Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback A point in defense of the new special attacks

There've been quite a few concerns regarding how the new special once-per-short-rest weapon moves introduced with Patch 6 basically turn everybody into a Battlemaster Fighter, and I do agree that there is definitely some balancing to be done there (like how the polearm knockdown is tactically identical to the trip attack maneuver).

However, if there's one thing that 5e has absolutely destroyed in comparison to 3/3.5e, it's weapon identity. Weapons used to have different critical threat ranges and critical modifiers subtly contributing to how they performed in combat and how well they worked with certain feats and weapon properties - like swords having a lower critical multiplier than axes but being twice as likely to score a critical hit in the first place, which would stack nicely with the Keen property / Keen Edge spell. Daggers were not just inferior shortswords but the off-hand option for halflings and gnomes for whom medium weapons were considered two-handed, so they'd need to wield a small and a tiny / two tiny weapons to minimize the dual-wielding penalties. And, of course, the entire exotic weapon class is missing from 5e entirely, which was kinda the reason the Fighter class had a real advantage with all the extra combat feats they could spend to learn and maximize the efficiency of such weapons.

Larian, in my opinion, have found a brilliant way to circumvent the limitations of the system while still staying within the ruleset by adding the new attacks. There's now actually a freaking reason to prefer one weapon over another apart from raw bonuses and aesthetics. If anything, it'd be neat to see even more moves added to further differentiate the arsenal - and if the feats that contribute to using a specific class of weapons make it into the game (like Polearm Master), then fighters will, in fact, have quite a lot to think about with their gear and actions.

That's homebrew I can get behind. I have some issues with balancing. Stun chance for bonus action is powerful for an "extra" attack - considering how powerful pummel strike and push are, I wonder if Larian is afraid they will not be able to convince mainstream audience about usefulness of utility actions, unless they make them ridiculusly powerful and cheap to use (aka. not interfiering with DPS).

I only sampled a small selection of weapons - but overall I like the concept.

In this case I personally would have preferred them to home brew emulate how it was in earlier editions instead then. Except the whole exotic weapon class prof feat needed to even be able to equip those weapons. That one I certainly don't miss.

The idea is definitely interresting, but the balance is terrible and it's too complicated in my opinion.

I'd rather have a few new actions (no bonus actions!) for a group of weapons rather than a whole bunch of different attacks for every weapons.

Why couldn't we use topple with a spear, a pike or a halberd in exemple.
Why couldn't we charge with all weapons ?
Why couldn't we use pommel strike with let's say all sword or all heavy weapons ? Why couldn't we use flourish with in exemple all light or finesse weapons ?

I think it would be more interresting if most of these new actions were a bit more "redundant" rather than 1 weapon = 1 or 2 actions.

And I definitely think we should not have any limit to use them. Better balance required of course.

+1 that the idea is very good but the execution is...questionable at best. Weapon abilities should give much-needed flexibility (and weapon identity) to martial characters without being strictly more powerful options or stepping on the toes of other classes' features. The current special attacks satisfy neither of those criteria.

Larian needs to be vary wary about weapon abilities that mess with the action economy (bonus action cost and/or stunning the enemy) and need to include an appropriate drawback for each ability. E.g., doesn't do damage, attack at disadvantage, etc.

Of the moves that are currently present in the game, Brace is probably the best example of how it should be implemented. You sacrifice most of your movement to get advantage on damage rolls, so there is a drawback (your mobility for the turn is heavily limited) coming with a bonus that's considerable enough to compensate. Maces spending a reaction to do some damage even when the attack misses is an interesting concept as well, making them a viable choice for a character that dumped both strength and dexterity.

I also see the potential in the concept but I'm not happy with the design.

Why can't you do a hamstring shot with a crossbow? It's just aiming at someone's feet. Why can you only do it once per Short Rest?

3e had a better design for Pinning Shot with unlimited uses but with an attack penalty. If you need to tactically restrict the mobility of a certain type of enemy, or one overpowering enemy, you need to be able to do it more than once for it to actually be a tactic.

It doesn't necessarily have to be an attack penalty. 5e even offers the perfect tradeoff without having to resort to making you miss more. Bonus Action. You could spend your Bonus Action to add an effect like movement penalty. It would make perfect sense to lose a Bonus Action for taking longer to aim. And Bonus Action would always have a use. It's win-win. Perhaps throw in a Con save to keep it balanced.

Then there are abilities like Mobile Shot that feel much more like a character ability than a weapon ability. Holding a bow doesn't turn a clumsy heavily armored fighter into a nimble Rogue who can do running shots.

Terrible idea IMO.

