Superior Technique is by far the most common fighting style I take on any fighter and I have not played a battlemaster in years.
Superior technique is competitive in tier 1; expected damage from Brace is around 8, which equals dueling fighting style at 4 hits per short rest, which isn't an unreasonable assumption in tier 1. It falls behind significantly in tier 2, though.
I don't take brace and I agree it is not that powerful. I take menacing attack and quick toss both of which are relevant through tier 4 at least.
A hit with menacing attack severely restricts mobility for a round. For example beat a purple worm in initiative and hit him and he saves at -1 and can't move closer to the party for an entire turn, so unless a party member is stupid enough to close with the worm it is a lost turn for the worm. If a party member is stupid enough to close with the worm then it still attacks him disadvantage.
Quick Toss is an entire extra attack which can include a bonus from sneak attack or sharpshooter or any other damage rider. It is also an attack you can take as a bonus action without taking an action to attack on your turn. It is very, very rare to find abilities that let you make an attack as a bonus action without taking the attack action. Things like XBE, TWF, PAM and martial Arts are require you to take the attack action to make a bonus action attack. Quick toss does not. As I mentioned this is a huge buff for caster Rogues, even if you only can do it 3 times a day. Taking the martial adept feat with quick toss is essentially action surge for a caster Rogue.
The only weapon eligible for both Quick Toss and The damage bonus from Sharpshooter is the dart.
I know. Normally that is what you get if you have quick toss on a character with sharpshooter. I do this a lot with Arcane Archers. Use your bow to attack then fling your dart. With a Rogue it works with darts or daggers.
I have long said that the weapons need to be adjusted. If it were up to me, anything finesse would stay like it is, as would all bows. The higher damage Strength only weapons would all creep up slightly so a Greatsword would do 4d4 damage, and a Greataxe would do 2d8 damage; Polearms would come in at 1d12, the Longsword would be 2d4/2d6, the Battleaxe and Warhammer would both be 1d10/1d12, and then the Arming Sword would get added slotting in at 1d10. Light and Heavy Crossbows would also bump up 1 die size each, and I’d add in a few other weapons like Staff Slings and specialized equipment like Mancatchers. I’d also add in a small shield and a large shield too to make those folks happy. That all would help, and it would help rebalance Str Vs Dex a bit too.
You know, I actually like this idea. Strength is undervalued, because dexterity is just so much more useful and versatile.
Weapons should also get additional damage types. Longsword can chop and pierce. Warhammer can bludgeon and pierce (real warhammers always had a spike so that they could be used as a pick to pierce armor). That way martials can have some flexibility with enemy resistances and vulnerabilities.
I don't understand why you think you have to play one subclass. I guess I get why you don't want magic, but why can't you play a Cavalier or a Champion or a Samaurai?
Eldritch Knight is actually my favourite fighter subclass. However, what I have seen in this thread and others like it is an insistence that there is "already the Battle Master", so anyone who wants to play a fighter with any level of complexity already has their one subclass picked out for them. Of the others? Arcane Archer sucks, Banneret sucks, Cavalier is a good defender but doesn't have much complexity, Champion sucks, and Samurai is solid but extremely simple. Rune Knight and Echo Knight get kinda close to the level of complexity I want in a fighter but they both still end up being bonk bonk subclasses with a fun twist a couple times a day. None of the subclasses or playstyles in Barbarian and Monk come close to the in-the-moment interesting decision-making the Battle Master allows you to do.
What do you even mean by "sucks"? If you like the thematics of the class play it. ALL of those classes are viable in high level play, none of them are inherently too weak to contrinbute effectively.
I mean Champion is effectively just playing a base fighter, it gives you almost nothing in terms of actual features, only passives. And Banneret? Good loooooooord banneret is absolute trash. It "improves" your few existing class features - Second Wind, Action Surge, and Indomitable - by allowing you to use them on other people, but only when you also use them. So again, a few times per day, you get an extremely minor effect on top of your existing effects. Wow. The healing from Rallying Cry is negligible, especially since healing is so situation-dependant (if they're down, its indispensable; if they're up its basically pointless unless they literally can't take another hit - the difference between 0HP and 3HP is massive, while between 4HP and 7HP is minor and between 20HP and 23HP is nothing); its not a decision point, its just more vertical progression, and not even any useful vertical progression. Royal Envoy is cool, but a ribbon feature. Inspiring Surge is more vertical progression, plus it can be accomplished by a single maneuver (Commander's Strike) or half as many levels in Order Cleric, PLUS it's only actually of any use at all if you have a rogue in the party. Bulwark only works on half of the saves in the game (two of which are weak saves), AND it only works on AoE effects, almost all of which target physical saves, rather than mental saves.
IME Arcane Archer measures up to a battlemaster pretty darn well because their signature Arcane shot (grasping arrow) is substantially more powerful than any battlemaster maneuver and the combination of sharpshooter and curving shot is devastating even without arcane shot or maneuvers. .... and they can get battlemaster maneuvers on top of that through fighting style and feats .... which they have plenty of.
Echo knight has no limit to its manifest echo ability and Rune knights can throw out 2-5 Runes per short rest, so it is a lot more than a couple times a day for either of them, even at 3rd level.
Arcane Archer is okay, the effects are pretty decent, but you only get two uses per short rest. So once you've done your cool thing twice,,, that's it. You get two turns of combat where you can do cool stuff, and then you're a basic fighter until a short rest. It's also once per turn, so you can't even combine them in real way. Ever-Ready Shot doesnt even give you both uses back on initiative, it gives you one use back, so if you have more than one encounter before a short rest, you now get one turn of combat to do A Cool Thing and then you're a basic fighter again. Curving Shot is an okay feature, and you're right, using Curving Shot to get another chance at hitting with sharpshooter is pretty cool, but it is effectively An Extra Attack once per turn, as a bonus action, maybe, if you miss.
(Also, real quick, to clarify, my fighter rework? I have them maneuvers and also Power Attack at 5th level (-5/+10) alongside barbarians and monks, to replace GWM and Sharpshooter. I also removed their extra ASIs, because between getting a free feat at 1st level from background, maneuvers, AND power attack without feat tax, they are no longer as feat-hungry because they no longer lack any substantial class features beyond level 2)
Echo Knight has no limit to its manifest echo ability, which does allow for some interesting shenanigans, but this can be pretty solidly replicated by any illusion spell. However, it does have a limit on its Unleash Incarnation feature, which means you get,,, a maximum of 5 extra attacks,,, per day. You know who else gets that? War Domain Cleric. At 1st level. Yay. I will give Echo Knight props for the manifest echo ability, it does fundamentally change how you play that fighter - but, mirroring what Yurei has already said about the Echo Knight, a lot of people don't like the Echo Knight specifically because it fundamentally changes how you play the fighter.
