I like the flavor of Rogues and Barbarians being able to inflict added effects with their attacks. But looking through the lists of what they get, a lot of it isn't that interesting. Rogues can spend Sneak Attack dice to try to inflict a single status, but some of the options are redundant with existing abilities like Withdraw or Trip. The options Barbarians get at Level 9 are pushing and slowing enemies, which are things you can already do with Weapon Mastery.
I wonder if this is a problem with these abilities being designed so that players can use them as often as possible. You can use Weapon Mastery on any attack, Cunning Strikes on any Sneak Attack, Brutal Strikes on any Reckless Attack. Because these features can be used very often, the effects they inflict have to be balanced around being usable every turn, and thus not as significant as what spellcasters can do with their spell slots or classes can do with rest-based resources. Not only is there overlap between these features, but with other existing class features as well. Why would a Battle Master take Trip Attack when every attack they make can have a chance to knock enemies prone?
Am I alone on this, or do other folks think these features would be more interesting if they were less frequently usable, but more impactful when they trigger? Either with limited uses per short rest, or conditions to activate these features?
Problem is that anyone can already take Martial Adept feat and/or the Superior Technique fighting style to get a few short-rest, limited-use, but more impactful abilities. Or they can simply MC into Battlemaster if they want SR, limited-use more impactful abilities. Just putting Battlemaster maneuvers into all the other martial classes cheapens Battlemaster and is kind of redundant.
PS Battlemasters IME almost never used Trip attack anyway, so redundancy with WM isn't that much of a big deal. Battlemasters almost always take some combination of these maneuvers: Riposte, Menacing Attack, Goading Attack, Precise Attack. The only ones to use Trip are archers and since Topple isn't available on ranged weapons they will continue to take it.
Brutal Strikes I'd still say is kinda underpowered, the pushback is nice, it stacks with a push weapon so you can push a creature back 25 foot, that opens a lot of situational uses, like knocking a creature over a cliff or into a river but the sacrifice of advantage for the damage is not a great deal, it's too little damage for the loss of advantage, IMO. At level 17 when it goes to 2d10, then it's a much better deal, you can only use Brutal strikes on the second attack of the round (or first depending on how you interpret it) too, which is just a weird limitation (once per round would have been fine tho).
Cunning Strike is fine, it has a lot more options and those options on the most part are good, the poisoned condition for example is very potent, yes it has a lot of creatures immune to it but the vast majority are not, withdraw allows you to retain your bonus action while getting away, which can be used to dash and move around the battlefield a lot more and disarm can be very useful in some cases. That subclasses then get extra options is also good, overall I think cunning strike works well and most of the choices are worth the ~3.5 or ~7 damage that they sacrifice.
Weapon Masteries job is to be something you can use whenever needed. More limited abilities don't get used in the same way, due to game design and op cosy
if you limit it to 1, but make them better, the goal becomes to use it once on every turn
it you give it a number of casts per cycle, people save it for great need
these effects are supposed to be things that are always available and used whenever it makes sense. A basketball analogy might be pass, dribble, crossover, layup, dunk, jumpshot. They are tools which expand how you play in general, not a more limited resource/condition effect.
Cunning strike and Brutal strike are different, one is tied to your first attack per round, and sacrifices accuracy, and the other is tied to SA and your damage dice. So they can be, and are a bit different in design.
the reason you probably find them less interesting, is because there is a finite amount of frequently useful things you can do that make sense for a martial themed character to do while attacking.
. Even among spells, most boil down to damage, and one of the effects in mastery or strikes
the reason you probably find them less interesting, is because there is a finite amount of frequently useful things you can do that make sense for a martial themed character to do while attacking.
. Even among spells, most boil down to damage, and one of the effects in mastery or strikes
This is very true, there isn't that much diversity in 5e, the common conditions are: charmed, frightened, reduce movement, prone, push, poison, blind, deal damage. I'd argue 95% of the game is just those options in different combinations.
No, not really. I feel like in general, spellcaster control is a bigger problem than anything that martials can do. Martials are pretty much pure damage for the most part. Pure damage spells don't really scale well, and are not super problematic. Spellcasters can just remove creatures from the board, and martials can only match that by connecting on Nova rounds to physically remove the creatures hitpoints with a single action.
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I find things like Trip way too spammy, since you can force a saving throw on every single attack you make in a turn; in general D&D combat needs less rolling, not more, as combat is already incredibly slow in D&D compared to some other systems.
Plus doing it on every attack just cheapens it; it's no longer some cool tactical choice you're making, you're just spamming it on every attack because why wouldn't you when it's free and there's always a chance the target will fail (or have to use a legendary resistance or whatever).
For masteries in particular I want a mastery to be something where choosing to use it feels impactful and meaningful, which is just not what mastery feels like to me at all.
Brutal Strikes I don't think have quite the same problem, as losing the advantage from Reckless Attacks is a pretty big cost, so you're much more likely to only use a Brutal Strike when the potential benefits outweigh the cost; most of the time advantage is the better choice, but when a big push could get an enemy into a rough area effect or environmental hazard it can absolutely be worth doing, and feels like a more tactical choice.
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I find things like Trip way too spammy, since you can force a saving throw on every single attack you make in a turn; in general D&D combat needs less rolling, not more, as combat is already incredibly slow in D&D compared to some other systems.
Plus doing it on every attack just cheapens it; it's no longer some cool tactical choice you're making, you're just spamming it on every attack because why wouldn't you when it's free and there's always a chance the target will fail (or have to use a legendary resistance or whatever).
For masteries in particular I want a mastery to be something where choosing to use it feels impactful and meaningful, which is just not what mastery feels like to me at all.
Brutal Strikes I don't think have quite the same problem, as losing the advantage from Reckless Attacks is a pretty big cost, so you're much more likely to only use a Brutal Strike when the potential benefits outweigh the cost; most of the time advantage is the better choice, but when a big push could get an enemy into a rough area effect or environmental hazard it can absolutely be worth doing, and feels like a more tactical choice.
Pretty much agree with everything here.
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I find things like Trip way too spammy, since you can force a saving throw on every single attack you make in a turn; in general D&D combat needs less rolling, not more, as combat is already incredibly slow in D&D compared to some other systems.
Plus doing it on every attack just cheapens it; it's no longer some cool tactical choice you're making, you're just spamming it on every attack because why wouldn't you when it's free and there's always a chance the target will fail (or have to use a legendary resistance or whatever).
For masteries in particular I want a mastery to be something where choosing to use it feels impactful and meaningful, which is just not what mastery feels like to me at all.
Brutal Strikes I don't think have quite the same problem, as losing the advantage from Reckless Attacks is a pretty big cost, so you're much more likely to only use a Brutal Strike when the potential benefits outweigh the cost; most of the time advantage is the better choice, but when a big push could get an enemy into a rough area effect or environmental hazard it can absolutely be worth doing, and feels like a more tactical choice.
while I might not love save rolling on every attack, I don't really think the do one thing per round works often enough that you can use it tactically. Each save based skill has to have two things happen to land, first land a hit, second land the save. 32% chance an attack, without advantage. In reality, you often spend your whole turn trying to prone enemies, if thats your game plan. Most casters just force one roll, so in general the multiattack feature balances this out. Most martials make 2-3 attacks per round, things like nick don't have a mastery, and can only swap once, so in actual play, weapon mastery saves are no more powerful than cantrips, and more limited in their effects/options and number of enemies effected. Essentially, masteries with saves are very well balanced in terms of effectiveness, and game design. The only issue is the extra rolling time, though since its gm dependent, its generally faster with experienced DMs. Of course not faster than no rolls.
Essentially, casters have always had this power, why is it bad for martials to have it?
They could have an optional rule that uses the roll from the attack to determine the save, but its probably too much math on the fly for many people. Essentially monster rolls the inverse of the attack roll (21-attack roll) that would have the effect of increasing the rate slightly, since attacks that hit, would be better rolls.
Also, most martial characters are designed with number of hits as a key balance point. Fighter is purposefully the one who gets the most out of mastery. then comes the rest of the real martials, then comes the one attack hybrid martials. I'd say the big flaw is, most martials won't have room to really feel the tactical option, many will choose vex/nick if 1handed, or graze/push if two handed. Topple in reality is situational, unless you have a crew of meleers.
