From time to time over the years, whenever I follow a discussion on people's thoughts on rules mechanics/game design, and usually coinciding with a new edition looming on the horizon, I've encountered the contention that we should simplify armour into simple categories, e.g. "Light/Medium/Heavy" and just have one set of statistics for each category, reducing the differences between armour types to mere flavor text.
Often, the same people arguing for that change will be the same ones who support 80+ pages of the PHB being taken up with lists of spells.
The spells represent interesting and mechanically distinct choices for the spellcasters, who seem to enjoy a certain degree of favoritism with designers in recent decades. Why, then, can't these people see that mechanically distinct weapons and armour represent precisely the same thing for the Fighter-types? After all, the shoe could conceivably be put on the other foot, and spells could be reduced to a half-dozen (or fewer!) pages of mechanics: "This is the spell that does hit-point damage: 1d6 per level; elemental effects are just flavor text. This spell forces a saving throw vs. [insert attribute] or else you fall unconscious/move at half-speed/etc; the effect that causes this is just flavor text."
I want to see dozens of pages devoted to exciting choices for weapons: for example, maybe a longsword and a warhammer both do 1d8 damage, but the warhammer has +1 to hit armoured targets or something in the weapon's description. And the same for armour. And decent rules for masterwork versions of both; after all, would it truly be game-breaking if masterwork armour actually did provide a +1 AC over the baseline type, offset by a significant increase in cost?
I don't need eighty pages of this, but I would definitely like to see more attention paid to it than the past few editions have given it. C'Mon, Devs! Give us something good! :D
The problem with armor currently is that it effectively IS just 3 types. As soon as your character reaches 3rd level, you probably have enough gold to afford the best in its class. That's the biggest limitation to new characters, the cost. Our options right now are really only what training our class/feats/stats give us:
Light - AC 12 + full dex + shield optional
Medium - AC 14 + 2 dex + shield optional. (Or +1 AC with disadvantage on stealth)
Heavy - AC 18 + 0 dex + shield optional + disadvantage on stealth
It's boring and repetitive. Now, I don't know who is saying there should only be 3 armor types, but I imagine that if they do exist, the above is the reason why. Not because they really want it, but because that's functionally all we have now. Might as well call it what it is.
I'd love to see more options, but I'm not sure how to do it without adding complexity that doesn't really add any value other than some notion of verisimilitude.
The same goes with a lot of weapon rules people have suggested. I have played old DnD where you cross-referenced your weapon vs their armor on a chart to know your hit bonus. I have played Rolemaster where there is literally an entire book of full page charts for this purpose. Each chart is for one specific weapon against different defenses. There are dozens of modifiers. Then another chart for critical hits to see how many rounds the target bleeds, and by how much, or if their speed is reduced a few feet for a day. It's just awful
This is a very extreme example, but the end result is the same. You know what we remembered from all of those games? It was never what box we rolled on a chart, or if we hit the monster's arm or leg, or if our warhammer gave a 5% bonus 1/10th of the time. It was the results of the combats, the tricks we pulled off by cutting down the chandelier or jumping through fire, the stories we told. All that math added exactly nothing to the game but time.
It's understandable how people get to the point they want more crunch in their games. But in my experience, most people who get it through more numbers eventually wish they hadn't and want to go back to rules that really matter. So I'm all for more options and meaning in armor and weapon choices. I just know that +1 vs plate armor isn't the most fun way to do it. So what can we do?
I like the weapon rules that 5e has. I can see expanding those with more keywords that tell you how one is different from the other. I would love more rules for master crafted items. Rules for exotic materials. I could see letting all heavy two-handed weapons giving a (toned down) version of 5e Great Weapon Master. Or staves offering a special trip attack. Or repeating hand crossbows you don't have to reload. Or shields having a bash or parry option baked in. I think there is room for more options. They just need to be meaningful and fast, and fit with the design philosophy of the game.
This goes deeper than just adding numbers and effects on weapons. The issue is that damage types themselves in DnD are nothing but colors for numbers. You'll understand what I'm talking about if you played Divinity: Original Sin. Elemental spells in that game form an elegan system with mind-boggling levels of tactical applications. Fire spells ignite things, melt ice, and turn water into clouds of steam. Ice spells condense steam into liquid, liquid into ice, and put down fire. Lightning spells electrify liquids and hit metal harder. Now, why would I start talking about magic in a martial thread? Martials are limited to three damage types (lacking chopping for some reason), and devs fear playing around with resistances to these because weapons themselves deal only one damage type. If a spellcaster can simply cast lightning instead of fireball, a spear-weilding fighter that encounters a skeleton would have to carry a spare bludgeoning weapon and spend a whole round to switch out (although technically you can sheathe one weapon at the end of your round as a free action, and then unsheathe another at the start of your next round, which is also a free action). What I'm saying is that existing damage types and weapon system in itself discourages devs from tinkering with melee, mostly treating it as unified "physical" damage out of fear of martial PCs meeting "incompatible" monsters.
