I am currently trying to make a homebrew subclass for barbarian with the following text. I would like to see if I am able to add this
You can use Dexterity instead of Strength for your melee attack and damage rolls while raging.

You would just write that and then maybe add a snippet to display the Dex mod. The system doesn’t automatically do anything when raging because it has no idea whose turn it is, how long it takes, or anything or the sort.

Now, if you’re asking is there a way to make the system default to Dex instead of Str for weapon that do not have the finesse property then the answer is no.

I would be careful with this. Fighter, rogue, and ranger do a pretty good job of covering DEX-based archetypes, so consider those classes as better bases for your subclass concept. Generally if you find yourself rewriting base class features as a part of your subclass, you're probably in the wrong class to begin with.

STR is a pretty core concept for barbarians, and their primary features - Rage, Unarmored Defense, Danger Sense, and Reckless Attack - were all written and balanced under the assumption that you're boosting STR as a primary stat. So were non-finesse weapons. A DEX barbarian would easily be the best defensive build in the game.

Quote from IamSposta >>

You would just write that and then maybe add a snippet to display the Dex mod. The system doesn’t automatically do anything when raging because it has no idea whose turn it is, how long it takes, or anything or the sort.

Now, if you’re asking is there a way to make the system default to Dex instead of Str for weapon that do not have the finesse property then the answer is no.

 Thank you for the help, I went with just flavour the rage damage as DEX

Quote from scatterbraind >>

I would be careful with this. Fighter, rogue, and ranger do a pretty good job of covering DEX-based archetypes, so consider those classes as better bases for your subclass concept. Generally if you find yourself rewriting base class features as a part of your subclass, you're probably in the wrong class to begin with.

STR is a pretty core concept for barbarians, and their primary features - Rage, Unarmored Defense, Danger Sense, and Reckless Attack - were all written and balanced under the assumption that you're boosting STR as a primary stat. So were non-finesse weapons. A DEX barbarian would easily be the best defensive build in the game.

 I understand the that Str is core to the barb, I decided just to change the rage damage to Dex, this is a for sub-sub class of a barb build, similar to the totem, so not a major core of the build. Thank you for your reply.