Rune Knight I think is the closest a fighter subclass has come to doing what the battle master can do. However, their flavour is very magical and mystical, and there are a lot of people who want to play a fighter who is just Really Good At Weapons, to match the theme of the whole fighter class, and the only way to really do that is to play a Battle Master, which doesn't seem right.
Think about the math here - Two things per short rest is 6 times a day. That means you are using one maneuver out of every 3-4 turns in combat (3-4 turns in a fight on average, 2 fights in a short rest). It is more than that if you have fewer than average number of encounters (as most groups do).
Ywo things per short rest is only 6 times a day if you get your two short rests every single day. A lot of groups don't get that, because of the serious imbalance in what you regain from a short and long rest. Also, again, taking both your Fighting Style - the only decision point in the entirety of the fighter class - AND a feat to do A Cool Thing twice per short sucks. At that point take pick up Fey Touched, its a single feat PLUS its a half feat PLUS it gives you two cool things per day PLUS it lets you choose one of a great selection of spells - Bless and Hex in particular will be signifcantly more impactful to any character than the one maneuver per short rest you get from Martial Adept.
Also, if I could pick between using something 2 times per short rest (6/day) or just 6 times per day, I would pick 6 times per day without hesitation every single time. I want to be able to control when and how I use my features, and restricting my features, especially maneuvers which you can use multiple times in one turn, to twice per short rest? Effectively twice per combat? That's not enough. The Battle Master, for example, gives you six uses per SHORT rest, and since by 18th level you're attacking three times every turn and using Action Surge twice per short rest, you can potentially burn all of that in one single turn. You shouldn't, obviously, but it goes to show how few resources this actually is in the grand scheme of things, especially when at the same level (18th) you have wizards with 20 spell slots per day of varying levels and powers, a prepared spell list of 23 spells to choose from each day (compared to the Battle Master's 9 maneuvers known, which you can only replace once per level), a minimum of 40 spells in their spellbook to choose (against the BM's like 20 options), and again, They Have Wish. A wizard can just Wish to have infinite spell slots. They can do whatever the hell they want. In fact, a 13th level wizard can create an army of themselves with Simulacrum and play the rest of the campaign alone. Meanwhile, the Battle Master fighter gets to do,,, A Cool Thing,,, six times per short rest.
Superior Technique is by far the most common fighting style I take on any fighter and I have not played a battlemaster in years. Even if I am playing an Arcane Archer I am trading archery for Superior technique at 8th level because by that time I have curving shot and rarely miss. At 12th level picking up a 2nd die and being able to make 4 sharpshooter attacks using quick toss when your first three on your action hit is pretty awesome. Menacing Attack is also good on an Arcane Archer and in terms of Nova this beats the battlemaster-archer as you can use both an Arcane Shot and a maneuver on the same hit.
I don't take martial adept that often as a fighter until high levels, although I do take it with Arcane Tricksters or multiclass Rogue spellcasters every time I play one because it lets me cast an offensive spell like tashas laughter or mind whip and make a sneak attack in the same turn using a bonus action with quick toss. Tasha's hideous laughter in the first turn of combat without losing a sneak attack is huge and I can do that in roughly half of the fights (usually actually more than that).
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Quick Toss is an entire extra attack which can include a bonus from sneak attack or sharpshooter or any other damage rider (in addition the 1d6 you already get). It is also an attack you can take as a bonus action without taking an action to attack on your turn. It is very rare to find abilities that let you do this. Things like XBE, TWF, PAM and Martial Arts all require you to take the attack action to make a bonus action attack. Quick toss does not. As I mentioned this is a huge buff for caster Rogues, even if you only can do it 3 times a day. Taking the martial adept feat with quick toss is essentially action surge for a caster Rogue. Once you are at high level and sporting wands, a mace of terror, horn of Valhala etc this can be huge on any Rogue because he doesn't have to lose his sneak attack to use one of these items.
Lol. Lmao. In terms of nova, a Battle Master is still by far the strongest fighter. In terms of DPR, Battle Master is usually the strongest fighter, and a lot of that is because of Grappling Attack, Precision Attack, and Trip Attack, all of which boost to hit instead of damage. In terms of battlefield utility, Battle Master is arguably the strongest fighter because of things like Grappling Attack and Menacing Attack (Rune Knight I'd say is a close second). And, again, Battle Master benefits more from Superior Technique and Martial Adept than any other character in the game. The Cavalier is arguably better at tanking, because of Unwavering Mark, but that's about it.
HOWEVER, paladins beat them in nova, literally any spellcaster beats them in battlefield utility by so many orders of magnitude its not even worth counting, and barbarians (especially Ancestral Guardian) tank better than fighters. On top of that, they all get more class features than the fighter, allowing them (maybe not the barbarian, they also got shafted) to actually take part in the game mechanically outside of combat, whereas the fighter gets,,, the exact same actions as everyone else does, and nothing more.
Also, Quick Shot is unironically redundant on fighters. The Thrown Weapon Fighting style already lets you draw thrown weapons as part of the attack, and you can already make attacks with thrown weapons as a bonus action as part of Two-Weapon Fighting. And, since you can add other maneuvers to thrown weapon attacks, the damage is irrelevant. Literally the only thing Quick Shot lets you do is take another fighting style, or make An Attack with your modifier Once Per Rest, compared to an infinite number of attacks for no extra cost.
Edit: forgot to mention Quick Toss on caster rogues. That is fair, it's a very good feature for them that unlocks a lot of different things. Once per short rest. As a feat - because they don't get fighting styles, so you're either choosing it through Martial Adept or Fighting Initiate (Martial Adept is better, it gives you two maneuvers known instead of one, but it still only lets you use them once per short rest). And even then, it isn't a fighter, AND its a caster. So yes, it is very good for Arcane Trickster rogues, but that's not what we're discussing here, we're discussing fighters.
A hit with menacing attack severely restricts mobility for a round. For example beat a purple worm in initiative and hit him and he can't move closer to the party for an entire round, so unless a party member is stupid enough to close with the worm it is a lost turn for the worm. If a party member is stupid enough to close with the worm then it still attacks him disadvantage. Canceling damage from a purple worm is an awesome 1-round debuff. If you are getting 3 attacks a turn, dueling is doing about 40 points extra damage between short rests if every attack hits (or probably 35 more realistically). At the levels you get 3 attacks, taking a turn away from a melee enemy once per short rest is better than 40 more damage per short rest I think. Even if you can't keep him from attacking making him roll attacks and skill checks at disadavantage for a round is probably worth about as much as 40 damage. Obviously it depends on the exact situation.
