The most powerful melee weapon in D&D 5e is... The Rowboat

[Brookshw]

Rules aside, a half orc with the sailor background running into foes with a boat ramp is hilarious.

Absolutely! I also like the idea of a boat dueling league, forced to go underground due to its lethality.

[stoutstien]

Absolutely! I also like the idea of a boat dueling league, forced to go underground due to its lethality.

Make them aquaphobic and let the rest write itself.

[Kane0]

The current reigning champion is a Duergar wielding the front portion of a Trireme.

[Joe the Rat]

And here i figured we were using the foldingboatapult to bludgeon and forcibly relocate opponents...

[JNAProductions]

Yes, I would. It incentivizes things like a rowboat wielder who uses Darkness to cancel out disadvantage so that attacks twice at +8 to hit by 6th level for 2d10+5 on each attack, which simultaneously obsoletes GWM and is absurd. In a world like that, why isn't everybody wielding enormous weapons? Why do greatwords even exist? It would damage my suspension of disbelief and make the game less fun for me so yes, I would have an objection to that ruling, as a player.

Yeah. Makes sense.

My off the cuff ruling was not a good one.

[Knaight]

Improvised weapons aside, this looks like an issue where the boat rules really only make sense interacting with each other - and even there it seems odd in places. I've been hit by a canoe more than once, it shouldn't do 4d10 damage. Ships damaging each other with collision makes a lot more sense than them doing meaningful damage ramming much of anything else, with the notable exception of high speed ramming vessels.

That... That makes no sense.

If I call you "A damnable fool, with the brains of a sniveling worm!" is that any less insulting than "A damnable FOOL, with the brains of a Sniveling Worm!"

For what it's worth, it's a funny bit of RAW, but not something that'd be allowed at any table I know of.

It may or may not be less insulting. Depends on what a Sniveling Worm is, because that sounds like jargon for some sort of astral plane monster.

[AdAstra]

For one, hilarious. On the other hand, your foes can just run into melee range of you. Since the boat only dows damage when it enters someone else’s space, if the enemy is already in its space they won’t take damage. Then it’s impossible to use the boat without getting opportunity attacks, unless you rule that you can move the boat without yourself moving. In which case, you could just infinitely spin the boat, dealing infinite nonmagical bludgeoning damage. Also a good way to get fireballed a bunch.

Or better yet, the dm can send a Gargantuan Swarm of Animated Rowboats after you. A swarm can enter someone’s space, and the rowboats themselves are smaller than the swarm’s space. Since there is no limit to the amount that one can move within their own space, the rowboats can form a tornado-like precession and infinitely enter and exit someone’s space, “instantly” pounding them into paste. Theoretically this could work with a single animated rowboat, or one moved with telekinesis as well, but it would be limited by movement.

Or the DM will just send lycanthropes and golems after you.

Personally, I would just make the player roll an acrobatics check to do combat maneuvers while carrying a boat. You’ve got a pretty long lever arm acting on you, even if it’s only 100 pounds.

[bid]

I guess the simplest thing to do is simply to have a strong guy carry a Rowboat into battle instead of a shield.

Mr. Canoehead!

[Monster Manuel]

Now a rowboat requires a crew of 2 to use it. If they aren't there it can't partecilate in combat and as such the boat "can't" decide to crash.
So a single PC can't use it as a weapon for the 4d10 damage

Aren't there rules about operating a ship with reduced crew? If not, I think this is, unfortunately, correct. This tactic now only works if the Goliath is carrying the rowboat with a gnome at the helm, co-piloting. The gnome does not put the rowboat over the carrying capacity of the Goliath, and the rules do not specify the size requirement of the crew members.

Ideally, the gnome captain can shout encouraging battle cries to his Goliath co-pilot, while posing and pointing dramatically forward in his jaunty captain's hat. I would rule that the gnome captain has to make dex saves to avoid being knocked from the boat upon impact, because I would not want to be unrealistic, here.

