Roderick_BR
2007-03-15, 06:19 PM
Edit: Added "magic attacks" to the weapons category. Also, you can set Weapon Specialization as fighter 4th, if you want, this variation is just a suggestion. I think only rangers would really used it, since barbarians will prefer power attack and rage feats, paladins and clerics will prefer divine feats, and others classes wouldn't need or use it as much.
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I was reading some foruns, and found out something interesting. In DDO (Dungeons and Dragons Online), Weapon Focus and Weapon Specialization works like the Weapon Mastery from PHB2. When you select Weapon Focus or Specialization, you can set it to one of 5 weapon types (Bludgeoning, Slashing, Puncturing, Ranged and Thrown) instead of a singe weapon.
For example, if you get Weapon Focus (Slashing), you gain a +1 to attack rolls with all slashing weapons (dagges, swords, axes, polearms with slashing damage).
It makes Weapon Focus more flexible, and a bit less useless, since you don't need to worry about switching weapons as much as with the normal version. Same with Weapon Specialization. AND Improved Critical.
So I thought about writting it down for some houserules I'm planning. However, with this variation, Weapon Mastery would become just another generic bonus, so I will throw in another idea I had for a while.
These variations work in the base that higher level fighters should be able to deal more steady damage, since others classes have high level features, and the fighter can just stack a bonus or another to his attacks.
So, here's my idea: First, we have weapon categories.
Weapon Types:
Bludgeoning: All melee weapons with bludgeoning type damage, like maces and hammers.
Puncturing: All melee weapons with puncturing type damage, like lances.
Slashing: All melee weapons with slashing type damage, like swords and axes.
Ranged: All ranged weapons that shots projectiles, like bows, crossbows, and slings.
Thrown: Weapons that can be thrown, like dagges javelins, and flasks of alchemy fire.
Natural Attacks: Natural attacks like slams, bites, and claws, and unarmed attacks.
Magic attacks: For magic abilities, like spell casting that you cast as touch attacks, ranged touch attacks, and rays.
Thrown weapons when used in melee uses the normal rules for one of the melee categories (daggers are slashing, javelins are puncturing, etc).
Weapons with more than one kind of damage, like a morninstar and polearms, gets benefits from any category it's part of, but the bonus is applied only once. If you have slashing or bludgeoning bonuses, both are applied to a morningstar, but if you have both, the bonus is applied only once.
Feats:
WEAPON FOCUS [GENERAL]
Choose one weapon category. You can choose among slashing, bludgeoning, puncturing, ranged, thrown, or natural attacks.
Prerequisites: Base attack bonus +1.
Benefit: You gain a +1 bonus on all attack rolls you make using weapons of the selected type.
Special: You can gain this feat multiple times. Its effects do not stack. Each time you take the feat, it applies to a new weapon category.
A fighter may select Weapon Focus as one of his fighter bonus feats.
WEAPON SPECIALIZATION [GENERAL]
Choose one weapon category for which you have already selected the Weapon Focus feat.
Prerequisites: Weapon Focus with selected weapon category, base attack bonus +4.
Benefit: You gain a +2 bonus on all damage rolls you make using the selected weapon category.
Special: You can gain this feat multiple times. Its effects do not stack. Each time you take the feat, it applies to a new weapon category.
A fighter may select Weapon Specialization as one of his fighter bonus feats.
GREATER WEAPON FOCUS [GENERAL]
Choose one weapon category for which you have already selected Weapon Focus.
Prerequisites: Weapon Focus with selected weapon category, fighter level 8th.
Benefit: You gain a +2 bonus on all attack rolls you make using the selected weapon category. This bonus stacks with other bonuses on attack rolls, including the one from Weapon Focus (see above).
Special: You can gain Greater Weapon Focus multiple times. Its effects do not stack. Each time you take the feat, it applies to a new weapon category.
A fighter may select Greater Weapon Focus as one of his fighter bonus feats.
GREATER WEAPON SPECIALIZATION [GENERAL]
Choose one weapon category for which you have already selected Weapon Specialization.
