Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Giving martials more to do

There's been quite a lot of discussion around this already, mainly around the shove bonus action, which is the current "solution". Rather than just bashing the bonus action shove, I would like to propose a different solution, because I understand the need for more to do in a low-level co-op video game. I think my solution would create more choice as well as retaining balance.

The idea is to give the attack action more options, where each choice has a positive effect, a negative effect, and sometimes a prerequisite. This will make every attack a choice depending on the situation, as well as give more difference to weapon types. This solution would be overly complicated for tabletop, but this isn't tabletop, so hell yeah!

Examples of these special types of attacks (Specific numbers untested of course):
[b]Jump attack[/b]
Positive: Due to the added weight behind the blow, your attack will deal +3 damage of the weapon's type.
Negative: You telegraph your attack so clearly, the enemy gains +1 AC for this attack.
Prerequisite: You need to move at least 10 feet straight towards the enemy for the jump.
When to use: It's generally a pretty good deal like the GWM feat against lower AC enemies. Sometimes you might want to move away from an enemy a little to be able to do this.

[b]Wide sweep[/b]
Positive: Your attack can hit two enemies right next to each other.
Negative: Both enemies will take half damage
Prerequisite: Two enemies next to each other
When to use: Two enemies are next to each other and one has low HP.

[b]All in[/b]
Positive: A risky move to finish off an enemy, +3 to the attack and damage roll.
Negative: If the enemy survives, they get an Attack of Opporunity on you.
Prerequisite: None
When to use: An enemy is nearly dead, or they've already used their reaction. Can also improve team-work, someone can bait reactions.

[b]Go for the... arms? boo![/b]
Positive: On a hit, the target's arm is wounded, giving them a -2 to all attack rolls.
Negative: The arm is not that vital a body part, the damage roll get a -2.
Prerequisite: Stand on the side of the enemy holding a weapon.
When to use: When an enemy can't be killed quickly, it's a great debuff.

[b]Armor breaker[/b]
Positive: Aiming for vital armor parts reduces the AC of the target by 2.
Negative: The attack focuses on the armor, it does half damage to the target.
Prerequisite: A blunt weapon and a target wearing plated armor
When to use: A target is heavily armored, taking down the AC a bit will help a lot for future hits. Also makes blunt weapons a bit more unique.

[b]Slash Achilles heel[/b]
Positive: A target hit by this has their speed reduced by half until the end of their next turn.
Negative: If the target is the same size or smaller than the user, the target has a +4 AC to the attack, due to the Achilles heel being hard to reach.
Prerequisite: A slashing weapon.
When to use: Mainly on larger enemies to keep them away from squishies.


I could come up with more, but I think the idea is clear. A standard attack should still be possible too of course.

When you click to attack an enemy, a menu could pop-up next to the enemy with all the options and some tooltips on mouse hover.

I believe that this will make each attack a bit more meaningful, without stepping on the Battlemaster's toes. It would also be better than the bonus action shove, because one attack type is not always the best thing to do, so it actually is a choice. Shove can just be one of the options of this special attack. the positioning prerequisites are an easy way of making some good things slightly more situationally useful.

Not sure, if similar ideas have already been discussed, I wouldn't be surprised. Nonetheless, I'm very curious what people here would think of such a solution. As a single player I don't mind having fighters with few options at low level, but I can imagine if you're playing with four people and you don't have the possibility of describing your attack in a cool way, it gets old quick.

Personally, Shove, Throw, and the implementation of Custom Abilities for weapons do enough to make martials feel like they have distinct useful abilities beyond hitting things hard in the early levels, and feel like the type of thing a martial character would ask their DM if they could do in encounters, so honestly I wouldn't really add more special abilities to the list. 5e is balanced in certain ways and adding too much could really mess up that balance.
Also i know its tangential, but I don't think people are bashing Shove so much as they want it nerfed so that it becomes more in line with the existing system and thus feels like a proper addition.