And, I think you are thinking these basic abilities are supposed to feel like rare special cases, when they are designed to feel like your readily available options for interacting in battle. They are supposed to make each round varied and more productive than just spamming damage. Once again, most of these effects are also found on cantrips, why are cantrips/spells supposed to feel interesting and effect multiple enemies per round, but martials are supposed to be more boring?
I have playtested the UA a lot over multiple classes, and its way better than 2014, and it feels so much better playing a martial, even with the solidness of monk, I can tell you the lack of mastery is very noticeable, especially in subclasses which don't offer much variation in on hit effects, like mercy monk and shadow. Rounds that end up just being I roll damage 3-4 times are not nearly as entertaining.
So yeah, rounds take slightly longer, but each martial turn, every attack feels like it matters more. Overall, the game feels better for martials, and casters always had this gameplay in their turns.
while I might not love save rolling on every attack, I don't really think the do one thing per round works often enough that you can use it tactically. Each save based skill has to have two things happen to land, first land a hit, second land the save. 32% chance an attack, without advantage.
That's not a good justification for it occurring on every attack though, because with a single use per turn ability you can simply make it trigger on landing a hit. This is how Sneak Attack works, and it's how Battle Master manoeuvres work (they're retroactive). But whereas mastery would be once per turn, manoeuvres remain limited use with a resource but adding damage in most cases (so there's a benefit even if they fail).
Essentially, casters have always had this power, why is it bad for martials to have it?
Literally not even remotely the argument I'm making – please don't straw-man me with this kind of nonsense.
And I think you know full well these aren't comparable; casters get one chance per creature at best, and it costs them a significant and limited resource to even attempt it. We're comparing to a feature that a high level Fighter can literally use 57,600+ times per day (4 times every 6 seconds, plus action surges).
And, I think you are thinking these basic abilities are supposed to feel like rare special cases, when they are designed to feel like your readily available options for interacting in battle.
Except they're not options; each weapon only ever has one mastery, so to get more than one you have to juggle weapons. Two-weapon fighting isn't really an option for getting more because one of them is always going to be Nick.
Weapon mastery doesn't feel like "mastery" in any way shape or form because none of it feels like a tactical choice, or really a choice at all, because 99% of characters are going to pick one mastery and that's it, there is very little incentive to actually change.
They are supposed to make each round varied and more productive than just spamming damage.
Then the system fails completely in that goal, because all it's doing is adding more spam to that equation.
And again, if you'd stop trying to straw-man me for two minutes you might realise I have never argued that weapon mastery should be removed and replaced with nothing – I have not once made such an argument, nor would I. Ever.
Martials clearly need improving to better balance them against spellcasters, I am very much in favour of some kind of improvements to weapon usage, especially if it distinguishes weapon types more. What I am not in favour of is weapon mastery as it is presented as I find it boring at best, and spammy and boring at worst, it just doesn't do anything for me – it feels cheap and half-baked as a solution for such a fundamental problem in 5e, and if it makes it to print as-is it'll be the first thing I rip out and replace with something better in my home games.
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Several of the comments here have brought a good point to my attention.
Weapon Mastery exists as the option that, hypothetically, gives you tactical choices each round in combat. (Even if, as pointed out, a lot of players will just stick with one weapon and one property.) You can use them every turn as desired. Then why do Cunning Strike and Brutal Strike need to also be options that can be used potentially every turn, if that sort of thing is already provided by Weapon Mastery?
There are ways to design more impactful and unique effects. The later Brutal Strike effects don't impose a condition, or an effect that is mirrored with Weapon Mastery. Frankly, being able to impose Disadvantage on the target's next saving throw, only requiring an attack to hit, feels very overpowered compared to the other Brutal Strike options.
Having options encourages tactical choices, but limitations on options also encourages tactics in making the most use of those options. Such as if Cunning Strikes was about taking advantage of circumstances, rather than being able to use them on any Sneak Attack.
(One Barbarian main I play with also raised a good point, in that Brutal Strikes being tied to Reckless Attacks means you have to make yourself more vulnerable to use Brutal Strikes, for a single attack that might miss entirely, whereas the Rogue has no defensive penalty to Cunning Strikes.)
Well, for Rogues they need Cunning Strikes because they're going to have a very limited pool of Masteries; realistically only Vex and Nick on their melee weapons (Finesse really needs a third option) and Vex and Slow on their ranged weapons. Frankly, given they only get two picks, I give it good odds they just take a ranged and melee Vex weapon, and the remainder will almost certainly be Vex and Nick melee. So rogues are really only dipping a toe in the water of Weapon Masteries, thus Cunning Strikes fills in the remaining void of "stuff weapon users can do besides just make attack rolls", which is what they're trying to develop with these repeatable options. And the "limitations" on Cunning Strikes is that you're trading in damage for either a wildly situational effect (Disarm), fishing for a debuff against a strong save (Poison), causing the Prone condition as the weapon-user least able to personally take advantage of it (Trip), or doing something you can already substantially do with a Bonus Action (Withdraw). About the only one of these someone might try to spam is Poison, which is also the one that's probably least likely to regularly proc and has a lot of monsters who are outright immune to it.
Regarding Brutal Strikes, it does not replace making two attacks in a turn and it adds a d10 to your damage on top of the other effects. And you were already risking a whiff when you used Reckless Attack, so you're just making the tactical decision of whether you want a better chance to hit or a chance at more damage and a push/slow effect. Really, the secondary effect is more a ribbon on the feature; the big option is it allows Barbarians to stack up damage on a low AC target as opposed to getting an accuracy boost they don't really need in that case.
while I might not love save rolling on every attack, I don't really think the do one thing per round works often enough that you can use it tactically. Each save based skill has to have two things happen to land, first land a hit, second land the save. 32% chance an attack, without advantage.
That's not a good justification for it occurring on every attack though, because with a single use per turn ability you can simply make it trigger on landing a hit. This is how Sneak Attack works, and it's how Battle Master manoeuvres work (they're retroactive). But whereas mastery would be once per turn, manoeuvres remain limited use with a resource but adding damage in most cases (so there's a benefit even if they fail).
Essentially, casters have always had this power, why is it bad for martials to have it?
Literally not even remotely the argument I'm making – please don't straw-man me with this kind of nonsense.
And I think you know full well these aren't comparable; casters get one chance per creature at best, and it costs them a significant and limited resource to even attempt it. We're comparing to a feature that a high level Fighter can literally use 57,600+ times per day (4 times every 6 seconds, plus action surges).
And, I think you are thinking these basic abilities are supposed to feel like rare special cases, when they are designed to feel like your readily available options for interacting in battle.
Except they're not options; each weapon only ever has one mastery, so to get more than one you have to juggle weapons. Two-weapon fighting isn't really an option for getting more because one of them is always going to be Nick.
Weapon mastery doesn't feel like "mastery" in any way shape or form because none of it feels like a tactical choice, or really a choice at all, because 99% of characters are going to pick one mastery and that's it, there is very little incentive to actually change.
They are supposed to make each round varied and more productive than just spamming damage.
Then the system fails completely in that goal, because all it's doing is adding more spam to that equation.
And again, if you'd stop trying to straw-man me for two minutes you might realise I have never argued that weapon mastery should be removed and replaced with nothing – I have not once made such an argument, nor would I. Ever.
Martials clearly need improving to better balance them against spellcasters, I am very much in favour of some kind of improvements to weapon usage, especially if it distinguishes weapon types more. What I am not in favour of is weapon mastery as it is presented as I find it boring at best, and spammy and boring at worst, it just doesn't do anything for me – it feels cheap and half-baked as a solution for such a fundamental problem in 5e, and if it makes it to print as-is it'll be the first thing I rip out and replace with something better in my home games.
Its not a strawman, its an inconsistency in your argument when applied to the game design you may not have been aware of.
your claim is that martials sometimes forcing 2-3 saves per round is over the top in time, however, for casters this is regular gameplay due to the AOEness of spells and spell save design.
and its not just leveled spells, its also cantrips.
.acid splash forces two saves
thunderclap forces up to 8 saves
sword burst forces up to 8 saves
word of radiance forces up to 8 saves
death cleric can make necromancy cantrips target two monsters
then there are all the spells. Fullcasters get from 2 to 22 a day, some of which can force even more saves. Low level casters struggle, but by level 8, they will often finish each day with left over spells slots.
note wizard can eventually get back up to 1/2 their level in slots, and eventually cast low level spells freely.
sorcerers can turn meta magic into spells. at roughly 1/2 their level. plus they recover 25% of their sorcery points per SR.
while its nice to say that martials can act infinitely, the reality is they need to recover HP, hit dice essentially gives you 100% more HP. After which no long rest = death. Depending on the difficulty of fights, that can be 2 fights or 10 fights. But if its 10 fights, they use almost no resources per fight for casters as well.