Prerequisites: Greater Weapon Focus with selected weapon category, Weapon Focus with selected weapon category, Weapon Specialization with selected weapon category, fighter level 12th.
Benefit: You gain a +4 bonus on all damage rolls you make using the selected weapon category. This bonus stacks with other bonuses on damage rolls, including the one from Weapon Specialization (see above).
Special: You can gain Greater Weapon Specialization multiple times. Its effects do not stack. Each time you take the feat, it applies to a new weapon category.
A fighter may select Greater Weapon Specialization as one of his fighter bonus feats.
IMPROVED CRITICAL [GENERAL]
Choose one weapon category for which you have already selected Weapon Focus.
Prerequisite: Weapon Focus with selected weapon category, base attack bonus +8.
Benefit: When using the weapon category you selected, your threat range is doubled.
Special: You can gain Improved Critical multiple times. The effects do not stack. Each time you take the feat, it applies to a new weapon category.
This effect doesn't stack with any other effect that expands the threat range of a weapon.
A fighter may select Improved Critical as one of his fighter bonus feats.
GREATER CRITICAL [GENERAL]
Choose one weapon category for which you have already selected Improved critical.
Prerequisite: Base attack bonus +8.
Benefit: When using the weapon category you selected, your critical damage multiplier is increased in +1.
Special: You can gain Greater Critical multiple times. The effects do not stack. Each time you take the feat, it applies to a new weapon category.
This effect doesn't stack with any other effect that increases the critical damage multipler of a weapon.
A fighter may select Improved Critical as one of his fighter bonus feats.
WEAPON MASTERY [GENERAL]
Choose one single type of weapon that has a category for which you have already selected Greater Weapon Specialization.
Prerequisites: Weapon Focus with selected weapon category, Greater Weapon Focus with selected weapon category, Weapon Specialization with selected weapon category, Greater Weapon Specialization with selected weapon category, fighter level 16th.
Benefit: When you use the chosen weapon, you treat it as a weapon one size category larger when calculating damage.
Special: You can gain Weapon Mastery multiple times. Its effects do not stack. Each time you take the feat, it applies to a new weapon.
This effect doesn't stack with weapons actually one or more size categoriess larger than the character size.
A fighter may select Greater Weapon Specialization as one of his fighter bonus feats.
Epic feats:
EPIC WEAPON FOCUS [GENERAL]
Choose one weapon category for which you have already selected Greater Weapon Focus.
Prerequisites: Weapon Focus with selected weapon category, Greater Weapon Focus with selected weapon category, fighter level 21th.
Benefit: You gain a +3 bonus on all attack rolls you make using the selected weapon category. This bonus stacks with other bonuses on attack rolls, including the one from Weapon Focus and Greater Weapon Focus (see above).
Special: You can gain Epic Weapon Focus multiple times. Its effects do not stack. Each time you take the feat, it applies to a new weapon category.
A fighter may select Epic Weapon Focus as one of his fighter bonus feats.
EPIC WEAPON SPECIALIZATION [GENERAL]
Choose one weapon category for which you have already selected Greater Weapon Specialization.
Prerequisites: Weapon Focus with selected weapon category, Greater Weapon Focus with selected weapon category, Weapon Specialization with selected weapon category, Greater Weapon Specialization with selected weapon category, fighter level 25th.
Benefit: You gain a +6 bonus on all damage rolls you make using the selected weapon category. This bonus stacks with other bonuses on attack rolls, including the one from Weapon Focus and Greater Weapon Focus (see above).
Special: You can gain Epic Weapon Focus multiple times. Its effects do not stack. Each time you take the feat, it applies to a new weapon category.
A fighter may select Epic Weapon Focus as one of his fighter bonus feats.
This is not meant to solve the fighter's problems, just to give him a little boost at high level, while adding a bit for others classes, mainly non-casters.
I made Weapon Specialization available for any character, but the greater and epic versions are fighter only. The greater versions now give better bonuses that stack with the previous versions, like Epic does now, and raised Epic more.
I added a feat to rise the critical of weapons (and Improved critical now has Weapon Focus as requisite), and turned Weapon Mastery into a less crappy version of Monkey Grip, but with a lot of prerequisites.