Menacing Attack is pretty cool! The frightened condition is quite nice in many many levels of play, especially since a looot of monsters don't have ranged attacks (I think they should personally). Unrelated, did you know that there are 11 spells that cause the frightened condition through all tiers of play, some of which target massive areas, on top of all the other class and subclass features that impose fear (looking at you, Oath of Conquest Paladin). Also unrelated, did you know that the Blinded, Charmed, Exhausted, Incapacitated, Paralysed, Petrified, Stunned and Unconscious conditions are all stronger than Frightened, and the Battle Master has exactly zero maneuvers that inflict any of those? Meanwhile, there are like 50 something spells that can inflict any number of those conditions, again onto massive areas?
Minor rant, but I promise its relevant:
I really like maneuvers, because it kind of closes the gap between martials and casters when it comes to unique combinations, decisions, and playstyles. However, it is nowhere near as strong as literally taking a couple levels of Any Spellcasting Class. Anything a Battle Master can do, a caster can do better. At least they have their sustained DPR, right? At least they can take down that ancient dragon, like St George or Perseus or any other number of myths? Ah, wait, not the wizard wished the dragon out of existence, or True Polymorphed it into a frog and locked it in a cage at the bottom of the ocean for it to die, or Forcecaged it for an hour without concentration while the party sat just out of its breath range and sniped it, or,,, not to mention that, with any level of armour training (mountain dwarf, an armour feat, even a single level dip in fighter lmao) and Shield, almost any caster can have a better AC than any martial; since Constitution is important for concentration, most spellcasters have a high Con too. Fundamentally, the problem with D&D is that, regardless of what you pick, regardless of what race/class combo you go with, however many magic items you give, a party of four spellcasters will be able to do any and everything a party of martials can do, better, easier, and for longer. You need a tank? Paladin or Druid. Skill monkey? Bard. Healer? Cleric, though its not as if any martial has the capacity to heal anyway. Problem solver? Wizard. Damage dealer? Paladin again. I want to add maneuvers to fighters because I believe it will somewhat close the thematic gap between martials and casters (as I've explained elsewhere) but when it comes to balance it is still just another stopgap measure.
I have long said that the weapons need to be adjusted. If it were up to me, anything finesse would stay like it is, as would all bows. The higher damage Strength only weapons would all creep up slightly so a Greatsword would do 4d4 damage, and a Greataxe would do 2d8 damage; Polearms would come in at 1d12, the Longsword would be 2d4/2d6, the Battleaxe and Warhammer would both be 1d10/1d12, and then the Arming Sword would get added slotting in at 1d10. Light and Heavy Crossbows would also bump up 1 die size each, and I’d add in a few other weapons like Staff Slings and specialized equipment like Mancatchers. I’d also add in a small shield and a large shield too to make those folks happy. That all would help, and it would help rebalance Str Vs Dex a bit too.
You know, I actually like this idea. Strength is undervalued, because dexterity is just so much more useful and versatile.
Weapons should also get additional damage types. Longsword can chop and pierce. Warhammer can bludgeon and pierce (real warhammers always had a spike so that they could be used as a pick to pierce armor). That way martials can have some flexibility with enemy resistances and vulnerabilities.
Agreed, most weapons should have multiple damage types, and different armors should be better against different damage types, but then it’ll be too much like 2e and people will complain. That’s why damage type is generally so irrelevant when it comes to the distinction between B, P, and S. Very few monsters care one way or another which one you use.
I have long said that the weapons need to be adjusted. If it were up to me, anything finesse would stay like it is, as would all bows. The higher damage Strength only weapons would all creep up slightly so a Greatsword would do 4d4 damage, and a Greataxe would do 2d8 damage; Polearms would come in at 1d12, the Longsword would be 2d4/2d6, the Battleaxe and Warhammer would both be 1d10/1d12, and then the Arming Sword would get added slotting in at 1d10. Light and Heavy Crossbows would also bump up 1 die size each, and I’d add in a few other weapons like Staff Slings and specialized equipment like Mancatchers. I’d also add in a small shield and a large shield too to make those folks happy. That all would help, and it would help rebalance Str Vs Dex a bit too.
You know, I actually like this idea. Strength is undervalued, because dexterity is just so much more useful and versatile.
Weapons should also get additional damage types. Longsword can chop and pierce. Warhammer can bludgeon and pierce (real warhammers always had a spike so that they could be used as a pick to pierce armor). That way martials can have some flexibility with enemy resistances and vulnerabilities.
Agreed, most weapons should have multiple damage types, and different armors should be better against different damage types, but then it’ll be too much like 2e and people will complain. That’s why damage type is generally so irrelevant when it comes to the distinction between B, P, and S. Very few monsters care one way or another which one you use.
I really like that monsters don’t care one way or another, otherwise you get to that golf bag phenomenon from earlier editions. It was fun for a minute, but ended up just being a hassle of swapping your sword for your hammer sometimes and not really meaning much beyond saying that. Though multiple damage types on a single weapon as you are suggesting would help mitigate that. But rather than doing it on the monster end, I would love to see expanded feats on the player end similar to crusher/slasher/piercer. Personally, I find those a great example of an optional way to add a bit of complexity and give martials some more things to do in a fight. I wouldn’t even mind more of a weapon-specific set of feats, rather than damage type feats. Which maybe we’re getting. Crawford did say we’d see weapons doing things we haven’t seen before.
I absolutely hate that the weapon in your hands means absolutely nothing and has dick-all bupkis nada impact on how you play and fight. Somebody with a shortsword and a large shield should be an entirely different style than somebody with a rapier and a buckler but in D&D? Nah. Those two are absolutely 100% identical in every single way. Hammers and other bludgeons should not be the exact same god damned thing as slashing armaments, but they are. It's dumb, and it makes combat deeply boring and aggravating.
What’s really childish is the reactionary arguments made by people supposing to protect new players from optional features that would in no way impact them if they didn’t want them too, while not one ‘new player’ has posted on the thread to say ‘I need/ed a simple fighter to learn D&D’.