So yes, I understand you aren't saying they should have no mastery, but you are saying they shouldn't be allowed to force 2-3 saves per round, but that is clearly a regular part of gameplay for like 9/13 classes. note that topple is only 1/9 masteries with a save. Why is it not a problem for all these other classes?
as for using weapon mastery requiring weapon swapping, Just because you personally don't like the idea of using multiple weapons, doesnt mean its bad game design. Players have the ability to choose what weapon they are using at start of round (free action sheathe/draw + attack action attack), or they can swap in the middle of a turn once, for most. and have two masteries, for most. If you don't need/want to do that, its fine, but its a capability and a choice you can make. A caster is just as freely allowed to never use more than one cantrip, but many choose each round what cantrip to use, or spell.
nick, is slightly problematic imo, maybe it should have stayed out of mastery, but I guess they wanted it to be a cost/benefit of being a barbarian/fighter to get good use from twf and mastery.
Well, for Rogues they need Cunning Strikes because they're going to have a very limited pool of Masteries; realistically only Vex and Nick on their melee weapons (Finesse really needs a third option) and Vex and Slow on their ranged weapons. Frankly, given they only get two picks, I give it good odds they just take a ranged and melee Vex weapon, and the remainder will almost certainly be Vex and Nick melee. So rogues are really only dipping a toe in the water of Weapon Masteries, thus Cunning Strikes fills in the remaining void of "stuff weapon users can do besides just make attack rolls", which is what they're trying to develop with these repeatable options. And the "limitations" on Cunning Strikes is that you're trading in damage for either a wildly situational effect (Disarm), fishing for a debuff against a strong save (Poison), causing the Prone condition as the weapon-user least able to personally take advantage of it (Trip), or doing something you can already substantially do with a Bonus Action (Withdraw). About the only one of these someone might try to spam is Poison, which is also the one that's probably least likely to regularly proc and has a lot of monsters who are outright immune to it.
Regarding Brutal Strikes, it does not replace making two attacks in a turn and it adds a d10 to your damage on top of the other effects. And you were already risking a whiff when you used Reckless Attack, so you're just making the tactical decision of whether you want a better chance to hit or a chance at more damage and a push/slow effect. Really, the secondary effect is more a ribbon on the feature; the big option is it allows Barbarians to stack up damage on a low AC target as opposed to getting an accuracy boost they don't really need in that case.
The limited number of Masteries available on Rogue weapons feels like something Weapon Mastery should improve upon, rather than being something the Rogue needs a feature dedicated to effectively making up for. Especially when any other martial can combine Vex and Prone, or use a poisoned weapon, with more chances to hit and without sacrificing their damage output.
The Rogue shouldn't feel the same as other martials, which is something that Cunning Strikes ends up serving to do.
Its not a strawman, its an inconsistency in your argument when applied to the game design you may not have been aware of.
your claim is that martials sometimes forcing 2-3 saves per round is over the top in time, however, for casters this is regular gameplay due to the AOEness of spells and spell save design.
and its not just leveled spells, its also cantrips.
.acid splash forces two saves
thunderclap forces up to 8 saves
sword burst forces up to 8 saves
word of radiance forces up to 8 saves
death cleric can make necromancy cantrips target two monsters
then there are all the spells. Fullcasters get from 2 to 22 a day, some of which can force even more saves. Low level casters struggle, but by level 8, they will often finish each day with left over spells slots.
note wizard can eventually get back up to 1/2 their level in slots, and eventually cast low level spells freely.
sorcerers can turn meta magic into spells. at roughly 1/2 their level. plus they recover 25% of their sorcery points per SR.
while its nice to say that martials can act infinitely, the reality is they need to recover HP, hit dice essentially gives you 100% more HP. After which no long rest = death. Depending on the difficulty of fights, that can be 2 fights or 10 fights. But if its 10 fights, they use almost no resources per fight for casters as well.
So yes, I understand you aren't saying they should have no mastery, but you are saying they shouldn't be allowed to force 2-3 saves per round, but that is clearly a regular part of gameplay for like 9/13 classes. note that topple is only 1/9 masteries with a save. Why is it not a problem for all these other classes?
as for using weapon mastery requiring weapon swapping, Just because you personally don't like the idea of using multiple weapons, doesnt mean its bad game design. Players have the ability to choose what weapon they are using at start of round (free action sheathe/draw + attack action attack), or they can swap in the middle of a turn once, for most. and have two masteries, for most. If you don't need/want to do that, its fine, but its a capability and a choice you can make. A caster is just as freely allowed to never use more than one cantrip, but many choose each round what cantrip to use, or spell.
nick, is slightly problematic imo, maybe it should have stayed out of mastery, but I guess they wanted it to be a cost/benefit of being a barbarian/fighter to get good use from twf and mastery.
I imagine very few people have ever been in a circumstance where they needed to roll 8 saving throws on an AoE cantrip.
There's also a difference between "affect many enemies" and "repeatedly attempt to affect one enemy". Didn't they already decide that the Monk being able to repeatedly use Stunning Strike in one turn was too excessive? Now we have a feature that can inflict a condition that leaves enemies vulnerable to attacks just like Stunning Strike, but it can be spammed many times per turn with no cost to the user. And unlike cantrips and spells, where stronger effects are offset by lower damage dice, Weapon Mastery has little restriction on stronger effects on stronger weapons.
I think the biggest problem regarding Weapon Mastery is that the options are so limited and unbalanced that it's effectively a "solved" puzzle. Do you have other melee combatants with you? Spamming Topple is the obvious winning move. Playing a Rogue? Obviously you want Vex to set up Sneak Attacks. Two Weapon Fighting? Nick plus Vex—Slow isn't of much use when you're already in melee. Allies have set up damaging fields? Push enemies around in them. There's only so many options, so few that the majority of PCs can have access to, and properties being restricted to individual weapons that most players are inevitably going to build strategies around exploiting one specific Mastery rather than trying to make use of multiple Weapon Masteries. A Rogue can have two Weapon Masteries, but 99% of Rogue players will inevitably go with Vex/Nick melee weapons or Vex melee/ranged weapons.
Its not a strawman, its an inconsistency in your argument when applied to the game design you may not have been aware of.
So now your argument is that I may have been unaware that magic exists in 5e? Seriously?
Literally all I said is that having a saving throw on every attack is too frequent, and that makes such masteries boring and spammy – that's it. And it's a simple conclusion to reach, because it's literally an unlimited use feature with little incentive to switch, so of course it gets spammy.
Meanwhile magic comes with resource costs, and usually a maximum of one attempt per creature per turn in exchange for that cost; to force multiple saving throws every turn a caster either needs the exact conditions required for a multi-target cantrip (of which there are not many, and most aren't that good anyway) or to be burning resources every turn (and usually still need ideal conditions for an area effect). This is being compared to something that's free on every attack you will ever make, and can be used infinitely no matter how many targets you have, and it's entirely besides the point – it's still boring, spammy and just not engaging no matter how you try to spin it.
If your principle argument is "other classes can be boring and spammy so why shouldn't martials also be boring and spammy" then that's a poor justification – something else being boring and spammy doesn't make it okay for weapon mastery to be boring and spammy too. But no matter how spammy on saves a caster can be, it's irrelevant, because they have a vast array of choices in what they do – what makes weapon mastery uniquely spammy is that there's no real incentive to do anything other than the same thing over and over again, which means it not only hasn't solved the original problem (just attacking over and over is boring) it's only made it worse by adding an extra layer of spam, or passive bonuses that are just boring.
What makes Battle Masters fun is that manoeuvres are a tactical choice from a range of options, and using them is significant because you can only do so a limited number of times, so you need to think about every time you use one. If you were to take away superiority dice and make manoeuvres infinite free use, you'd have the current mastery system, and that is why it's so cheapened.
I'm all for martials having fun new ways to use their weapons, but the currently proposed system isn't anything like what I want. What I'd like to see from weapon mastery is something like:
Reduce the number of mastered weapons as it's too high – most classes should have 1 or 2, only Fighter should get more (4?) though a feat could be used to gain additional. Proficiency is the ability to use entire categories of weapons with skill, mastery is something that should go beyond that into specialisation. Since you can change mastered weapons anyway the limit is really just on how many load-outs you can have prepared.