"RAMMING SPEED, ENSIGN GROG!" "All hands...BRACE FOR IMPACT!!!"

Phew, I thought we had hit a snag, but it appears the tactic is even more viable now, than it was before...

[Nefariis]

I believe RAW this works, there isn't anything to indicate that it doesn't

it makes no mention of "crashing" being on or located in water and you can dash faster than you can row.

I might make the caveat that you must be dashing and that you you have to drop the ship on someone - but even then, the next round you can pick something back up as a free action.

Now, as for RAI....

eh probably not

either way I love you guys for finding random and hilarious stuff like this

[MaxWilson]

Aren't there rules about operating a ship with reduced crew? If not, I think this is, unfortunately, correct. This tactic now only works if the Goliath is carrying the rowboat with a gnome at the helm, co-piloting. The gnome does not put the rowboat over the carrying capacity of the Goliath, and the rules do not specify the size requirement of the crew members.

Ideally, the gnome captain can shout encouraging battle cries to his Goliath co-pilot, while posing and pointing dramatically forward in his jaunty captain's hat. I would rule that the gnome captain has to make dex saves to avoid being knocked from the boat upon impact, because I would not want to be unrealistic, here.

"RAMMING SPEED, ENSIGN GROG!" "All hands...BRACE FOR IMPACT!!!"

Phew, I thought we had hit a snag, but it appears the tactic is even more viable now, than it was before...

Instead of a gnome, might as well make it an infinitely-high stack of centaurs riding centaurs.

[Damon_Tor]

Aren't there rules about operating a ship with reduced crew?

There are. Each action a ship can take notes the minium number of crewmen needed to perform it. A rowboat's movement action requires only one crewman. This is, however, entirely irrelevant. We aren't rowing the boat, we are carrying it, and nothing about the crashing rules implies a ship has to be crewed or in any way moving under its own power in order to crash.

[Chronos]

This thread sort of reminds me of Pathfinder orcs being proficient in blowtorches and motorcycles, as weapons.

[ATHATH]

Shouldn't you use the grappling/dragging rules for this? Can we treat the rowboat as a creature for the purposes of grappling?

[Rukelnikov]

Yes, I would. It incentivizes things like a rowboat wielder who uses Darkness to cancel out disadvantage so that attacks twice at +8 to hit by 6th level for 2d10+5 on each attack, which simultaneously obsoletes GWM and is absurd. In a world like that, why isn't everybody wielding enormous weapons? Why do greatwords even exist? It would damage my suspension of disbelief and make the game less fun for me so yes, I would have an objection to that ruling, as a player.

You can already do that RAW. DMG 287:

"Big monsters typically wield oversized weapons that deal extra dice of damage on a hit. Double the weapon dice if the creature is Large, triple the weapon dice if it's Huge, and quadruple the weapon dice if it's Gargantuan. For example, a Huge giant wielding an appropriately sized greataxe deals 3d12 slashing damage (plus its Strength bonus), instead of the normal 1d12.
A creature has disadvantage on attack rolls with a weapon that is sized for a larger attacker. You can rule that a weapon sized for an attacker two or more sizes larger is too big for the creature to use at all."

So you can have a Large sized GreatAxe that hits for 2d12, and cast darkness, yada yada

Yeah. Makes sense.

My off the cuff ruling was not a good one.

I think your ruling is ok, much better than "you hit for 1d4 with a blunt object that weights 50 lb"

[Damon_Tor]

Shouldn't you use the grappling/dragging rules for this? Can we treat the rowboat as a creature for the purposes of grappling?

It isn't a creature, so grappling wouldn't apply. You only have to drag something if you don't have the strength to carry it. A rowboat only weighs 100 pounds.

[Yunru]

People, people!
You're missing the obvious!
...
Put the boat on a cart and have the strong guy push that :P

Or better yet, the dm can send a Gargantuan Swarm of Animated Rowboats after you.