Wait, what? I literally posted several times saying that I needed exactly that to learn D&D. Many of my players have had similar experiences, but you are unlikely to see anyone who is new to a game posting to a discussion forum for something they just learned and don't fully understand. In short, there are many new players like me who needed Fighter, but you are unlikely to see any of them here. To be honest though, I do find it a bit frustrating that you said no one on this thread needed Fighter to help them adjust to the game when I literally explained, several times, that I needed exactly that when I was a new player. Also, not everyone may feel comfortable saying "I struggled/am struggling with learning the rules of the game and this helped me/is helping me overcome that challenge." Telling people they have to share something that they feel sensitive about and that they are "childish" if they don't do so is both impolite and hurtful.
I wasn’t referring to the new players as childish. I was referring to reactionary arguments saying optional complexity on the fighter shouldn’t be allowed because it will harm new players’ experience.
My apologies. I didn’t see you posting about how you needed the simple fighter to learn the game.
I absolutely hate that the weapon in your hands means absolutely nothing and has dick-all bupkis nada impact on how you play and fight. Somebody with a shortsword and a large shield should be an entirely different style than somebody with a rapier and a buckler but in D&D? Nah. Those two are absolutely 100% identical in every single way. Hammers and other bludgeons should not be the exact same god damned thing as slashing armaments, but they are. It's dumb, and it makes combat deeply boring and aggravating.
I agree, it’s just a tough line to walk. The current version where it does nothing is boring. The 1e version, with a chart of weapon modifiers vs. different ac (that no one ever used, at least in my experience) didn’t work either. There’s got to be someplace in the middle. This did get me thinking about the 3e fighter who had access to weapon focus feats (bonus to hit with only a specific weapon) and weapon specialization feats (bonus to damage, but only to a weapon you had focus on already). It was a little edge fighters got that other classes didn’t. At least, I think maybe anyone could take focus, but only fighters could take specialization. The down side was they became must-take feats. Technically they were a choice, but they were a choice that everyone playing a fighter basically had to take, so not really a choice at all. Maybe they could just bake those in as a class feature. Pick one weapon as a fighter and you’ll keep getting better with it. It’s not the complexity people are after, but it would be something to set them apart from other martials.
I absolutely hate that the weapon in your hands means absolutely nothing and has dick-all bupkis nada impact on how you play and fight. Somebody with a shortsword and a large shield should be an entirely different style than somebody with a rapier and a buckler but in D&D? Nah. Those two are absolutely 100% identical in every single way. Hammers and other bludgeons should not be the exact same god damned thing as slashing armaments, but they are. It's dumb, and it makes combat deeply boring and aggravating.
Especially since any tiny mechanical difference being obliterated by the fact that almost every monster that is immune/resistant to one of the weapon damage types is immune/resistant to all of them.
I absolutely hate that the weapon in your hands means absolutely nothing and has dick-all bupkis nada impact on how you play and fight. Somebody with a shortsword and a large shield should be an entirely different style than somebody with a rapier and a buckler but in D&D? Nah. Those two are absolutely 100% identical in every single way. Hammers and other bludgeons should not be the exact same god damned thing as slashing armaments, but they are. It's dumb, and it makes combat deeply boring and aggravating.
Especially since any tiny mechanical difference being obliterated by the fact that almost every monster that is immune/resistant to one of the weapon damage types is immune/resistant to all of them.
This is really the crux of the problem of strategic combat in 5e. Monsters need way more variable damage resistances and immunities - oozes should be resistant to piercing & slashing, things with hard shells (e.g. turtles, bulettes) should be resistant to slashing, things with thick layers of fat (whales, walruses, etc..) should be resistant to piercing & bludgeoning, things with thick fur coats should be resistant to bludgeoning, etc..... [there also need to be way more things resistant to force damage, psychic damage and radiant damage]. And magical weapons should NOT be the instant solve-all for overcoming resistances.
Also there should be way more creatures that have a "regenerates X hp at the start of their turn unless they take Y damage", and way more creatures with a "If they take Z damage ability A recharges". To really incentivize both casters and martials to have and use many different options.
I absolutely hate that the weapon in your hands means absolutely nothing and has dick-all bupkis nada impact on how you play and fight. Somebody with a shortsword and a large shield should be an entirely different style than somebody with a rapier and a buckler but in D&D? Nah. Those two are absolutely 100% identical in every single way. Hammers and other bludgeons should not be the exact same god damned thing as slashing armaments, but they are. It's dumb, and it makes combat deeply boring and aggravating.
Especially since any tiny mechanical difference being obliterated by the fact that almost every monster that is immune/resistant to one of the weapon damage types is immune/resistant to all of them.
This is really the crux of the problem of strategic combat in 5e. Monsters need way more variable damage resistances and immunities - oozes should be resistant to piercing & slashing, things with hard shells (e.g. turtles, bulettes) should be resistant to slashing, things with thick layers of fat (whales, walruses, etc..) should be resistant to piercing & bludgeoning, things with thick fur coats should be resistant to bludgeoning, etc..... [there also need to be way more things resistant to force damage, psychic damage and radiant damage]. And magical weapons should NOT be the instant solve-all for overcoming resistances.
Also there should be way more creatures that have a "regenerates X hp at the start of their turn unless they take Y damage", and way more creatures with a "If they take Z damage ability A recharges". To really incentivize both casters and martials to have and use many different options.
I agree that would be interesting and fun, but I don’t think it’s the crux of the problem, at least for martials - that’s the short sword and large shield versus rapier and buckler problem Yurei mentioned earlier. A warhammer should not be essentially identical to a rapier. Dexterity should not be superior to strength.
And magical weapons should NOT be the instant solve-all for overcoming resistances.
People found the golf bag of weapons in 3.5e extremely annoying. Also, bringing the right weapon to a fight isn't really a tactical decision, it's preparation.
And magical weapons should NOT be the instant solve-all for overcoming resistances.
People found the golf bag of weapons in 3.5e extremely annoying. Also, bringing the right weapon to a fight isn't really a tactical decision, it's preparation.
There is other options. For example, dual-wielding could become more viable if in one hand you had a warhammer and the other a longsword - that’s two of the three covered (I know according to the UA that’s impossible, but that might change). Or there could be fighter options to temporarily or limited-use bypass resistances. Or a spell.
What the heck kinda game are you playing where a single attack could drop 1/3 of a Fighter’s HP?!? I hope to God you don’t run monsters with Multiattack or your players are absolutely boned. Round 1, the tank drops, round 2 the striker drops, round 3 the spellcasters run away because if a single hit will strip a fighter of 1/3 of their HP, then it’ll drop 3/3 of a Wizard’s HP.