Each weapon type should have three mastery abilities, all of which are active abilities you must choose to use. Most characters can use a maximum of one per turn (possible exception on Nick?), and some masteries may be usable once per Attack action, others might be bonus actions, reactions etc., the key thing is that they have some appropriate limitations so stronger masteries are more costly to use in action economy, and weaker ones are easier to use (might even be a free action).
Save-or-suck masteries like Push could receive a bonus to their DC based upon the number of times a target is hit before triggering it, so only a single saving throw is needed but it gets harder the more attacks you can land to overwhelm the target with. This gives added value to extra attacks.
Fighters can be distinguished by a) changing the masteries on a chosen weapon, b) in tier 2/3, using two masteries per turn (subject to action economy), c) in tier 3/4 performing two masteries using the same bonus action or reaction (so they can double up more masteries).
More masteries! It would be necessary for three per weapon anyway, and it would be nice to see some masteries that don't exist on any weapons as standard, i.e- they're available only on new or special weapons, or via the Fighter's ability to swap masteries. If it's a system that's supposed to compete a little the versatility of spellcasting then it needs more actual versatility and some depth to it. For example, a proper cleaving mastery that uses your action to hit multiple targets would probably be too strong in tier 1, but for a tier 2/3 Fighter swapping it in it should be okay.
Actually iterate upon the system – the most frustrating part about weapon mastery is that it basically hasn't changed at all since it was first introduced, meaning WotC have likely only looked at the positive ratings and ignored the actual criticisms and balance issues. All they did was ditch Flex without replacing it with anything, which isn't an improvement.
I'm fully aware that probably none of this is going to be done, and we're just going to get weapon mastery as-is, and I'm not going to be at all happy with it. But that's why I say I'll just homebrew something else, because I've playtested the proposed system and while I like the idea, I don't feel that it delivers on any of its promises, and it's not especially fun to use (and often feels more like an added chore instead).
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I had an idea for a Rogue alternative to Cunning Strikes, inspired by thinking about how one of the few unique options for Cunning Strikes doesn't make sense at all.
At 5th level in the UAs, the Rogue gains the ability to trip an enemy. They can disarm an enemy. They can slip away after making their Sneak Attack. And, at 5th level, a Rogue gains the inexplicable ability to generate infinite amounts of poison from zero resources besides a poisoner's kit! Furthermore, even though they can do so, only they can apply this poison on their own attacks and only on specific attacks. Doesn't make much sense, does it?
So, for an alternative idea for Cunning Strikes: a mechanic where the Rogue gains a number of options from the base class and potentially subclasses as well, and the Rogue can prepare a total number of them (Proficiency Bonus, perhaps?) each time they take a short rest. When they land a Sneak Attack, or potentially in other circumstances, they can use one of these prepared abilities. For instance, a Rogue might gain a poisoning ability, an ability to release oil at a target's feet upon attacking, or an ability that sets the target on fire. The Rogue chooses which options to prepare, how many of each, up to a total number of uses per short rest.
It fixes the logic issue with the Rogue being able to infinitely generate an arbitrary amount of poison without resource or time cost, gives a justification for limited uses, and allows the Rogue to be given impactful and unique abilities that fit the Rogue instead of giving them another Topple variant. It also gives the Rogue a unique element of preparation in their abilities, befitting the flavor of the class.
Well, for Rogues they need Cunning Strikes because they're going to have a very limited pool of Masteries; realistically only Vex and Nick on their melee weapons (Finesse really needs a third option) and Vex and Slow on their ranged weapons. Frankly, given they only get two picks, I give it good odds they just take a ranged and melee Vex weapon, and the remainder will almost certainly be Vex and Nick melee. So rogues are really only dipping a toe in the water of Weapon Masteries, thus Cunning Strikes fills in the remaining void of "stuff weapon users can do besides just make attack rolls", which is what they're trying to develop with these repeatable options. And the "limitations" on Cunning Strikes is that you're trading in damage for either a wildly situational effect (Disarm), fishing for a debuff against a strong save (Poison), causing the Prone condition as the weapon-user least able to personally take advantage of it (Trip), or doing something you can already substantially do with a Bonus Action (Withdraw). About the only one of these someone might try to spam is Poison, which is also the one that's probably least likely to regularly proc and has a lot of monsters who are outright immune to it.
Regarding Brutal Strikes, it does not replace making two attacks in a turn and it adds a d10 to your damage on top of the other effects. And you were already risking a whiff when you used Reckless Attack, so you're just making the tactical decision of whether you want a better chance to hit or a chance at more damage and a push/slow effect. Really, the secondary effect is more a ribbon on the feature; the big option is it allows Barbarians to stack up damage on a low AC target as opposed to getting an accuracy boost they don't really need in that case.
The limited number of Masteries available on Rogue weapons feels like something Weapon Mastery should improve upon, rather than being something the Rogue needs a feature dedicated to effectively making up for. Especially when any other martial can combine Vex and Prone, or use a poisoned weapon, with more chances to hit and without sacrificing their damage output.
The Rogue shouldn't feel the same as other martials, which is something that Cunning Strikes ends up serving to do.
Its not a strawman, its an inconsistency in your argument when applied to the game design you may not have been aware of.
your claim is that martials sometimes forcing 2-3 saves per round is over the top in time, however, for casters this is regular gameplay due to the AOEness of spells and spell save design.
and its not just leveled spells, its also cantrips.
.acid splash forces two saves
thunderclap forces up to 8 saves
sword burst forces up to 8 saves
word of radiance forces up to 8 saves
death cleric can make necromancy cantrips target two monsters
then there are all the spells. Fullcasters get from 2 to 22 a day, some of which can force even more saves. Low level casters struggle, but by level 8, they will often finish each day with left over spells slots.
note wizard can eventually get back up to 1/2 their level in slots, and eventually cast low level spells freely.
sorcerers can turn meta magic into spells. at roughly 1/2 their level. plus they recover 25% of their sorcery points per SR.
while its nice to say that martials can act infinitely, the reality is they need to recover HP, hit dice essentially gives you 100% more HP. After which no long rest = death. Depending on the difficulty of fights, that can be 2 fights or 10 fights. But if its 10 fights, they use almost no resources per fight for casters as well.
So yes, I understand you aren't saying they should have no mastery, but you are saying they shouldn't be allowed to force 2-3 saves per round, but that is clearly a regular part of gameplay for like 9/13 classes. note that topple is only 1/9 masteries with a save. Why is it not a problem for all these other classes?
as for using weapon mastery requiring weapon swapping, Just because you personally don't like the idea of using multiple weapons, doesnt mean its bad game design. Players have the ability to choose what weapon they are using at start of round (free action sheathe/draw + attack action attack), or they can swap in the middle of a turn once, for most. and have two masteries, for most. If you don't need/want to do that, its fine, but its a capability and a choice you can make. A caster is just as freely allowed to never use more than one cantrip, but many choose each round what cantrip to use, or spell.
nick, is slightly problematic imo, maybe it should have stayed out of mastery, but I guess they wanted it to be a cost/benefit of being a barbarian/fighter to get good use from twf and mastery.
I imagine very few people have ever been in a circumstance where they needed to roll 8 saving throws on an AoE cantrip.
There's also a difference between "affect many enemies" and "repeatedly attempt to affect one enemy". Didn't they already decide that the Monk being able to repeatedly use Stunning Strike in one turn was too excessive? Now we have a feature that can inflict a condition that leaves enemies vulnerable to attacks just like Stunning Strike, but it can be spammed many times per turn with no cost to the user. And unlike cantrips and spells, where stronger effects are offset by lower damage dice, Weapon Mastery has little restriction on stronger effects on stronger weapons.
I think the biggest problem regarding Weapon Mastery is that the options are so limited and unbalanced that it's effectively a "solved" puzzle. Do you have other melee combatants with you? Spamming Topple is the obvious winning move. Playing a Rogue? Obviously you want Vex to set up Sneak Attacks. Two Weapon Fighting? Nick plus Vex—Slow isn't of much use when you're already in melee. Allies have set up damaging fields? Push enemies around in them. There's only so many options, so few that the majority of PCs can have access to, and properties being restricted to individual weapons that most players are inevitably going to build strategies around exploiting one specific Mastery rather than trying to make use of multiple Weapon Masteries. A Rogue can have two Weapon Masteries, but 99% of Rogue players will inevitably go with Vex/Nick melee weapons or Vex melee/ranged weapons.