The reason they made shove a bonus action, as I understand it, is to give martials more to do than just whack. So if they were to balance shove to be a replacement of a weapon attack, that would be a problem again. The current solutions to what they're trying to fix are huge problems to the 5e balance.

I actually agree with you entirely that it's not necessary, but I'm trying to come up with a compromise to keep everyone happy. A solution that wouldn't mess up the balance of 5e so much.

The issue with Martials isn't the amount of things they can do in a turn, cause they have the same actions as everyone else, it was the variety of things they could do, which the current homebrew has addressed that. in fact, a fighter with Action Surge genuinely can do more actions than anyone else, making them have a lot. Making shove a bonus action just made it that anyone, fighter or wizard or rogue or druid could abuse the action economy to get a free extra "attack" off that can be more devastating than anything else.

But don't let my opinions stop you, I have said my piece and how I see the situation, you see it differently. Conversation lets both be in the light and discussed so I don't think putting solutions is a bad thing at all, even if I believe said solution doesn't work for me.

Those special attacks you describe remind me of Battle Master Fighter maneuvers. I've heard people complaining about the 5e fighter and wishing that the Battle Master fighter wasn't a sub-class, but part of the base class. Doing that would be a homebrew, but it might be less disruptive than giving bonus action shove to EVERYONE.

If they aren't interested in going in that direction, only allowing Fighters/Barbarians to do bonus action Shove, and making it an action for every other class would be better. Oh wait, they probably aren't interested in doing that either, because that would mean different classes would have slightly different UI's.

[quote=CJMPinger] The issue with Martials isn't the amount of things they can do in a turn, cause they have the same actions as everyone else, it was the variety of things they could do, which the current homebrew has addressed that. in fact, a fighter with Action Surge genuinely can do more actions than anyone else, making them have a lot. Making shove a bonus action just made it that anyone, fighter or wizard or rogue or druid could abuse the action economy to get a free extra "attack" off that can be more devastating than anything else.

But don't let my opinions stop you, I have said my piece and how I see the situation, you see it differently. Conversation lets both be in the light and discussed so I don't think putting solutions is a bad thing at all, even if I believe said solution doesn't work for me.[/quote]

Yeah, it's a terrible solution to the problem they were trying to solve. It doesn't even solve it, it has many terrible side-effects, just like BA disengage and high ground advantage/disadvantage. I completely agree with you, I know the problems with the bonus action shove. You don't have to tell me what the problem is with the BA shove, preaching to the choir here.

I'm trying to come up with an alternative solution to something that many people and Larian seem to think needs to be fixed. This alternative solution would not mess with the game balance nearly as much as BA shove and would give those martials meaningful decisions to make every turn, rather than just attacking and shoving every turn, thus fixing the original problem.

Now, maybe Larian didn't add the BA shove for that purpose, but that's what I read a lot, if that's not true, please let me know. I don't think my proposed solution would be such a problem to the balance, due to the relatively small effects, the negative side-effects and prerequisites. Also it would give them a larger variety of things to do, rather than give them more things to do.

They really should just stick with 5e. As the characters advance to higher levels, it gets better and better. The superiority dice should allow a fighter a gazillion options. Larian only gave like 5. That's just one example.

Oh NO please stop with all these rules that will break the game even more.
Ready, dodge, grab, shove to prone and feint/distract (RAW help action). These are actions that lacks in BG3 and that could give a bit more variety if necessary.

Don't play a fighter if you don't like to play a fighter or play a battlemaster. Pick a rogue, a ranger, a cleric, a paladin, a barbarian, a monk, a druid or any other class that can be melee builded if you want a melee character that have more buttons to click on.
Larian just doesn't understand at all why some players like the simplicity of fighters and they're obviously unable to add new things that won't break the game.

Don't give them any value because they call a class they just don't like "a tutorial class". Their design decisions make the fighter way less interresting. Not DnD, whatever Swen can say.

It's a team based game. Even if Shove was an attack action, level 1-4 Fighters can Shove enemies prone for their team mates to get advantage even if they can't follow up with an attack of their own. Assuming they will implement that at some point. It's a good tactical move so obviously they should.. and there's no reason not to.