Now weapons actions = things to always do. The limit is your slot/rest.
With your suggestion weapons actions = things to always do until you'd like to spend your bonus action for something else. Exactly like pommel strike.

Correct me if I'm wrong but most classes doesn't often/always use a bonus action at each turn. If the trade off is a bonus action, most attacks (players and AI) would be done with special effects... And this would be boring.

Yeah, there's less classes that's built around consequently using bonus actions than the opposite. I think only Monks and Rogues are "bonus action every turn" classes. Clerics who cast Spiritual Weapon will spend every bonus action to control that one, but the reason that is so common to use that spell is that the class itself basically doesn't use bonus actions at all.

Most classes Shove or drink potion each turn for BA.

It depends on balancing. Weapon abilities would have to be weaker if they would work on Bonus Action. But I think the goal here is more to give martials choice rather than power. I would like to have weaker or tradeoff abilities you can use more often. These are mundane things you can do with a weapon like Pommel Strike or Trip, they shouldn't be limited to 1 / rest.

That is Larian homebrew, which in itself already debalances the action economy...

I just checked and Hamstring Shot does have a Con saving throw. I assume all the weapon abilities with debuffs do.

As I said, I totally agree that we should not have any limit on weapons actions and I totally agree with more "choices" for all or martial classes.

But shove, hide, dip, eating food and all homebrew bonus actions in BG3 had proven that creating new rules arround bonus actions does not lead to an interresting gameplay (I'm absolutely fine with healing potions as bonus action to be honnest).

You don't like shove more than I do but your suggestion would just increase the problem.
With limitations : just play with Lae'zel and a 2 handed sword. Pommel strike is absolutely boring because you use it as soon as you can.
Without limitations : spending a bonus action + an action to do "normal damages + a chance to stun" would also be boring because both players and the AI would use it all the time exactly like shove.
And Without limitations : spending an action + a bonus action to do "strength modifier damage + a chance to stun" would never make sense.

Let DnD do what DnD does with bonus actions. It's too important in the balance. Playing with bonus actions each turns with every classes could only be interresting if they added TONS of homebrew bonus actions for every classes, reworking the whole balance at the same time and adding tons of new things to DnD...

Pommel strike could just be an unlimited action right now : compared to a normal attack, "strength modifier damage + a chance to stun" is already a choice that does not need any limitation, that is not breaking the class balance and that would not lead to a repetitive gameplay. Hamrstring shot could easily be unlimited too if the damages were not the same than with a normal attack.

Choices should be in a variety of unlimited balanced actions. Everything else would have bad consequences on the game in my opinion.

I also don't like them stubbornly making everything a Bonus Action just to get more actions per turn. But if they absolutely must insist on staying on that path I'd rather they would come up with something like Bonus Weapon Abilities than making stuff like Hide and Shove a BA for everyone and breaking the game.

I would like to try Pommel Strike as an unlimited action with proper balancing. Trading damage for a status effect feels like a real tactical choice. But with Stun I do smell a potential problem in a 3v1 situation or an 11th level Fighter spamming up to 3 Pommel Strikes per turn to stun-lock a target. Pommel Strike's Daze is now Disadvantage on Wis Saving Throws, no reactions and lose Dex Bonus to AC for 2 turns. Pretty powerful already and crippling for Dex classes. But the Wis debuff is really cool. Pommel Strike > Hold Person would be fun. I guess they'd just have to do a lot of balancing.

I definitely welcome their addition. A mentioned above, 5e really neutered what made various weapons unique. Crit range & crit multipliers, & utility for special actions like tripping. Giving the weapons special abilities like Larian has done goes a long way towards remedying that and I love it, although I'm not crazy about the abilities being used like spells that have to be regained on a rest.

I feel like doing some D&D math.

The average weapon attack is ~1d8+3 damage, with about a 65% chance to hit. Ergo, if special weapon attacks become unlimited usage, for balance purposes Special Weapon Attacks should roughly be equivalent to 0.65*(4.5+3) = 4.9 damage (which includes both actual damage dealt and the "effective damage" of any condition). This simple for abilities that deal direct damage, but more difficult for condition-inflicting attacks.