Specifically, I was talking about the slowing down the game aspect.
stunning strike was considered excessive because the power level of stunning strike and how it altered ki use, it isn't because of saves per round. I don't expect people to force 8 saves often, but 2-3 saves is fairly common for caster gameplay.
in terms of slowing down gameplay, there isn't much difference between aoe and individual targets, topple is 1 mastery out of 8, and due to the fact it causes disadvantage for attackers outside 5 feet, it's not always going to be useful, so it won't realistically be spammed, unless your group is all about that. All melee, not pushing, etc.
As far as power levels, martials are still not approaching caster power levels in 2014 or in 2024 from what we have seen. Masteries just lowers the gap. So I don't think thats an actual issue.
Generally, cantrips are supposed to be less effecient than a martials regular attacks. However, In terms of power level, those aoe cantrips are highly efficient damage and scale very well. The only thing making them less dominant is the fact that most casters have ready access to more powerful abilities via their spell slots, which rarely run out. A pseudo caster martial build, in 2014, often out performed monk and rogue. sword burst at 11 is 3d6 per target. or 10.5 per target, thats a d10+5, so if you were hitting 3 targets you were making 3 attacks, plus if you had haste, you could do attack+BA. Once again, the reason no one cared is because casters are much more powerful than that with less risk via other spells. Even with mastery casters are more powerful, I don't think anyone has made the argument that martials are too strong compared to casters now, and definitely without mastery.
mastery is a 'solved puzzle' for martials outside of barbarian and fighter by design, because other classes have other things, like spells. Now while that kinda sucks for other meleers, these classes also needed more options in combat. paladin, Ranger, warlock, artificers already had many options. Monk baseline is kinda lacking a bit in versatility of attacking, but it gets a bit of versatility outside that, in movement, defense, and use of action versus BA. Rogue would have been lacking, but thats why they gave them cunning strikes. I think maybe rogue should always have nick prepared free, but not all rogues will even use twf, so maybe its just my personal bias towards melee rogues. For these meleers, mastery is more of a specialization than a tactical option, but they get their tactical options elsewhere.
A barbarian will quickly have 3 masteries(eventually 4), so at least one is situational, but they also get brutal strikes
fighter will have 4 by 4rth level, and eventually 6. And can alter the masteries more.
Generally, cantrips are supposed to be less effecient than a martials regular attacks. However, In terms of power level, those aoe cantrips are highly efficient damage and scale very well.
AoE cantrips like thunderclap are only highly efficient if you can get two or more enemies within range, but that also means having two or more enemies within range of you, so that's far from ideal for your average Sorcerer or Wizard. It's only really problematic on something like the Blade Singer which can hold its own in melee for a while, but that's more a problem with how its extra attack works (the swap one attack for a cantrip option should really specify a cantrip that makes one attack roll).
Word of radiance is the easier to see used because it can come on a full caster with access to armour for some solid melee staying power, and they might be combining it with the likes of spirit guardians, though they still don't really want to be taking too many extra hits if they can avoid them; as with spirit guardians down word of radiance on its own isn't as impressive with 2+ enemies curb stomping you, sure it'll probably do more damage than your one mace attack, but it's still not an enormous amount.
It's also worth keeping in mind that these are still a form of save-or-suck effects; you can't compare them directly with an area spell like a fireball where you still do half damage if the enemy succeeds. Also these are both Constitution saving throws, so enemies that are the biggest threat to you up close are often going to be the least likely to fail the saving throw, and thus less likely to take any damage at all. Acid splash is at least a Dexterity saving throw but it has a more difficult targeting requirement for its maximum of two targets, though you might get more if they keep the UA 5 foot area, but realistically two should still be tricky unless your DM is making it really easy for you.
And you're still comparing magic with an opportunity cost of needing multiple targets to be positioned the way you want, only affecting each one once (one saving throw each), with the possibility of zero damage, to an effect that can force multiple saving throws to a single creature over and over again, and is on top of having already dealt damage. This was one of the major problems with Stunning Strike in 5e, though even that at least had a cost (up to five Ki for the maximum number of attempts in a single turn), but that didn't make it much less boring to actually run unless a player was good at using it sparingly, and it would still have been better if it was one saving throw with a way to make it harder.
My aim as a DM in combat is typically to roll as little as possible, because the more rolling I'm doing, the longer it takes for each player to get their turn, whether that's due to long player turns or long enemy turns doesn't matter; D&D 5e has a really slow combat system, the goal should always be to do less rolling, not more, or a quick half hour combat will soon creep into an hour long slog.
You say that the point of mastery isn't to be a tactical choice, and yet it's a whole heap of abilities so that's exactly what it's presented as. If it's supposed to just be "proficiency but better" then just slap "proficiency and a half" on attack rolls with the weapon and leave it at that. It'd be just as boring but without the spam and balancing problems.
But I don't know anyone who seriously sees the issue of martial vs. caster balance as one where their preferred solution is for martials to stay repetitive but be slightly more effective – everyone I know is desperate for more things to do as martials, because that's the real big difference between them and casters; casters can have answers to everything, whereas martials just hit stuff or, if they're feeling really adventurous, hit stuff some more. When I'm playing a martial what I want are options, I want to be choosing between different options for risk and reward.
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But I don't know anyone who seriously sees the issue of martial vs. caster balance as one where their preferred solution is for martials to stay repetitive but be slightly more effective – everyone I know is desperate for more things to do as martials, because that's the real big difference between them and casters; casters can have answers to everything, whereas martials just hit stuff or, if they're feeling really adventurous, hit stuff some more. When I'm playing a martial what I want are options, I want to be choosing between different options for risk and reward.
This is why I transitioned from martials to warlock as sort of my go-to. Warlock is a martial in the manner that it plays like any other archer if that's what you want to do. Round to round, I shoot eldritch blast instead of a bow. I don't have to invest a lot of thought into it. However, I have /options/ should I want to do something else. I have a spell selection I can choose though, I have other cantrips that provide me situational benefits should I feel that eldritch blast is the wrong cantrip for the situation I am in. Warlock is a martial with options.
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Any time an unfathomably powerful entity sweeps in and offers godlike rewards in return for just a few teensy favors, it’s a scam. Unless it’s me. I’d never lie to you, reader dearest.
But I don't know anyone who seriously sees the issue of martial vs. caster balance as one where their preferred solution is for martials to stay repetitive but be slightly more effective – everyone I know is desperate for more things to do as martials, because that's the real big difference between them and casters; casters can have answers to everything, whereas martials just hit stuff or, if they're feeling really adventurous, hit stuff some more. When I'm playing a martial what I want are options, I want to be choosing between different options for risk and reward.
This is only true because martial players refuse to sacrifice DPR to do something else. Everyone is gushing about Push being able to move enemies into AoE spells, when martials can already do that with Grapple & Drag! Why is Push suddenly this amazing thing but nobody ever uses Grapple? - ANS: because martial players want to hit stuff with big weapons for big damage.
Martial players don't really want options, they want to hit stuff with weapons - if they wanted lots of tactical options they could go play a Moon Druid with it's dozens of situationally powerful spells and dozens of different animal forms with different abilities to choose from. They don't, and Moon Druid is much maligned for being "Too complicated" because "I don't want to have to look through half a dozen books to find the optimal choices".
Fundamentally the fantasy for martial players is "Rarr! Big axe go Smash!". It's why Riposte is the favourite Battlemaster maneuver, and why Grapple, Shove, and Push are massively underutilized, despite being very good options in many situations. It's why GWM and PAM are considered must-takes but Shield Master with it's choice of Shove/Push as a BA is considered a 2nd or 3rd tier feat. Sure people love the Weapon Mastery, but that is specifically because it just adds on top of "Rarr! Big axe go Smash!", it isn't really a choice as nothing is sacrificed and especially won't be a choice as soon as the party gets magic weapons.
According to D&D Beyond statistics, martials remain more popular than casters across the platform. This is despite the omnipresent narrative of "martials suck, everyone should play a caster." So clearly, there is demand for simple straightforward characters, that fulfill their presented fantasy.
I like the flavor of Rogues and Barbarians being able to inflict added effects with their attacks. But looking through the lists of what they get, a lot of it isn't that interesting. Rogues can spend Sneak Attack dice to try to inflict a single status, but some of the options are redundant with existing abilities like Withdraw or Trip. The options Barbarians get at Level 9 are pushing and slowing enemies, which are things you can already do with Weapon Mastery.