I play with optimizers, so each attack by a monster has ~30% chance to hit [b/c of min-maxing AC to 23-25 at mid-tiers] if they don't have disadvantage (which they do ~50% of the time), around 50% of monsters in a combat will fall victim to battlefield control and/or positioning making them unable to attack the players or will get NOVAed out of existence before they take a turn in combat. Combat usually lasts only 3-4 rounds and 80% of the party has Healing Word so dropping a character to 0 HP has almost 0 effect on the player's action economy. So yeah, in my combats with only 3-4 monsters each monster has a 50:50 shot of downing a player each round to make the combat actually challenging.
Why are you guys so hung up on power and battlefield on control options if those effects aren't making decisive differences in your combat? If a monster having DA on attacks or not isn't the difference between a player getting dropped to 0 hp or not then why would you bother expending limited resources to cause a condition to make that monster have DA?
Also, it's worth noting that many (real world) weapons could be used to inflict multiple damage types. A longsword can definitely inflict slashing and piercing damage quite well, but it can also inflict bludgeoning damage - just...less successfully. You flip it over, grab it by the blade and bash your opponent with the pommel. Done.
One of the benefits of certain kinds of polearms was that they were designed to *effectively* produce multiple kinds of damage, penetrate certain kinds of armor, and so forth. The golfbag of weapons gets *much* smaller when a single weapon (like a poleaxe) can function as a double-ended, reach, armor-penetrating, tripping, slashing, piercing, and bludgeoning weapon.
Also, it's worth noting that many (real world) weapons could be used to inflict multiple damage types. A longsword can definitely inflict slashing and piercing damage quite well, but it can also inflict bludgeoning damage - just...less successfully. You flip it over, grab it by the blade and bash your opponent with the pommel. Done.
One of the benefits of certain kinds of polearms was that they were designed to *effectively* produce multiple kinds of damage, penetrate certain kinds of armor, and so forth. The golfbag of weapons gets *much* smaller when a single weapon (like a poleaxe) can function as a double-ended, reach, armor-penetrating, tripping, slashing, piercing, and bludgeoning weapon.
Right. Which is exactly why real world armies eventually evolved to only have 3 types of soldiers - Ranged, Polearms, and Cavalry. And battles were just rock-paper-scissors for years. (Ranged beat melee, cavalry beat ranged, and polearms beat cavalry) They were simply the most effective options.
When firearms became simple enough to train, easy to mass produce, and accurate enough, they replaced all foot soldier's options. Armor started to disappear entirely. The only other troop type that remained was fast cavalry. And cannon started to take the place of the 3rd option in the rock-paper-scissors matches, being vulnerable to cavalry but powerful against foot soldiers.
When firearms got even more devastating, even cavalry was replaced with armored vehicles.
If we were to imagine a truly realistic DnD world, it would probably look more like the English Civil War than Arthurian legends. Or even later periods in earth history. And that's not even taking magic into account. But that's not the fantasy most people want.
What the heck kinda game are you playing where a single attack could drop 1/3 of a Fighter’s HP?!? I hope to God you don’t run monsters with Multiattack or your players are absolutely boned. Round 1, the tank drops, round 2 the striker drops, round 3 the spellcasters run away because if a single hit will strip a fighter of 1/3 of their HP, then it’ll drop 3/3 of a Wizard’s HP.
I play with optimizers, so each attack by a monster has ~30% chance to hit [b/c of min-maxing AC to 23-25 at mid-tiers] if they don't have disadvantage (which they do ~50% of the time), around 50% of monsters in a combat will fall victim to battlefield control and/or positioning making them unable to attack the players or will get NOVAed out of existence before they take a turn in combat. Combat usually lasts only 3-4 rounds and 80% of the party has Healing Word so dropping a character to 0 HP has almost 0 effect on the player's action economy. So yeah, in my combats with only 3-4 monsters each monster has a 50:50 shot of downing a player each round to make the combat actually challenging.
Why are you guys so hung up on power and battlefield on control options if those effects aren't making decisive differences in your combat? If a monster having DA on attacks or not isn't the difference between a player getting dropped to 0 hp or not then why would you bother expending limited resources to cause a condition to make that monster have DA?
Same thing with parties over 4 players. I find myself needing to create enemies that are capable of dropping everyone but a heavy front line player to 0 in one round just to challenge a group if I want to avoid other buffs like tripling the enemy HP to make combat go on for many many rounds to drain resources.
And magical weapons should NOT be the instant solve-all for overcoming resistances.
People found the golf bag of weapons in 3.5e extremely annoying. Also, bringing the right weapon to a fight isn't really a tactical decision, it's preparation.
That's only assuming you only have non-magical weapons. As soon as you have 3 different weapons that have 3 different magical properties that do different types of damage, it is now strategy which one you choose to use, because maybe halving the damage from your rapier is worth it if also deals 1d6 fire damage which stops the enemy regenerating 20 hp each round. Or maybe it's worth moving into melee to use your pike rather than throwing your hammer of returning if the enemy is resistant to bludgeoning damage. Or maybe you swap to the mace that gets 1d8 radiant damage bonus to stop the zombies' undead fortitude even if it deal less overall damage than the flametongue greatsword...
I agree that would be interesting and fun, but I don’t think it’s the crux of the problem, at least for martials - that’s the short sword and large shield versus rapier and buckler problem Yurei mentioned earlier. A warhammer should not be essentially identical to a rapier. Dexterity should not be superior to strength.
But they are identical because almost all enemies treat b/s/p identically. If they didn't then those would not be the same. A warhammer + Crusher is very different from a rapier + Piercer. But why should the base weapons be hugely different? Almost all weapons are some version of "Hit guy with physical thing until it hurt them." And have only relatively minor differences in style -> hitting a guy in plate armour with a longsword isn't significantly different from hitting them with a mace. And polearms are generally interchangeable since their main feature was having a spiky thing at the end of a long pole to skewer a charging horse.
There is room for more diversity in armour though.... a large shield that gives +3 AC but -10 ft movement speed a regular shield with +2 AC that limits the DEX bonus to your AC to +2 and a light shield +1 AC with no penalties
.....would make sense. And more options for turning monster hides into magical armour (aside from dragon scale mail) would be very welcome.
Impose a myriad of various conditions on your enemies from blinded to unconscious
Cast spells to control the battlefield
And do lots of cool stuff outside of combat too
Ain’t nobody’s fault but yorn that all ya do is spam magic missile and cower.