Weapon Ability Analysis (purple = well balanced with normal weapon attacks)

• Cleave:
  - a.) Deal only half damage upon a hit. Assuming you can attack 2 enemies, this deals expected 0.65*3.75*2 = 4.9 damage. If you can hit 3 enemies, it deals 7.3 damage. Equally as strong against 2 enemies, but you're splitting up the damage which is worse. 50% more damage (again split) if you can hit 3 enemies. Both are fine.
  - b.) Attacking 2 enemies with disadvantage deals expected: 0.65^2*7.5*2 = 6.3 damage. About 30% more powerful, but you're spreading out damage.
  - c.) Alternatively, a -5 penalty is better because it stacks with advantage/disadvantage. (0.65-0.25)*7.2*2 = 5.8 damage. About 18% more powerful, still balanced by being split between two targets. Better!
  Note- for the above 2 options, hitting 3 enemies makes it much powerful than a normal weapon attack.
• Lacerate: Assuming Bleeding deals 1d4 damage per turn for 2 turns, that's an additional 5 damage.
  - a.) Half normal weapon damage means that total expected damage is 0.65*(7.5/2+5) = 5.7 damage. About 16% more damage, but dealing it over the course of 2 turns.
  - b.) Disadvantage (or -5) on your attack means that total expected damage is 0.65^2*(7.5/2+5) = 3.6 damage. About 25% less damage, so too weak.
• Backbreaker: Enemy gets a Str ST to prevent being knocked Prone. Let's say the enemy has a 50% chance of success. We also know that Shove Prone is, according to RAW, a ~balanced alternative to an attack roll.
  - a.) BG3 Backbreaker is thus equivalent to 1.5 weapon attacks -> 50% more powerful with no downside. Obviously too powerful.
  - b.) Attacking at Disadvantage (or -5 penalty): the effective damage is 0.65^2*(7.5+0.5*7.5) = 4.6 damage. Basically balanced.
• Brace: Costs 25ft of movement, and allows you to reroll ALL melee damage for your turn. Rerolling 1d8 turns the expected value from 4.5->5.5 = +1 damage
  - a.) With a single attack, you spend 25ft of movement for +1 damage -> which is actually only +0.65 damage because you need to hit. I'm going to declare that this is too weak.
  - b.) With two attacks (bonus action or extra attack or haste), you deal an extra 1.3 damage. Idk this is fair maybe?
  - c.) With three attacks, you deal an extra 2 damage.Idk this might also be fair?
• Hamstring Shot: Enemy gets a Con ST to avoid having their movement reduced by 50%. Obviously strictly better than a single attack. But by how much? Reducing an enemy's speed by 50% can prevent them from reaching and attacking you or an ally. We know that Shove Prone is equivalent to an attack, and roughly half of prone is "getting up requires half your movement." 0.5*(1d8+3)=3.75. We also know that the cantrip Ray of Frost reduces enemy speed by 10 feet but only deals 1d8 instead of firebolt's 1d10 damage, a difference of 1 damage. Let's take the weighted average (ray of frost only reduces speed by 10, not half) and say that reducing an enemy's speed by 50% is worth 3 damage.
  a.) Thus, BG3's Hamstring Shot (50% chance to deal 3 "prone" damage) is roughly 30% better than a normal attack - too strong
  b.) Dealing half weapon damage results in an effective 0.65*(7.5/2+3*0.5)=3.4 damage, ~30% too weak.
  c.) Disadvantage on the attack has the same problem: 0.65^2*(7.5+3*0.5)= 3.8 damage. About 22% less damage, still too weak.
  e.) Take a -2 penalty to attack. The "effective damage" becomes 0.55*(7.5+3*0.5)= 4.95 Perfect
• Crippling Strike: inflicts Crippled...I believe that crippled sets your speed to zero..? Setting an enemy (that you're already in melee with)'s speed to zero is not much better than reducing their speed by 50% from ranged, so I'm going to use the same logic as for Hamstring Shot. Somewhere between a -2 and a -5 penalty, along with a ST
• Prepare: Applies Prepared which deals X (I'm not sure) extra damage. Assuming you deal 1 extra weapon damage die (2d8+3 -> 12 damage):
  a.) A -5 penalty results in an expected 4.8 damage. A perfect tradeoff - less likely chance to hit for extra damage.
• Heartstopper: inflicts Chest Trauma No.
• Rush Attack: inflicts Off Balance?
• Weakening Strike: inflicts Weak Grip?
• Pommel Strike: inflicts Dazed?
• Piercing Strike/Shot inflicts Gaping Wounds?
• Flourish: inflicts Off Balance?

I don't know what Gaping Wounds, Prepared, Off-Balance, Dazed, or Weak Grip so I can't comment on these. If someone wants to post their effects I'd much appreciate it!

And again, all of the above is assuming unlimited special weapon attacks. Being restricted to 1x/short rest changes the math.

Edited for accuracy re:cleave

Not all attacks does full damage. Cleave for example splits it's damage in two.

Gotcha. Thanks for the info. Post updated.