I wonder if this is a problem with these abilities being designed so that players can use them as often as possible. You can use Weapon Mastery on any attack, Cunning Strikes on any Sneak Attack, Brutal Strikes on any Reckless Attack. Because these features can be used very often, the effects they inflict have to be balanced around being usable every turn, and thus not as significant as what spellcasters can do with their spell slots or classes can do with rest-based resources. Not only is there overlap between these features, but with other existing class features as well. Why would a Battle Master take Trip Attack when every attack they make can have a chance to knock enemies prone?
Am I alone on this, or do other folks think these features would be more interesting if they were less frequently usable, but more impactful when they trigger? Either with limited uses per short rest, or conditions to activate these features?
Problem is that anyone can already take Martial Adept feat and/or the Superior Technique fighting style to get a few short-rest, limited-use, but more impactful abilities. Or they can simply MC into Battlemaster if they want SR, limited-use more impactful abilities. Just putting Battlemaster maneuvers into all the other martial classes cheapens Battlemaster and is kind of redundant.
PS Battlemasters IME almost never used Trip attack anyway, so redundancy with WM isn't that much of a big deal. Battlemasters almost always take some combination of these maneuvers: Riposte, Menacing Attack, Goading Attack, Precise Attack. The only ones to use Trip are archers and since Topple isn't available on ranged weapons they will continue to take it.
Brutal Strikes I'd still say is kinda underpowered, the pushback is nice, it stacks with a push weapon so you can push a creature back 25 foot, that opens a lot of situational uses, like knocking a creature over a cliff or into a river but the sacrifice of advantage for the damage is not a great deal, it's too little damage for the loss of advantage, IMO. At level 17 when it goes to 2d10, then it's a much better deal, you can only use Brutal strikes on the second attack of the round (or first depending on how you interpret it) too, which is just a weird limitation (once per round would have been fine tho).
Cunning Strike is fine, it has a lot more options and those options on the most part are good, the poisoned condition for example is very potent, yes it has a lot of creatures immune to it but the vast majority are not, withdraw allows you to retain your bonus action while getting away, which can be used to dash and move around the battlefield a lot more and disarm can be very useful in some cases. That subclasses then get extra options is also good, overall I think cunning strike works well and most of the choices are worth the ~3.5 or ~7 damage that they sacrifice.
Weapon Masteries job is to be something you can use whenever needed. More limited abilities don't get used in the same way, due to game design and op cosy
if you limit it to 1, but make them better, the goal becomes to use it once on every turn
it you give it a number of casts per cycle, people save it for great need
these effects are supposed to be things that are always available and used whenever it makes sense. A basketball analogy might be pass, dribble, crossover, layup, dunk, jumpshot. They are tools which expand how you play in general, not a more limited resource/condition effect.
Cunning strike and Brutal strike are different, one is tied to your first attack per round, and sacrifices accuracy, and the other is tied to SA and your damage dice. So they can be, and are a bit different in design.
the reason you probably find them less interesting, is because there is a finite amount of frequently useful things you can do that make sense for a martial themed character to do while attacking.
. Even among spells, most boil down to damage, and one of the effects in mastery or strikes
This is very true, there isn't that much diversity in 5e, the common conditions are: charmed, frightened, reduce movement, prone, push, poison, blind, deal damage. I'd argue 95% of the game is just those options in different combinations.
No, not really. I feel like in general, spellcaster control is a bigger problem than anything that martials can do. Martials are pretty much pure damage for the most part. Pure damage spells don't really scale well, and are not super problematic. Spellcasters can just remove creatures from the board, and martials can only match that by connecting on Nova rounds to physically remove the creatures hitpoints with a single action.
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My answer to the question is "yes and no".
I find things like Trip way too spammy, since you can force a saving throw on every single attack you make in a turn; in general D&D combat needs less rolling, not more, as combat is already incredibly slow in D&D compared to some other systems.
Plus doing it on every attack just cheapens it; it's no longer some cool tactical choice you're making, you're just spamming it on every attack because why wouldn't you when it's free and there's always a chance the target will fail (or have to use a legendary resistance or whatever).
For masteries in particular I want a mastery to be something where choosing to use it feels impactful and meaningful, which is just not what mastery feels like to me at all.
Brutal Strikes I don't think have quite the same problem, as losing the advantage from Reckless Attacks is a pretty big cost, so you're much more likely to only use a Brutal Strike when the potential benefits outweigh the cost; most of the time advantage is the better choice, but when a big push could get an enemy into a rough area effect or environmental hazard it can absolutely be worth doing, and feels like a more tactical choice.
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Pretty much agree with everything here.
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Tasha
while I might not love save rolling on every attack, I don't really think the do one thing per round works often enough that you can use it tactically. Each save based skill has to have two things happen to land, first land a hit, second land the save. 32% chance an attack, without advantage. In reality, you often spend your whole turn trying to prone enemies, if thats your game plan. Most casters just force one roll, so in general the multiattack feature balances this out. Most martials make 2-3 attacks per round, things like nick don't have a mastery, and can only swap once, so in actual play, weapon mastery saves are no more powerful than cantrips, and more limited in their effects/options and number of enemies effected. Essentially, masteries with saves are very well balanced in terms of effectiveness, and game design. The only issue is the extra rolling time, though since its gm dependent, its generally faster with experienced DMs. Of course not faster than no rolls.
Essentially, casters have always had this power, why is it bad for martials to have it?
They could have an optional rule that uses the roll from the attack to determine the save, but its probably too much math on the fly for many people. Essentially monster rolls the inverse of the attack roll (21-attack roll) that would have the effect of increasing the rate slightly, since attacks that hit, would be better rolls.
Also, most martial characters are designed with number of hits as a key balance point. Fighter is purposefully the one who gets the most out of mastery. then comes the rest of the real martials, then comes the one attack hybrid martials. I'd say the big flaw is, most martials won't have room to really feel the tactical option, many will choose vex/nick if 1handed, or graze/push if two handed. Topple in reality is situational, unless you have a crew of meleers.
And, I think you are thinking these basic abilities are supposed to feel like rare special cases, when they are designed to feel like your readily available options for interacting in battle. They are supposed to make each round varied and more productive than just spamming damage. Once again, most of these effects are also found on cantrips, why are cantrips/spells supposed to feel interesting and effect multiple enemies per round, but martials are supposed to be more boring?
I have playtested the UA a lot over multiple classes, and its way better than 2014, and it feels so much better playing a martial, even with the solidness of monk, I can tell you the lack of mastery is very noticeable, especially in subclasses which don't offer much variation in on hit effects, like mercy monk and shadow. Rounds that end up just being I roll damage 3-4 times are not nearly as entertaining.
So yeah, rounds take slightly longer, but each martial turn, every attack feels like it matters more. Overall, the game feels better for martials, and casters always had this gameplay in their turns.
That's not a good justification for it occurring on every attack though, because with a single use per turn ability you can simply make it trigger on landing a hit. This is how Sneak Attack works, and it's how Battle Master manoeuvres work (they're retroactive). But whereas mastery would be once per turn, manoeuvres remain limited use with a resource but adding damage in most cases (so there's a benefit even if they fail).
Literally not even remotely the argument I'm making – please don't straw-man me with this kind of nonsense.
And I think you know full well these aren't comparable; casters get one chance per creature at best, and it costs them a significant and limited resource to even attempt it. We're comparing to a feature that a high level Fighter can literally use 57,600+ times per day (4 times every 6 seconds, plus action surges).
Except they're not options; each weapon only ever has one mastery, so to get more than one you have to juggle weapons. Two-weapon fighting isn't really an option for getting more because one of them is always going to be Nick.
Weapon mastery doesn't feel like "mastery" in any way shape or form because none of it feels like a tactical choice, or really a choice at all, because 99% of characters are going to pick one mastery and that's it, there is very little incentive to actually change.
Then the system fails completely in that goal, because all it's doing is adding more spam to that equation.
And again, if you'd stop trying to straw-man me for two minutes you might realise I have never argued that weapon mastery should be removed and replaced with nothing – I have not once made such an argument, nor would I. Ever.
Martials clearly need improving to better balance them against spellcasters, I am very much in favour of some kind of improvements to weapon usage, especially if it distinguishes weapon types more. What I am not in favour of is weapon mastery as it is presented as I find it boring at best, and spammy and boring at worst, it just doesn't do anything for me – it feels cheap and half-baked as a solution for such a fundamental problem in 5e, and if it makes it to print as-is it'll be the first thing I rip out and replace with something better in my home games.