Rowboat + Animate Objects?
Sure it can attack for the listed damage, or it could just crash into them? :P

[Monster Manuel]

Instead of a gnome, might as well make it an infinitely-high stack of centaurs riding centaurs.

"But what is the first Centaur standing on?"

"Can't fool me, mister. It's Centaurs all the way down."

We aren't rowing the boat, we are carrying it

Point taken about the reduced crew being an option, and probably not applicable in this instance since the boat is not actually being rowed. But in my head the gnome is still up there. I will not budge on this.

What if the Large Goliath carrying the Enlarged rowboat was a Grave cleric? Building for a Strength of 16 is not unreasonable. Now he can use an action to hit a target with Path to the Grave, and the target is Vulnerable to boat damage. Double dice on the first collision!

[BloodSnake'sCha]

For one, hilarious. On the other hand, your foes can just run into melee range of you. Since the boat only dows damage when it enters someone else’s space, if the enemy is already in its space they won’t take damage. Then it’s impossible to use the boat without getting opportunity attacks, unless you rule that you can move the boat without yourself moving. In which case, you could just infinitely spin the boat, dealing infinite nonmagical bludgeoning damage. Also a good way to get fireballed a bunch.

Or better yet, the dm can send a Gargantuan Swarm of Animated Rowboats after you. A swarm can enter someone’s space, and the rowboats themselves are smaller than the swarm’s space. Since there is no limit to the amount that one can move within their own space, the rowboats can form a tornado-like precession and infinitely enter and exit someone’s space, “instantly” pounding them into paste. Theoretically this could work with a single animated rowboat, or one moved with telekinesis as well, but it would be limited by movement.

Or the DM will just send lycanthropes and golems after you.

Personally, I would just make the player roll an acrobatics check to do combat maneuvers while carrying a boat. You’ve got a pretty long lever arm acting on you, even if it’s only 100 pounds.

You can always use your action to disengage.

[Willie the Duck]

Is your objective to prove that the Saltmarsh rules as written are stupid and shouldn't be used? If so congratulations. I will continue not to buy it.

I think at this point, the thread should be read more as, 'look at what kind of shenanigans I can do with the rules/look at what kind of shenanigans I can do by willfully misinterpreting the empty space in the allowances of the rules.' It says about as much about 5e or Saltmarsh as drown-healing does about 3e (which is to say nothing). It is pseudo-mental/semantic gymnastics.

Why are there always so many joyless naysayers on the 5e boards? No one is coming to your house to put a gun to your head to force you to turn some Guy On The Internet's silly thought experiment into literal table rules you have to follow or die.

History. This place (and most gamer forums) have a long history of people coming and doing things not-unlike this in relative bad faith and then suggesting that it has grander implications one way or another (usually some variation of, 'this game is broken and you should feel bad for liking it because I can take it and do XYZ'). No one takes in on good faith (since such faith has so repeatedly been broken) that OP is just doing a silly thought experiment. Besides, if that is all they are doing, then pointing out the logical leaps they are making to do so is honing the experimental controls.

Yes, I would. It incentivizes things like a rowboat wielder who uses Darkness to cancel out disadvantage so that attacks twice at +8 to hit by 6th level for 2d10+5 on each attack, which simultaneously obsoletes GWM and is absurd. In a world like that, why isn't everybody wielding enormous weapons? Why do greatwords even exist? It would damage my suspension of disbelief and make the game less fun for me so yes, I would have an objection to that ruling, as a player.

Quick aside: greatwords exist because people have amazing vocabularies

Anyways, as a player in an actual game, I wouldn't accept this as appropriate use of the boat crash rules at all. There is plenty of space for additional 'portable hazards' rules (not unlike the caltrops and earthen berms we discussed in the thread about the party with no one filling the tank role), particularly for creatures big enough to carry massive items (preferably better than rowboats). I think 100 pound objects optimized to the task (spherical balls, possibly with 'children's jacks'-like roll-prevention spikes, if desired) should have some rules, and then a rowboat would be an improvised (poor) substitute. I can see a couple dice damage and maybe a save vs knockback or push-over. Hopefully, the 100 lb weight would make carrying massively multiple of them still prohibitive, and you would still do more actual damage with a great sword.