For starters, there should be chopping damage type. Slash and chop are very different things - try chopping bread with a vertical motion, like a guillotine, and slashing it with sawing motion, and you'll see the difference. Second, most weapons should have multiple damage types assigned to them. You can both chop and thrust with a longsword. Real historical warhammers always had a pointed end to deal piercing damage against armored enemies. The few weapons that could not deal multiple damage types, like a mace, were either easier to manufacture and obtain, or easier to handle, making this a potential criteria for simple weapons category. And lastly, damage types need something to differentiate them. Let bludgeoning hits knock down enemies, slashing strikes cause bleeding, chopping damage to crit harder and sever limbs, piercing damage to partially ignore armor, something like that. Just like fire should always ignite stuff, lightning should transmit through liquids and jump to metal, etc. Just by fiddling with damage types and adding them to weapons, you can have a way deeper melee combat.
These are good points. One of my favorite low-level monsters to use is skeletons, precisely because of their vulnerability to bludgeoning damage. They have 13 HP, a decent AC, and immunities, which is a lot to overcome for a CR 1/4 creature. But if you have the right tool, you really get to shine. Thematically, it's also great that the clerics are usually the ones with the warhammers to smash them. That's great monster design to me.
I'm just kind of 'thinking out loud' at this moment, because I think you are on the right track for how to improve this.
The spell comparison is a good one. At low level, a wizard has 1-3 damage cantrips, and a fighter has 1-3 weapons they can reasonably carry. I think it's worth comparing them this way. Cantrips have different damage types, but very few monsters at low level have any resistance or vulnerability to elements. But cantrips also have additional effects themed to the element. They slow the target, or hit multiple enemies with splash, etc.
The disparity becomes greater at high levels, where many monsters have types that are strong or weak against different elements, and the wizard has a whole arsenal of weapons to swap between. While the fighter can still only carry a few weapons, and the toughest monsters are just resistant to all of them that aren't magical. So monster design is really important to help balance this out, as well as weapon design.
As much as people love to talk about the nuances of the medieval arms race, what weapons beat what armor, what swords were superior, etc.... in practical terms for DnD it really doesn't matter as much. DnD uses a very stylized approach to combat. We might say 'you missed the goblin' when we really mean 'you hit his armor and didn't hurt him this time.' That's what AC represents. HP is even more nebulous. A high level character doesn't have titanium skin, they just are better at rolling with the blows, protecting vital areas, and lasting longer through the pain.
A weapon effect is never going to match the level of spell potential, without the weapon also being enchanted with magic. But there is definitely still room to expand on them. And I think comparing them to cantrips is a good idea. I'm going to look through them and come up with some examples.
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From time to time over the years, whenever I follow a discussion on people's thoughts on rules mechanics/game design, and usually coinciding with a new edition looming on the horizon, I've encountered the contention that we should simplify armour into simple categories, e.g. "Light/Medium/Heavy" and just have one set of statistics for each category, reducing the differences between armour types to mere flavor text.
Often, the same people arguing for that change will be the same ones who support 80+ pages of the PHB being taken up with lists of spells.
The spells represent interesting and mechanically distinct choices for the spellcasters, who seem to enjoy a certain degree of favoritism with designers in recent decades. Why, then, can't these people see that mechanically distinct weapons and armour represent precisely the same thing for the Fighter-types? After all, the shoe could conceivably be put on the other foot, and spells could be reduced to a half-dozen (or fewer!) pages of mechanics: "This is the spell that does hit-point damage: 1d6 per level; elemental effects are just flavor text. This spell forces a saving throw vs. [insert attribute] or else you fall unconscious/move at half-speed/etc; the effect that causes this is just flavor text."
I want to see dozens of pages devoted to exciting choices for weapons: for example, maybe a longsword and a warhammer both do 1d8 damage, but the warhammer has +1 to hit armoured targets or something in the weapon's description. And the same for armour. And decent rules for masterwork versions of both; after all, would it truly be game-breaking if masterwork armour actually did provide a +1 AC over the baseline type, offset by a significant increase in cost?
I don't need eighty pages of this, but I would definitely like to see more attention paid to it than the past few editions have given it. C'Mon, Devs! Give us something good! :D
The problem with armor currently is that it effectively IS just 3 types. As soon as your character reaches 3rd level, you probably have enough gold to afford the best in its class. That's the biggest limitation to new characters, the cost. Our options right now are really only what training our class/feats/stats give us:
Light - AC 12 + full dex + shield optional
Medium - AC 14 + 2 dex + shield optional. (Or +1 AC with disadvantage on stealth)
Heavy - AC 18 + 0 dex + shield optional + disadvantage on stealth
It's boring and repetitive. Now, I don't know who is saying there should only be 3 armor types, but I imagine that if they do exist, the above is the reason why. Not because they really want it, but because that's functionally all we have now. Might as well call it what it is.
I'd love to see more options, but I'm not sure how to do it without adding complexity that doesn't really add any value other than some notion of verisimilitude.