And most of your list of what you do in melee is a rinse & repeat of:
grapple/shove
move
attack
LOL, You've never played a druid have you? Massive devastating spells? like what? Wall of Fire that is both more expensive and inferior in every way to Fireball? Call Lightning that does less damage than the PAM fighter? Spike Growth that costs enemies only 1 turn to simply run around it? Um.. conditions yes... sooo devastating.... using an action and a 2nd level spell for a 50:50 shot to blind an enemy for 1 round which doesn't stop them attacking or moving, and which a large number of creatures are either immune to or just ignore by using other senses.... Or maybe poison that a third of the monsters in the game are immune to? Or.... maybe we can turn the whole battlefield into a muddy morrass with Transmute Rock only this cripples our ally fighters as much as the enemy and has no effect on flying creatures or creatures with non-attack based abilities.... Or covering the whole battlefield in sleet so now our spellcasters are utterly crippled b/c they can't see the enemy....
Yeah.. so many options, I can't believe I've ended up relying on Conjure Animals in 99% of combat because it is simply more powerful and more versatile than any other two spells on the druid spell list put together...
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I know. Normally that is what you get if you have quick toss on a character with sharpshooter. I do this a lot with Arcane Archers. Use your bow to attack then fling your dart. With a Rogue it works with darts or daggers.
You know, I actually like this idea. Strength is undervalued, because dexterity is just so much more useful and versatile.
Weapons should also get additional damage types. Longsword can chop and pierce. Warhammer can bludgeon and pierce (real warhammers always had a spike so that they could be used as a pick to pierce armor). That way martials can have some flexibility with enemy resistances and vulnerabilities.
I mean Champion is effectively just playing a base fighter, it gives you almost nothing in terms of actual features, only passives. And Banneret? Good loooooooord banneret is absolute trash. It "improves" your few existing class features - Second Wind, Action Surge, and Indomitable - by allowing you to use them on other people, but only when you also use them. So again, a few times per day, you get an extremely minor effect on top of your existing effects. Wow. The healing from Rallying Cry is negligible, especially since healing is so situation-dependant (if they're down, its indispensable; if they're up its basically pointless unless they literally can't take another hit - the difference between 0HP and 3HP is massive, while between 4HP and 7HP is minor and between 20HP and 23HP is nothing); its not a decision point, its just more vertical progression, and not even any useful vertical progression. Royal Envoy is cool, but a ribbon feature. Inspiring Surge is more vertical progression, plus it can be accomplished by a single maneuver (Commander's Strike) or half as many levels in Order Cleric, PLUS it's only actually of any use at all if you have a rogue in the party. Bulwark only works on half of the saves in the game (two of which are weak saves), AND it only works on AoE effects, almost all of which target physical saves, rather than mental saves.
Arcane Archer is okay, the effects are pretty decent, but you only get two uses per short rest. So once you've done your cool thing twice,,, that's it. You get two turns of combat where you can do cool stuff, and then you're a basic fighter until a short rest. It's also once per turn, so you can't even combine them in real way. Ever-Ready Shot doesnt even give you both uses back on initiative, it gives you one use back, so if you have more than one encounter before a short rest, you now get one turn of combat to do A Cool Thing and then you're a basic fighter again. Curving Shot is an okay feature, and you're right, using Curving Shot to get another chance at hitting with sharpshooter is pretty cool, but it is effectively An Extra Attack once per turn, as a bonus action, maybe, if you miss.
(Also, real quick, to clarify, my fighter rework? I have them maneuvers and also Power Attack at 5th level (-5/+10) alongside barbarians and monks, to replace GWM and Sharpshooter. I also removed their extra ASIs, because between getting a free feat at 1st level from background, maneuvers, AND power attack without feat tax, they are no longer as feat-hungry because they no longer lack any substantial class features beyond level 2)
Echo Knight has no limit to its manifest echo ability, which does allow for some interesting shenanigans, but this can be pretty solidly replicated by any illusion spell. However, it does have a limit on its Unleash Incarnation feature, which means you get,,, a maximum of 5 extra attacks,,, per day. You know who else gets that? War Domain Cleric. At 1st level. Yay. I will give Echo Knight props for the manifest echo ability, it does fundamentally change how you play that fighter - but, mirroring what Yurei has already said about the Echo Knight, a lot of people don't like the Echo Knight specifically because it fundamentally changes how you play the fighter.
Rune Knight I think is the closest a fighter subclass has come to doing what the battle master can do. However, their flavour is very magical and mystical, and there are a lot of people who want to play a fighter who is just Really Good At Weapons, to match the theme of the whole fighter class, and the only way to really do that is to play a Battle Master, which doesn't seem right.
Ywo things per short rest is only 6 times a day if you get your two short rests every single day. A lot of groups don't get that, because of the serious imbalance in what you regain from a short and long rest. Also, again, taking both your Fighting Style - the only decision point in the entirety of the fighter class - AND a feat to do A Cool Thing twice per short sucks. At that point take pick up Fey Touched, its a single feat PLUS its a half feat PLUS it gives you two cool things per day PLUS it lets you choose one of a great selection of spells - Bless and Hex in particular will be signifcantly more impactful to any character than the one maneuver per short rest you get from Martial Adept.
Also, if I could pick between using something 2 times per short rest (6/day) or just 6 times per day, I would pick 6 times per day without hesitation every single time. I want to be able to control when and how I use my features, and restricting my features, especially maneuvers which you can use multiple times in one turn, to twice per short rest? Effectively twice per combat? That's not enough. The Battle Master, for example, gives you six uses per SHORT rest, and since by 18th level you're attacking three times every turn and using Action Surge twice per short rest, you can potentially burn all of that in one single turn. You shouldn't, obviously, but it goes to show how few resources this actually is in the grand scheme of things, especially when at the same level (18th) you have wizards with 20 spell slots per day of varying levels and powers, a prepared spell list of 23 spells to choose from each day (compared to the Battle Master's 9 maneuvers known, which you can only replace once per level), a minimum of 40 spells in their spellbook to choose (against the BM's like 20 options), and again, They Have Wish. A wizard can just Wish to have infinite spell slots. They can do whatever the hell they want. In fact, a 13th level wizard can create an army of themselves with Simulacrum and play the rest of the campaign alone. Meanwhile, the Battle Master fighter gets to do,,, A Cool Thing,,, six times per short rest.