I doubt anyone will think these are too powerful, seeing that others classes get a lot of better features, but any input is welcome.
--------------
I was reading some foruns, and found out something interesting. In DDO (Dungeons and Dragons Online), Weapon Focus and Weapon Specialization works like the Weapon Mastery from PHB2. When you select Weapon Focus or Specialization, you can set it to one of 5 weapon types (Bludgeoning, Slashing, Puncturing, Ranged and Thrown) instead of a singe weapon.
For example, if you get Weapon Focus (Slashing), you gain a +1 to attack rolls with all slashing weapons (dagges, swords, axes, polearms with slashing damage).
It makes Weapon Focus more flexible, and a bit less useless, since you don't need to worry about switching weapons as much as with the normal version. Same with Weapon Specialization. AND Improved Critical.
So I thought about writting it down for some houserules I'm planning. However, with this variation, Weapon Mastery would become just another generic bonus, so I will throw in another idea I had for a while.
These variations work in the base that higher level fighters should be able to deal more steady damage, since others classes have high level features, and the fighter can just stack a bonus or another to his attacks.
So, here's my idea: First, we have weapon categories.
Weapon Types:
Bludgeoning: All melee weapons with bludgeoning type damage, like maces and hammers.
Puncturing: All melee weapons with puncturing type damage, like lances.
Slashing: All melee weapons with slashing type damage, like swords and axes.
Ranged: All ranged weapons that shots projectiles, like bows, crossbows, and slings.
Thrown: Weapons that can be thrown, like dagges javelins, and flasks of alchemy fire.
Natural Attacks: Natural attacks like slams, bites, and claws, and unarmed attacks.
Magic attacks: For magic abilities, like spell casting that you cast as touch attacks, ranged touch attacks, and rays.
Thrown weapons when used in melee uses the normal rules for one of the melee categories (daggers are slashing, javelins are puncturing, etc).
Weapons with more than one kind of damage, like a morninstar and polearms, gets benefits from any category it's part of, but the bonus is applied only once. If you have slashing or bludgeoning bonuses, both are applied to a morningstar, but if you have both, the bonus is applied only once.
Feats:
WEAPON FOCUS [GENERAL]
Choose one weapon category. You can choose among slashing, bludgeoning, puncturing, ranged, thrown, or natural attacks.
Prerequisites: Base attack bonus +1.
Benefit: You gain a +1 bonus on all attack rolls you make using weapons of the selected type.
Special: You can gain this feat multiple times. Its effects do not stack. Each time you take the feat, it applies to a new weapon category.
A fighter may select Weapon Focus as one of his fighter bonus feats.
WEAPON SPECIALIZATION [GENERAL]
Choose one weapon category for which you have already selected the Weapon Focus feat.
Prerequisites: Weapon Focus with selected weapon category, base attack bonus +4.
Benefit: You gain a +2 bonus on all damage rolls you make using the selected weapon category.
Special: You can gain this feat multiple times. Its effects do not stack. Each time you take the feat, it applies to a new weapon category.
A fighter may select Weapon Specialization as one of his fighter bonus feats.
GREATER WEAPON FOCUS [GENERAL]
Choose one weapon category for which you have already selected Weapon Focus.
Prerequisites: Weapon Focus with selected weapon category, fighter level 8th.
Benefit: You gain a +2 bonus on all attack rolls you make using the selected weapon category. This bonus stacks with other bonuses on attack rolls, including the one from Weapon Focus (see above).
Special: You can gain Greater Weapon Focus multiple times. Its effects do not stack. Each time you take the feat, it applies to a new weapon category.
A fighter may select Greater Weapon Focus as one of his fighter bonus feats.
GREATER WEAPON SPECIALIZATION [GENERAL]
Choose one weapon category for which you have already selected Weapon Specialization.
Prerequisites: Greater Weapon Focus with selected weapon category, Weapon Focus with selected weapon category, Weapon Specialization with selected weapon category, fighter level 12th.