And leveling up and gaining new abilities is so fast in the beginning going all in on figuring out a million things for low level Fighters to do seems a bit pointless. In 30 mins you are an Eldritch Knight with spells or a Battlemaster with Action Surge, Second Wind, Menacing Attack, Pushing Attack, Rally....

Positioning is important in 5e as well which adds meaningful choices for low level Fighters other than just attack. Which enemies to engage, where to block enemy movement, which party member to protect.. just Larian decided positioning isn't going to be important in tactical combat and gave everyone a Bonus Action Disengage and handed out Teleport abilities like candy even if the battlefields are already vast open spaces that are impossible to control.

I am one of those people who likes playing the fighter class but who hates that the fighter does not have anything to do that makes them unique like all the other classes. So I like these ideas!

+1
I'm in favor of additional abilities that offer positives but that also come with numerical negatives. I like your ideas OP, though they probably would require some fine tuning: e.g., go for the arms shouldn't require you to physically stand on the side of an enemy. That's too finicky and precise.

These abilities could be instead of or in addition to the weapon abilities already in BG3 (you have a bludgeoning-specific action in your list). Weapon ability cooldowns don't really make sense, so making them include penalties to attack or AC or provoke an AoO makes more sense. Aside from the cooldowns and the fact that some weapon abilities in BG3 are much better than others, these are one of Larian's homebrew I like most.

D&D in previous editions had these additional attack options (or at least, Pathfinder has them) and it's a shame that they disappeared in the simplification to 5e.

I feel about the same. I miss the older "Called Shot" system that allowed for special attacks with a penalty.

I'd said elsewhere I'd like to see the weapon specific attacks updated a bit and maybe added to. Some of the ideas may not be 5e, but as far as homebrews go at least these are in line with that older system.

One big special ability I haven't seen yet in BG3 that should be there, especially for martials, is a disarm. That is a 5e thing.

Definitely +1

+100. Please no. People. Play D&D first before judging the rules and saying they suck. The fighter has LOTS of options. These are beginner levels in EA. Please don't break the entire system more because you are so limited at lower levels. The fighter is brutal already at later levels.

That's part of the problem right now with EA. Everyone thinks the classes suck in 5e because there isn't a lot of variation
..YET. Everyone starts out relatively the same, but as you get higher level, the differences begin to really show.

Alter the game at low levels to make fighters tougher and you will have super OP fighters at levels 8+. D&D is about growing from noob to hero, not about starting as a hero.

Excerpt from the Afflicted. Note: Vexir is a 3rd level Fighter Battlemaster:

It was Vexir's turn. Harpy 3 landed just in time for her to snap out of her funk. Her eyes narrowed at the creature, and she attacked. She was within melee range of the Harpy, along with Ryth-Shan, so Vexir gained advantage for flanking. She rolled a Natural 20 and 1. Critical hit! She used Menacing Attack and added 1d8 to her roll. Since she got a Critical hit, that meant she rolled 2d12+2d8+2 for damage. She rolled a total of 25 damage as she roared in fury. The Harpy had 14 HP remaining. The monster then had to make a Wisdom save or be frightened. She rolled a 12. Success. The Harpy barely resisted being frightened.

Vexir then used Action Surge. She rolled a 2 and 11+4=15. Hit. She used another superiority die. 1d12+1d8+2. She rolled 5+2=7. Harpy 3 was down to 7 HP. She rolled another Wisdom save and succeeded with a 16.


Now, if I were to take Vexir and level her up to level 7, she'd have "Know Your Enemy" special ability. If she spends 1 minute observing or interacting with another creature outside of combat, she can learn certain information about its capabilities compared to her own. The DM tells her if the creature is her equal, superior, or inferior in regards to two of the following characteristics of the player's choice: Strength, Dex, Constitution, Armor Class, Current HP, Class Level, Fighter Level.