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Several of the comments here have brought a good point to my attention.
Weapon Mastery exists as the option that, hypothetically, gives you tactical choices each round in combat. (Even if, as pointed out, a lot of players will just stick with one weapon and one property.) You can use them every turn as desired. Then why do Cunning Strike and Brutal Strike need to also be options that can be used potentially every turn, if that sort of thing is already provided by Weapon Mastery?
There are ways to design more impactful and unique effects. The later Brutal Strike effects don't impose a condition, or an effect that is mirrored with Weapon Mastery. Frankly, being able to impose Disadvantage on the target's next saving throw, only requiring an attack to hit, feels very overpowered compared to the other Brutal Strike options.
Having options encourages tactical choices, but limitations on options also encourages tactics in making the most use of those options. Such as if Cunning Strikes was about taking advantage of circumstances, rather than being able to use them on any Sneak Attack.
(One Barbarian main I play with also raised a good point, in that Brutal Strikes being tied to Reckless Attacks means you have to make yourself more vulnerable to use Brutal Strikes, for a single attack that might miss entirely, whereas the Rogue has no defensive penalty to Cunning Strikes.)
Well, for Rogues they need Cunning Strikes because they're going to have a very limited pool of Masteries; realistically only Vex and Nick on their melee weapons (Finesse really needs a third option) and Vex and Slow on their ranged weapons. Frankly, given they only get two picks, I give it good odds they just take a ranged and melee Vex weapon, and the remainder will almost certainly be Vex and Nick melee. So rogues are really only dipping a toe in the water of Weapon Masteries, thus Cunning Strikes fills in the remaining void of "stuff weapon users can do besides just make attack rolls", which is what they're trying to develop with these repeatable options. And the "limitations" on Cunning Strikes is that you're trading in damage for either a wildly situational effect (Disarm), fishing for a debuff against a strong save (Poison), causing the Prone condition as the weapon-user least able to personally take advantage of it (Trip), or doing something you can already substantially do with a Bonus Action (Withdraw). About the only one of these someone might try to spam is Poison, which is also the one that's probably least likely to regularly proc and has a lot of monsters who are outright immune to it.
Regarding Brutal Strikes, it does not replace making two attacks in a turn and it adds a d10 to your damage on top of the other effects. And you were already risking a whiff when you used Reckless Attack, so you're just making the tactical decision of whether you want a better chance to hit or a chance at more damage and a push/slow effect. Really, the secondary effect is more a ribbon on the feature; the big option is it allows Barbarians to stack up damage on a low AC target as opposed to getting an accuracy boost they don't really need in that case.
Its not a strawman, its an inconsistency in your argument when applied to the game design you may not have been aware of.
your claim is that martials sometimes forcing 2-3 saves per round is over the top in time, however, for casters this is regular gameplay due to the AOEness of spells and spell save design.
and its not just leveled spells, its also cantrips.
.acid splash forces two saves
thunderclap forces up to 8 saves
sword burst forces up to 8 saves
word of radiance forces up to 8 saves
death cleric can make necromancy cantrips target two monsters
then there are all the spells. Fullcasters get from 2 to 22 a day, some of which can force even more saves. Low level casters struggle, but by level 8, they will often finish each day with left over spells slots.
note wizard can eventually get back up to 1/2 their level in slots, and eventually cast low level spells freely.
sorcerers can turn meta magic into spells. at roughly 1/2 their level. plus they recover 25% of their sorcery points per SR.
while its nice to say that martials can act infinitely, the reality is they need to recover HP, hit dice essentially gives you 100% more HP. After which no long rest = death. Depending on the difficulty of fights, that can be 2 fights or 10 fights. But if its 10 fights, they use almost no resources per fight for casters as well.
So yes, I understand you aren't saying they should have no mastery, but you are saying they shouldn't be allowed to force 2-3 saves per round, but that is clearly a regular part of gameplay for like 9/13 classes. note that topple is only 1/9 masteries with a save. Why is it not a problem for all these other classes?
as for using weapon mastery requiring weapon swapping, Just because you personally don't like the idea of using multiple weapons, doesnt mean its bad game design. Players have the ability to choose what weapon they are using at start of round (free action sheathe/draw + attack action attack), or they can swap in the middle of a turn once, for most. and have two masteries, for most. If you don't need/want to do that, its fine, but its a capability and a choice you can make. A caster is just as freely allowed to never use more than one cantrip, but many choose each round what cantrip to use, or spell.
nick, is slightly problematic imo, maybe it should have stayed out of mastery, but I guess they wanted it to be a cost/benefit of being a barbarian/fighter to get good use from twf and mastery.
The limited number of Masteries available on Rogue weapons feels like something Weapon Mastery should improve upon, rather than being something the Rogue needs a feature dedicated to effectively making up for. Especially when any other martial can combine Vex and Prone, or use a poisoned weapon, with more chances to hit and without sacrificing their damage output.
The Rogue shouldn't feel the same as other martials, which is something that Cunning Strikes ends up serving to do.
I imagine very few people have ever been in a circumstance where they needed to roll 8 saving throws on an AoE cantrip.
There's also a difference between "affect many enemies" and "repeatedly attempt to affect one enemy". Didn't they already decide that the Monk being able to repeatedly use Stunning Strike in one turn was too excessive? Now we have a feature that can inflict a condition that leaves enemies vulnerable to attacks just like Stunning Strike, but it can be spammed many times per turn with no cost to the user. And unlike cantrips and spells, where stronger effects are offset by lower damage dice, Weapon Mastery has little restriction on stronger effects on stronger weapons.
I think the biggest problem regarding Weapon Mastery is that the options are so limited and unbalanced that it's effectively a "solved" puzzle. Do you have other melee combatants with you? Spamming Topple is the obvious winning move. Playing a Rogue? Obviously you want Vex to set up Sneak Attacks. Two Weapon Fighting? Nick plus Vex—Slow isn't of much use when you're already in melee. Allies have set up damaging fields? Push enemies around in them. There's only so many options, so few that the majority of PCs can have access to, and properties being restricted to individual weapons that most players are inevitably going to build strategies around exploiting one specific Mastery rather than trying to make use of multiple Weapon Masteries. A Rogue can have two Weapon Masteries, but 99% of Rogue players will inevitably go with Vex/Nick melee weapons or Vex melee/ranged weapons.
So now your argument is that I may have been unaware that magic exists in 5e? Seriously?
Literally all I said is that having a saving throw on every attack is too frequent, and that makes such masteries boring and spammy – that's it. And it's a simple conclusion to reach, because it's literally an unlimited use feature with little incentive to switch, so of course it gets spammy.
Meanwhile magic comes with resource costs, and usually a maximum of one attempt per creature per turn in exchange for that cost; to force multiple saving throws every turn a caster either needs the exact conditions required for a multi-target cantrip (of which there are not many, and most aren't that good anyway) or to be burning resources every turn (and usually still need ideal conditions for an area effect). This is being compared to something that's free on every attack you will ever make, and can be used infinitely no matter how many targets you have, and it's entirely besides the point – it's still boring, spammy and just not engaging no matter how you try to spin it.
If your principle argument is "other classes can be boring and spammy so why shouldn't martials also be boring and spammy" then that's a poor justification – something else being boring and spammy doesn't make it okay for weapon mastery to be boring and spammy too. But no matter how spammy on saves a caster can be, it's irrelevant, because they have a vast array of choices in what they do – what makes weapon mastery uniquely spammy is that there's no real incentive to do anything other than the same thing over and over again, which means it not only hasn't solved the original problem (just attacking over and over is boring) it's only made it worse by adding an extra layer of spam, or passive bonuses that are just boring.
What makes Battle Masters fun is that manoeuvres are a tactical choice from a range of options, and using them is significant because you can only do so a limited number of times, so you need to think about every time you use one. If you were to take away superiority dice and make manoeuvres infinite free use, you'd have the current mastery system, and that is why it's so cheapened.
I'm all for martials having fun new ways to use their weapons, but the currently proposed system isn't anything like what I want. What I'd like to see from weapon mastery is something like:
I'm fully aware that probably none of this is going to be done, and we're just going to get weapon mastery as-is, and I'm not going to be at all happy with it. But that's why I say I'll just homebrew something else, because I've playtested the proposed system and while I like the idea, I don't feel that it delivers on any of its promises, and it's not especially fun to use (and often feels more like an added chore instead).