The same goes with a lot of weapon rules people have suggested. I have played old DnD where you cross-referenced your weapon vs their armor on a chart to know your hit bonus. I have played Rolemaster where there is literally an entire book of full page charts for this purpose. Each chart is for one specific weapon against different defenses. There are dozens of modifiers. Then another chart for critical hits to see how many rounds the target bleeds, and by how much, or if their speed is reduced a few feet for a day. It's just awful
This is a very extreme example, but the end result is the same. You know what we remembered from all of those games? It was never what box we rolled on a chart, or if we hit the monster's arm or leg, or if our warhammer gave a 5% bonus 1/10th of the time. It was the results of the combats, the tricks we pulled off by cutting down the chandelier or jumping through fire, the stories we told. All that math added exactly nothing to the game but time.
It's understandable how people get to the point they want more crunch in their games. But in my experience, most people who get it through more numbers eventually wish they hadn't and want to go back to rules that really matter. So I'm all for more options and meaning in armor and weapon choices. I just know that +1 vs plate armor isn't the most fun way to do it. So what can we do?
I like the weapon rules that 5e has. I can see expanding those with more keywords that tell you how one is different from the other. I would love more rules for master crafted items. Rules for exotic materials. I could see letting all heavy two-handed weapons giving a (toned down) version of 5e Great Weapon Master. Or staves offering a special trip attack. Or repeating hand crossbows you don't have to reload. Or shields having a bash or parry option baked in. I think there is room for more options. They just need to be meaningful and fast, and fit with the design philosophy of the game.
So what are some ideas you would like to see?
This goes deeper than just adding numbers and effects on weapons. The issue is that damage types themselves in DnD are nothing but colors for numbers. You'll understand what I'm talking about if you played Divinity: Original Sin. Elemental spells in that game form an elegan system with mind-boggling levels of tactical applications. Fire spells ignite things, melt ice, and turn water into clouds of steam. Ice spells condense steam into liquid, liquid into ice, and put down fire. Lightning spells electrify liquids and hit metal harder. Now, why would I start talking about magic in a martial thread? Martials are limited to three damage types (lacking chopping for some reason), and devs fear playing around with resistances to these because weapons themselves deal only one damage type. If a spellcaster can simply cast lightning instead of fireball, a spear-weilding fighter that encounters a skeleton would have to carry a spare bludgeoning weapon and spend a whole round to switch out (although technically you can sheathe one weapon at the end of your round as a free action, and then unsheathe another at the start of your next round, which is also a free action). What I'm saying is that existing damage types and weapon system in itself discourages devs from tinkering with melee, mostly treating it as unified "physical" damage out of fear of martial PCs meeting "incompatible" monsters.
For starters, there should be chopping damage type. Slash and chop are very different things - try chopping bread with a vertical motion, like a guillotine, and slashing it with sawing motion, and you'll see the difference. Second, most weapons should have multiple damage types assigned to them. You can both chop and thrust with a longsword. Real historical warhammers always had a pointed end to deal piercing damage against armored enemies. The few weapons that could not deal multiple damage types, like a mace, were either easier to manufacture and obtain, or easier to handle, making this a potential criteria for simple weapons category. And lastly, damage types need something to differentiate them. Let bludgeoning hits knock down enemies, slashing strikes cause bleeding, chopping damage to crit harder and sever limbs, piercing damage to partially ignore armor, something like that. Just like fire should always ignite stuff, lightning should transmit through liquids and jump to metal, etc. Just by fiddling with damage types and adding them to weapons, you can have a way deeper melee combat.
These are good points. One of my favorite low-level monsters to use is skeletons, precisely because of their vulnerability to bludgeoning damage. They have 13 HP, a decent AC, and immunities, which is a lot to overcome for a CR 1/4 creature. But if you have the right tool, you really get to shine. Thematically, it's also great that the clerics are usually the ones with the warhammers to smash them. That's great monster design to me.
I'm just kind of 'thinking out loud' at this moment, because I think you are on the right track for how to improve this.
The spell comparison is a good one. At low level, a wizard has 1-3 damage cantrips, and a fighter has 1-3 weapons they can reasonably carry. I think it's worth comparing them this way. Cantrips have different damage types, but very few monsters at low level have any resistance or vulnerability to elements. But cantrips also have additional effects themed to the element. They slow the target, or hit multiple enemies with splash, etc.
The disparity becomes greater at high levels, where many monsters have types that are strong or weak against different elements, and the wizard has a whole arsenal of weapons to swap between. While the fighter can still only carry a few weapons, and the toughest monsters are just resistant to all of them that aren't magical. So monster design is really important to help balance this out, as well as weapon design.
As much as people love to talk about the nuances of the medieval arms race, what weapons beat what armor, what swords were superior, etc.... in practical terms for DnD it really doesn't matter as much. DnD uses a very stylized approach to combat. We might say 'you missed the goblin' when we really mean 'you hit his armor and didn't hurt him this time.' That's what AC represents. HP is even more nebulous. A high level character doesn't have titanium skin, they just are better at rolling with the blows, protecting vital areas, and lasting longer through the pain.
A weapon effect is never going to match the level of spell potential, without the weapon also being enchanted with magic. But there is definitely still room to expand on them. And I think comparing them to cantrips is a good idea. I'm going to look through them and come up with some examples.