Lol. Lmao. In terms of nova, a Battle Master is still by far the strongest fighter. In terms of DPR, Battle Master is usually the strongest fighter, and a lot of that is because of Grappling Attack, Precision Attack, and Trip Attack, all of which boost to hit instead of damage. In terms of battlefield utility, Battle Master is arguably the strongest fighter because of things like Grappling Attack and Menacing Attack (Rune Knight I'd say is a close second). And, again, Battle Master benefits more from Superior Technique and Martial Adept than any other character in the game. The Cavalier is arguably better at tanking, because of Unwavering Mark, but that's about it.
HOWEVER, paladins beat them in nova, literally any spellcaster beats them in battlefield utility by so many orders of magnitude its not even worth counting, and barbarians (especially Ancestral Guardian) tank better than fighters. On top of that, they all get more class features than the fighter, allowing them (maybe not the barbarian, they also got shafted) to actually take part in the game mechanically outside of combat, whereas the fighter gets,,, the exact same actions as everyone else does, and nothing more.
Also, Quick Shot is unironically redundant on fighters. The Thrown Weapon Fighting style already lets you draw thrown weapons as part of the attack, and you can already make attacks with thrown weapons as a bonus action as part of Two-Weapon Fighting. And, since you can add other maneuvers to thrown weapon attacks, the damage is irrelevant. Literally the only thing Quick Shot lets you do is take another fighting style, or make An Attack with your modifier Once Per Rest, compared to an infinite number of attacks for no extra cost.
Edit: forgot to mention Quick Toss on caster rogues. That is fair, it's a very good feature for them that unlocks a lot of different things. Once per short rest. As a feat - because they don't get fighting styles, so you're either choosing it through Martial Adept or Fighting Initiate (Martial Adept is better, it gives you two maneuvers known instead of one, but it still only lets you use them once per short rest). And even then, it isn't a fighter, AND its a caster. So yes, it is very good for Arcane Trickster rogues, but that's not what we're discussing here, we're discussing fighters.
Menacing Attack is pretty cool! The frightened condition is quite nice in many many levels of play, especially since a looot of monsters don't have ranged attacks (I think they should personally). Unrelated, did you know that there are 11 spells that cause the frightened condition through all tiers of play, some of which target massive areas, on top of all the other class and subclass features that impose fear (looking at you, Oath of Conquest Paladin). Also unrelated, did you know that the Blinded, Charmed, Exhausted, Incapacitated, Paralysed, Petrified, Stunned and Unconscious conditions are all stronger than Frightened, and the Battle Master has exactly zero maneuvers that inflict any of those? Meanwhile, there are like 50 something spells that can inflict any number of those conditions, again onto massive areas?
Minor rant, but I promise its relevant:
I really like maneuvers, because it kind of closes the gap between martials and casters when it comes to unique combinations, decisions, and playstyles. However, it is nowhere near as strong as literally taking a couple levels of Any Spellcasting Class. Anything a Battle Master can do, a caster can do better. At least they have their sustained DPR, right? At least they can take down that ancient dragon, like St George or Perseus or any other number of myths? Ah, wait, not the wizard wished the dragon out of existence, or True Polymorphed it into a frog and locked it in a cage at the bottom of the ocean for it to die, or Forcecaged it for an hour without concentration while the party sat just out of its breath range and sniped it, or,,, not to mention that, with any level of armour training (mountain dwarf, an armour feat, even a single level dip in fighter lmao) and Shield, almost any caster can have a better AC than any martial; since Constitution is important for concentration, most spellcasters have a high Con too. Fundamentally, the problem with D&D is that, regardless of what you pick, regardless of what race/class combo you go with, however many magic items you give, a party of four spellcasters will be able to do any and everything a party of martials can do, better, easier, and for longer. You need a tank? Paladin or Druid. Skill monkey? Bard. Healer? Cleric, though its not as if any martial has the capacity to heal anyway. Problem solver? Wizard. Damage dealer? Paladin again. I want to add maneuvers to fighters because I believe it will somewhat close the thematic gap between martials and casters (as I've explained elsewhere) but when it comes to balance it is still just another stopgap measure.
Agreed, most weapons should have multiple damage types, and different armors should be better against different damage types, but then it’ll be too much like 2e and people will complain. That’s why damage type is generally so irrelevant when it comes to the distinction between B, P, and S. Very few monsters care one way or another which one you use.
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I really like that monsters don’t care one way or another, otherwise you get to that golf bag phenomenon from earlier editions. It was fun for a minute, but ended up just being a hassle of swapping your sword for your hammer sometimes and not really meaning much beyond saying that. Though multiple damage types on a single weapon as you are suggesting would help mitigate that.
But rather than doing it on the monster end, I would love to see expanded feats on the player end similar to crusher/slasher/piercer. Personally, I find those a great example of an optional way to add a bit of complexity and give martials some more things to do in a fight. I wouldn’t even mind more of a weapon-specific set of feats, rather than damage type feats. Which maybe we’re getting. Crawford did say we’d see weapons doing things we haven’t seen before.
I absolutely hate that the weapon in your hands means absolutely nothing and has dick-all bupkis nada impact on how you play and fight. Somebody with a shortsword and a large shield should be an entirely different style than somebody with a rapier and a buckler but in D&D? Nah. Those two are absolutely 100% identical in every single way. Hammers and other bludgeons should not be the exact same god damned thing as slashing armaments, but they are. It's dumb, and it makes combat deeply boring and aggravating.
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I wasn’t referring to the new players as childish. I was referring to reactionary arguments saying optional complexity on the fighter shouldn’t be allowed because it will harm new players’ experience.
My apologies. I didn’t see you posting about how you needed the simple fighter to learn the game.
I can’t remember what’s supposed to go here.
I agree, it’s just a tough line to walk. The current version where it does nothing is boring. The 1e version, with a chart of weapon modifiers vs. different ac (that no one ever used, at least in my experience) didn’t work either. There’s got to be someplace in the middle.
This did get me thinking about the 3e fighter who had access to weapon focus feats (bonus to hit with only a specific weapon) and weapon specialization feats (bonus to damage, but only to a weapon you had focus on already). It was a little edge fighters got that other classes didn’t. At least, I think maybe anyone could take focus, but only fighters could take specialization.
The down side was they became must-take feats. Technically they were a choice, but they were a choice that everyone playing a fighter basically had to take, so not really a choice at all.
Maybe they could just bake those in as a class feature. Pick one weapon as a fighter and you’ll keep getting better with it. It’s not the complexity people are after, but it would be something to set them apart from other martials.