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I had an idea for a Rogue alternative to Cunning Strikes, inspired by thinking about how one of the few unique options for Cunning Strikes doesn't make sense at all.
At 5th level in the UAs, the Rogue gains the ability to trip an enemy. They can disarm an enemy. They can slip away after making their Sneak Attack. And, at 5th level, a Rogue gains the inexplicable ability to generate infinite amounts of poison from zero resources besides a poisoner's kit! Furthermore, even though they can do so, only they can apply this poison on their own attacks and only on specific attacks. Doesn't make much sense, does it?
So, for an alternative idea for Cunning Strikes: a mechanic where the Rogue gains a number of options from the base class and potentially subclasses as well, and the Rogue can prepare a total number of them (Proficiency Bonus, perhaps?) each time they take a short rest. When they land a Sneak Attack, or potentially in other circumstances, they can use one of these prepared abilities. For instance, a Rogue might gain a poisoning ability, an ability to release oil at a target's feet upon attacking, or an ability that sets the target on fire. The Rogue chooses which options to prepare, how many of each, up to a total number of uses per short rest.
It fixes the logic issue with the Rogue being able to infinitely generate an arbitrary amount of poison without resource or time cost, gives a justification for limited uses, and allows the Rogue to be given impactful and unique abilities that fit the Rogue instead of giving them another Topple variant. It also gives the Rogue a unique element of preparation in their abilities, befitting the flavor of the class.
Specifically, I was talking about the slowing down the game aspect.
stunning strike was considered excessive because the power level of stunning strike and how it altered ki use, it isn't because of saves per round. I don't expect people to force 8 saves often, but 2-3 saves is fairly common for caster gameplay.
in terms of slowing down gameplay, there isn't much difference between aoe and individual targets, topple is 1 mastery out of 8, and due to the fact it causes disadvantage for attackers outside 5 feet, it's not always going to be useful, so it won't realistically be spammed, unless your group is all about that. All melee, not pushing, etc.
As far as power levels, martials are still not approaching caster power levels in 2014 or in 2024 from what we have seen. Masteries just lowers the gap. So I don't think thats an actual issue.
Generally, cantrips are supposed to be less effecient than a martials regular attacks. However, In terms of power level, those aoe cantrips are highly efficient damage and scale very well. The only thing making them less dominant is the fact that most casters have ready access to more powerful abilities via their spell slots, which rarely run out. A pseudo caster martial build, in 2014, often out performed monk and rogue. sword burst at 11 is 3d6 per target. or 10.5 per target, thats a d10+5, so if you were hitting 3 targets you were making 3 attacks, plus if you had haste, you could do attack+BA. Once again, the reason no one cared is because casters are much more powerful than that with less risk via other spells. Even with mastery casters are more powerful, I don't think anyone has made the argument that martials are too strong compared to casters now, and definitely without mastery.
mastery is a 'solved puzzle' for martials outside of barbarian and fighter by design, because other classes have other things, like spells. Now while that kinda sucks for other meleers, these classes also needed more options in combat. paladin, Ranger, warlock, artificers already had many options. Monk baseline is kinda lacking a bit in versatility of attacking, but it gets a bit of versatility outside that, in movement, defense, and use of action versus BA. Rogue would have been lacking, but thats why they gave them cunning strikes. I think maybe rogue should always have nick prepared free, but not all rogues will even use twf, so maybe its just my personal bias towards melee rogues. For these meleers, mastery is more of a specialization than a tactical option, but they get their tactical options elsewhere.
A barbarian will quickly have 3 masteries(eventually 4), so at least one is situational, but they also get brutal strikes
fighter will have 4 by 4rth level, and eventually 6. And can alter the masteries more.
AoE cantrips like thunderclap are only highly efficient if you can get two or more enemies within range, but that also means having two or more enemies within range of you, so that's far from ideal for your average Sorcerer or Wizard. It's only really problematic on something like the Blade Singer which can hold its own in melee for a while, but that's more a problem with how its extra attack works (the swap one attack for a cantrip option should really specify a cantrip that makes one attack roll).
Word of radiance is the easier to see used because it can come on a full caster with access to armour for some solid melee staying power, and they might be combining it with the likes of spirit guardians, though they still don't really want to be taking too many extra hits if they can avoid them; as with spirit guardians down word of radiance on its own isn't as impressive with 2+ enemies curb stomping you, sure it'll probably do more damage than your one mace attack, but it's still not an enormous amount.
It's also worth keeping in mind that these are still a form of save-or-suck effects; you can't compare them directly with an area spell like a fireball where you still do half damage if the enemy succeeds. Also these are both Constitution saving throws, so enemies that are the biggest threat to you up close are often going to be the least likely to fail the saving throw, and thus less likely to take any damage at all. Acid splash is at least a Dexterity saving throw but it has a more difficult targeting requirement for its maximum of two targets, though you might get more if they keep the UA 5 foot area, but realistically two should still be tricky unless your DM is making it really easy for you.
And you're still comparing magic with an opportunity cost of needing multiple targets to be positioned the way you want, only affecting each one once (one saving throw each), with the possibility of zero damage, to an effect that can force multiple saving throws to a single creature over and over again, and is on top of having already dealt damage. This was one of the major problems with Stunning Strike in 5e, though even that at least had a cost (up to five Ki for the maximum number of attempts in a single turn), but that didn't make it much less boring to actually run unless a player was good at using it sparingly, and it would still have been better if it was one saving throw with a way to make it harder.
My aim as a DM in combat is typically to roll as little as possible, because the more rolling I'm doing, the longer it takes for each player to get their turn, whether that's due to long player turns or long enemy turns doesn't matter; D&D 5e has a really slow combat system, the goal should always be to do less rolling, not more, or a quick half hour combat will soon creep into an hour long slog.
You say that the point of mastery isn't to be a tactical choice, and yet it's a whole heap of abilities so that's exactly what it's presented as. If it's supposed to just be "proficiency but better" then just slap "proficiency and a half" on attack rolls with the weapon and leave it at that. It'd be just as boring but without the spam and balancing problems.
But I don't know anyone who seriously sees the issue of martial vs. caster balance as one where their preferred solution is for martials to stay repetitive but be slightly more effective – everyone I know is desperate for more things to do as martials, because that's the real big difference between them and casters; casters can have answers to everything, whereas martials just hit stuff or, if they're feeling really adventurous, hit stuff some more. When I'm playing a martial what I want are options, I want to be choosing between different options for risk and reward.
Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
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This is why I transitioned from martials to warlock as sort of my go-to. Warlock is a martial in the manner that it plays like any other archer if that's what you want to do. Round to round, I shoot eldritch blast instead of a bow. I don't have to invest a lot of thought into it. However, I have /options/ should I want to do something else. I have a spell selection I can choose though, I have other cantrips that provide me situational benefits should I feel that eldritch blast is the wrong cantrip for the situation I am in. Warlock is a martial with options.
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This is only true because martial players refuse to sacrifice DPR to do something else. Everyone is gushing about Push being able to move enemies into AoE spells, when martials can already do that with Grapple & Drag! Why is Push suddenly this amazing thing but nobody ever uses Grapple? - ANS: because martial players want to hit stuff with big weapons for big damage.
Martial players don't really want options, they want to hit stuff with weapons - if they wanted lots of tactical options they could go play a Moon Druid with it's dozens of situationally powerful spells and dozens of different animal forms with different abilities to choose from. They don't, and Moon Druid is much maligned for being "Too complicated" because "I don't want to have to look through half a dozen books to find the optimal choices".
Fundamentally the fantasy for martial players is "Rarr! Big axe go Smash!". It's why Riposte is the favourite Battlemaster maneuver, and why Grapple, Shove, and Push are massively underutilized, despite being very good options in many situations. It's why GWM and PAM are considered must-takes but Shield Master with it's choice of Shove/Push as a BA is considered a 2nd or 3rd tier feat. Sure people love the Weapon Mastery, but that is specifically because it just adds on top of "Rarr! Big axe go Smash!", it isn't really a choice as nothing is sacrificed and especially won't be a choice as soon as the party gets magic weapons.
According to D&D Beyond statistics, martials remain more popular than casters across the platform. This is despite the omnipresent narrative of "martials suck, everyone should play a caster." So clearly, there is demand for simple straightforward characters, that fulfill their presented fantasy.