Benefit: You gain a +4 bonus on all damage rolls you make using the selected weapon category. This bonus stacks with other bonuses on damage rolls, including the one from Weapon Specialization (see above).
Special: You can gain Greater Weapon Specialization multiple times. Its effects do not stack. Each time you take the feat, it applies to a new weapon category.
A fighter may select Greater Weapon Specialization as one of his fighter bonus feats.
IMPROVED CRITICAL [GENERAL]
Choose one weapon category for which you have already selected Weapon Focus.
Prerequisite: Weapon Focus with selected weapon category, base attack bonus +8.
Benefit: When using the weapon category you selected, your threat range is doubled.
Special: You can gain Improved Critical multiple times. The effects do not stack. Each time you take the feat, it applies to a new weapon category.
This effect doesn't stack with any other effect that expands the threat range of a weapon.
A fighter may select Improved Critical as one of his fighter bonus feats.
GREATER CRITICAL [GENERAL]
Choose one weapon category for which you have already selected Improved critical.
Prerequisite: Base attack bonus +8.
Benefit: When using the weapon category you selected, your critical damage multiplier is increased in +1.
Special: You can gain Greater Critical multiple times. The effects do not stack. Each time you take the feat, it applies to a new weapon category.
This effect doesn't stack with any other effect that increases the critical damage multipler of a weapon.
A fighter may select Improved Critical as one of his fighter bonus feats.
WEAPON MASTERY [GENERAL]
Choose one single type of weapon that has a category for which you have already selected Greater Weapon Specialization.
Prerequisites: Weapon Focus with selected weapon category, Greater Weapon Focus with selected weapon category, Weapon Specialization with selected weapon category, Greater Weapon Specialization with selected weapon category, fighter level 16th.
Benefit: When you use the chosen weapon, you treat it as a weapon one size category larger when calculating damage.
Special: You can gain Weapon Mastery multiple times. Its effects do not stack. Each time you take the feat, it applies to a new weapon.
This effect doesn't stack with weapons actually one or more size categoriess larger than the character size.
A fighter may select Greater Weapon Specialization as one of his fighter bonus feats.
Epic feats:
EPIC WEAPON FOCUS [GENERAL]
Choose one weapon category for which you have already selected Greater Weapon Focus.
Prerequisites: Weapon Focus with selected weapon category, Greater Weapon Focus with selected weapon category, fighter level 21th.
Benefit: You gain a +3 bonus on all attack rolls you make using the selected weapon category. This bonus stacks with other bonuses on attack rolls, including the one from Weapon Focus and Greater Weapon Focus (see above).
Special: You can gain Epic Weapon Focus multiple times. Its effects do not stack. Each time you take the feat, it applies to a new weapon category.
A fighter may select Epic Weapon Focus as one of his fighter bonus feats.
EPIC WEAPON SPECIALIZATION [GENERAL]
Choose one weapon category for which you have already selected Greater Weapon Specialization.
Prerequisites: Weapon Focus with selected weapon category, Greater Weapon Focus with selected weapon category, Weapon Specialization with selected weapon category, Greater Weapon Specialization with selected weapon category, fighter level 25th.
Benefit: You gain a +6 bonus on all damage rolls you make using the selected weapon category. This bonus stacks with other bonuses on attack rolls, including the one from Weapon Focus and Greater Weapon Focus (see above).
Special: You can gain Epic Weapon Focus multiple times. Its effects do not stack. Each time you take the feat, it applies to a new weapon category.
A fighter may select Epic Weapon Focus as one of his fighter bonus feats.
This is not meant to solve the fighter's problems, just to give him a little boost at high level, while adding a bit for others classes, mainly non-casters.
I made Weapon Specialization available for any character, but the greater and epic versions are fighter only. The greater versions now give better bonuses that stack with the previous versions, like Epic does now, and raised Epic more.
I added a feat to rise the critical of weapons (and Improved critical now has Weapon Focus as requisite), and turned Weapon Mastery into a less crappy version of Monkey Grip, but with a lot of prerequisites.
I doubt anyone will think these are too powerful, seeing that others classes get a lot of better features, but any input is welcome.