like to min/max my characters and break the game when I can. The way I see this player's build there really isn't anything game breaking.
You know what is better then one pc tunnel fighter with polearm master? Five gnolls with the same feats and some kobolds with bows ;)
The Five-Foot Step rule isn't in 5e. Now granted you could always house rule it back in, but it isn't a core rule. That being said, one solution is to use rogues that have Cunning Action to disengage, which prevents Opportunity Attacks all together. That being said, that can be countered if the Fighter gets the bright idea of taking the Sentinel feat
The problem is this character has infinite attacks that a large number of enemies can't do much against. When this character is in their defensive stance they are granted one free attack against every single creature that either enters or leaves their rather large reach zone. If the other players are standing inside or behind that zone then they are all covered by this protection. The point of Tunnel Fighter is that you block a corridor by not letting anyone get through your zone without an opportunity attack, it is not designed to hit monsters that are targeting the Tunnel Fighter themself in melee. The point of Polearm Master is that you get one reaction strike against an enemy as it approaches, but this is reliant on reactions being a limited supply. The combination of the two results in attacks on everything that wants to get close, not even past the Tunnel Fighter. That is unprecedented. It clearly breaks the action economy and the monster choice for the DM is suddenly very restricted (against a level 3 party) such that the OP has felt the need to appeal to this forum for help. We are attempting to give advice, and mine is that if a player has used a combination of optional and non-published rules to break the game and make it harder for everyone except themselves to have fun, then you as DM are within your rights to revoke or amend what was granted.