This could be implemented into BG3 even without time being a thing. Just basically allowing the fighter to gain this knowledge against enemies on the fighter's first turn without requiring 1 actual minute of observing. The fighter just automatically knows the enemy's strengths. In order to do this, Larian would need to stop letting everyone know all of the stats of every enemy they face.

Levels 7 and 10 also allow the fighter more maneuvers and more superiority dice. The more maneuvers and superiority dice, the more OTHER abilities besides just hitting things that they have to choose from.

Combat maneuvers that you SHOULD be able to choose from when building a Battlemaster:

Commander's Strike, Disarming Attack, Distracting Strike, Evasive Footwork, Feinting Attack, Goading Attack, Lunging Attack, Maneuvering Attack, Menacing Attack, Parry, Precision Attack, Pushing Attack, Rally, Riposte, Sweeping Attack, Trip Attack, Ambush, Bait and Switch, Brace, Commanding Presence, Grappling Strike, Quick Toss and Tactical Assessment. And that's just the Battlemaster's abilities.

So, as you can see, the higher the levels the more maneuvers the fighter has to choose from out of the list above and the more superiority dice they can use to activate those maneuvers. Thus, giving MORE maneuvers to fighters early game will only make them even more unbalanced for later because they will have even more abilities than they already currently possess. On top of that, by giving them maneuvers they shouldn't have via weapon abilities, they negate a fighter's ability to gain some of those maneuvers later via their maneuvers. Thus, they break the system.

Seriously. I'm not saying 100% D&D 5e, but I have to continue to caution out here that the more they create homebrew rules the more they break things and later will have to somehow try to fix them. Patience, people. Think of classic RPG games. Any time you start, you don't have a ton of special abilities and traits. You gain them throughout the course of leveling up so that the Level 10 Fighter could easily beat the crap out of lots of enemies while the Level 1 Fighter can barely hold their own against a few goblins.

The first impression is always the most important thing.
In games, this is probably definitely true since most players don't even finish their games.
It is true that the farther in the levels the characters actually have more to do, the problem is that the game was originally supposed to be limited to level 10 (I doubt it is now higher than 12) which means that level 7 a character should not reach level until somewhere in act 2 ( and rather not at the beginning).
The first act itself takes about 30 hours of play. Therefore, they will most likely try to move some of the Fighter's abilities to lower levels to avoid discouraging the player.

After all, balance is the least important in a non-pvp game.

Show the players what they will get at later levels.

Right now players of BG3 don't know what feats or abilities they can get when they continue to play.

Like in PF:K or PF:WotR, where at character creation and every level up you see what will be available to your class later on, so you can easily plan ahead.

It's an incentive to keep leveling, a carrot on a stick if you will.

EDIT:
And I also don't get the notion why a developer should upset balance and therefore making the game bad for the subset of players who like well thought out game mechanics.
What kind of logic is that?
"My game is not so good, only 40%" of all players will finish it, so fuck game mechanics!"

Exactly, it's a point of discussion in the DnD community anyway.

Please note that this idea is intended to be a replacement of their Bonus Action shove idea. I also think they should just keep to RAW, but I expect Larian to want to add something. The balance would not nearly be as upset by these special types of melee attacks, because they're not simply more powerful like the battlemaster manuevers.

So if you could choose, would you rather have these different options for your attacks, or BA shove? xD

These special moves replace your normal attack and have a negative effect too. The effects are intentionally small, which is gonna be a bigger deal at lower levels than they are at later levels. They are not straight buffs, so it's definitely not about making players a hero immediately, it's about giving options.


The things I suggested aren't more powerful abilities, they're different types of attacks. The BM's manuevres are straight up better than just attacking. That is not the case with my suggestion. Also, this is not another homebrew to add, this is an alternative solution to a problem (they think low level fighters don't have much to do) Larian tried (and failed) to solve, so it would replace their Bonus Action shove...

Yeah, positioning might be a bit finnicky with their current system. Having some good GUI or a grid would fix it I think, just like FF tactics, but that's just another thing that won't happen. And yeah, they would definitely require fine-tuning, this was just stuff I came up with while writing the post.