Especially since any tiny mechanical difference being obliterated by the fact that almost every monster that is immune/resistant to one of the weapon damage types is immune/resistant to all of them.
I can’t remember what’s supposed to go here.
This is really the crux of the problem of strategic combat in 5e. Monsters need way more variable damage resistances and immunities - oozes should be resistant to piercing & slashing, things with hard shells (e.g. turtles, bulettes) should be resistant to slashing, things with thick layers of fat (whales, walruses, etc..) should be resistant to piercing & bludgeoning, things with thick fur coats should be resistant to bludgeoning, etc..... [there also need to be way more things resistant to force damage, psychic damage and radiant damage]. And magical weapons should NOT be the instant solve-all for overcoming resistances.
Also there should be way more creatures that have a "regenerates X hp at the start of their turn unless they take Y damage", and way more creatures with a "If they take Z damage ability A recharges". To really incentivize both casters and martials to have and use many different options.
I agree that would be interesting and fun, but I don’t think it’s the crux of the problem, at least for martials - that’s the short sword and large shield versus rapier and buckler problem Yurei mentioned earlier. A warhammer should not be essentially identical to a rapier. Dexterity should not be superior to strength.
I can’t remember what’s supposed to go here.
People found the golf bag of weapons in 3.5e extremely annoying. Also, bringing the right weapon to a fight isn't really a tactical decision, it's preparation.
There is other options. For example, dual-wielding could become more viable if in one hand you had a warhammer and the other a longsword - that’s two of the three covered (I know according to the UA that’s impossible, but that might change). Or there could be fighter options to temporarily or limited-use bypass resistances. Or a spell.
I can’t remember what’s supposed to go here.
I play with optimizers, so each attack by a monster has ~30% chance to hit [b/c of min-maxing AC to 23-25 at mid-tiers] if they don't have disadvantage (which they do ~50% of the time), around 50% of monsters in a combat will fall victim to battlefield control and/or positioning making them unable to attack the players or will get NOVAed out of existence before they take a turn in combat. Combat usually lasts only 3-4 rounds and 80% of the party has Healing Word so dropping a character to 0 HP has almost 0 effect on the player's action economy. So yeah, in my combats with only 3-4 monsters each monster has a 50:50 shot of downing a player each round to make the combat actually challenging.
Why are you guys so hung up on power and battlefield on control options if those effects aren't making decisive differences in your combat? If a monster having DA on attacks or not isn't the difference between a player getting dropped to 0 hp or not then why would you bother expending limited resources to cause a condition to make that monster have DA?
Also, it's worth noting that many (real world) weapons could be used to inflict multiple damage types. A longsword can definitely inflict slashing and piercing damage quite well, but it can also inflict bludgeoning damage - just...less successfully. You flip it over, grab it by the blade and bash your opponent with the pommel. Done.
One of the benefits of certain kinds of polearms was that they were designed to *effectively* produce multiple kinds of damage, penetrate certain kinds of armor, and so forth. The golfbag of weapons gets *much* smaller when a single weapon (like a poleaxe) can function as a double-ended, reach, armor-penetrating, tripping, slashing, piercing, and bludgeoning weapon.
Right. Which is exactly why real world armies eventually evolved to only have 3 types of soldiers - Ranged, Polearms, and Cavalry. And battles were just rock-paper-scissors for years. (Ranged beat melee, cavalry beat ranged, and polearms beat cavalry) They were simply the most effective options.
When firearms became simple enough to train, easy to mass produce, and accurate enough, they replaced all foot soldier's options. Armor started to disappear entirely. The only other troop type that remained was fast cavalry. And cannon started to take the place of the 3rd option in the rock-paper-scissors matches, being vulnerable to cavalry but powerful against foot soldiers.
When firearms got even more devastating, even cavalry was replaced with armored vehicles.
If we were to imagine a truly realistic DnD world, it would probably look more like the English Civil War than Arthurian legends. Or even later periods in earth history. And that's not even taking magic into account. But that's not the fantasy most people want.
Same thing with parties over 4 players. I find myself needing to create enemies that are capable of dropping everyone but a heavy front line player to 0 in one round just to challenge a group if I want to avoid other buffs like tripling the enemy HP to make combat go on for many many rounds to drain resources.
That's only assuming you only have non-magical weapons. As soon as you have 3 different weapons that have 3 different magical properties that do different types of damage, it is now strategy which one you choose to use, because maybe halving the damage from your rapier is worth it if also deals 1d6 fire damage which stops the enemy regenerating 20 hp each round. Or maybe it's worth moving into melee to use your pike rather than throwing your hammer of returning if the enemy is resistant to bludgeoning damage. Or maybe you swap to the mace that gets 1d8 radiant damage bonus to stop the zombies' undead fortitude even if it deal less overall damage than the flametongue greatsword...
But they are identical because almost all enemies treat b/s/p identically. If they didn't then those would not be the same. A warhammer + Crusher is very different from a rapier + Piercer. But why should the base weapons be hugely different? Almost all weapons are some version of "Hit guy with physical thing until it hurt them." And have only relatively minor differences in style -> hitting a guy in plate armour with a longsword isn't significantly different from hitting them with a mace. And polearms are generally interchangeable since their main feature was having a spiky thing at the end of a long pole to skewer a charging horse.
There is room for more diversity in armour though....
a large shield that gives +3 AC but -10 ft movement speed
a regular shield with +2 AC that limits the DEX bonus to your AC to +2
and a light shield +1 AC with no penalties
.....would make sense. And more options for turning monster hides into magical armour (aside from dragon scale mail) would be very welcome.
LOL, You've never played a druid have you? Massive devastating spells? like what? Wall of Fire that is both more expensive and inferior in every way to Fireball? Call Lightning that does less damage than the PAM fighter? Spike Growth that costs enemies only 1 turn to simply run around it? Um.. conditions yes... sooo devastating.... using an action and a 2nd level spell for a 50:50 shot to blind an enemy for 1 round which doesn't stop them attacking or moving, and which a large number of creatures are either immune to or just ignore by using other senses.... Or maybe poison that a third of the monsters in the game are immune to? Or.... maybe we can turn the whole battlefield into a muddy morrass with Transmute Rock only this cripples our ally fighters as much as the enemy and has no effect on flying creatures or creatures with non-attack based abilities.... Or covering the whole battlefield in sleet so now our spellcasters are utterly crippled b/c they can't see the enemy....
Yeah.. so many options, I can't believe I've ended up relying on Conjure Animals in 99% of combat because it is simply more powerful and more versatile than any other two spells on the druid spell list put together...