[Damon_Tor]

No one takes in on good faith (since such faith has so repeatedly been broken) that OP is just doing a silly thought experiment.

I think there are plenty of people understand exactly what I'm doing. Rest assured, I'm not showing up to your AL table with a rowboat tomorrow night.

[MaxWilson]

I think at this point, the thread should be read more as, 'look at what kind of shenanigans I can do with the rules/look at what kind of shenanigans I can do by willfully misinterpreting the empty space in the allowances of the rules.' It says about as much about 5e or Saltmarsh as drown-healing does about 3e (which is to say nothing). It is pseudo-mental/semantic gymnastics.

Not so. It's apparently rooted firmly in the Saltmarsh's rules for rowboats, which make hitting someone with a rowboat do an absurd amount of damage compared to hitting them repeatedly with a giant sword. If hitting someone with a rowboat did damage comparable to tossing them off a two-story building (2d6), we wouldn't be having this conversation.

[Willie the Duck]

I think there are plenty of people understand exactly what I'm doing. Rest assured, I'm not showing up to your AL table with a rowboat tomorrow night.

I'm more talking more in general about the 'joyless naysayer' tendency, and the knee-jerk need to have to jump in and point out that someone is, how shall we put it, doing something wacky with the rules (as if it were not obvious).

Yes, those of us even remotely familiar with you individually know you're grinding the mental wheels, etc.

Not so. It's apparently rooted firmly in the Saltmarsh's rules for rowboats, which make hitting someone with a rowboat do an absurd amount of damage compared to hitting them repeatedly with a giant sword. If hitting someone with a rowboat did damage comparable to tossing them off a two-story building (2d6), we wouldn't be having this conversation.

In both cases it is violating the intended use of the rules in a deliberate 'aha I see a linguistic gap' fashion. The boat crash rules were meant for use in ramming people with a boat moving through water (where even there it does do an absurd amount of damage, honestly, but really isn't comparable to a sword since it's a lot harder to engineer the setup), not just dropping them in their square. Likewise drown-healing exists because the person writing the rules that day didn't think through that hit points can be negative when they wrote "falls unconscious (0 hit points)" instead of 'falls unconscious (hit points fall to 0, if positive)' or the like. Yes, in both cases the rules could have been more tightly worded to exclude such loopholes, but IMO that's really all it says about anything.

[Damon_Tor]

In both cases it is violating the intended use of the rules in a deliberate 'aha I see a linguistic gap' fashion. The boat crash rules were meant for use in ramming people with a boat moving through water

I think the core problem here is that for some reason they decided to use the same chart for damage a ship does to an object/creature and the damage an object/creature does to a ship. Ships are tanky as heck, with their beefy hitpoints and (for the bigger ships) hefty damage thresholds, so it makes sense that they would have to put some big numbers on a chart intended to be used to figure out how much damage a ship takes when it hits something. Two rowboats hitting each other for 4d10 damage (50% chance of half) is fine: they each have 50 hitpoints.

The problem comes in when they use that SAME chart to note the damage taken by objects struck by the ships. We are but fleshy creatures, and 4d10 is a lot of damage.

[MaxWilson]

In both cases it is violating the intended use of the rules in a deliberate 'aha I see a linguistic gap' fashion. The boat crash rules were meant for use in ramming people with a boat moving through water (where even there it does do an absurd amount of damage, honestly, but really isn't comparable to a sword since it's a lot harder to engineer the setup), not just dropping them in their square. Likewise drown-healing exists because the person writing the rules that day didn't think through that hit points can be negative when they wrote "falls unconscious (0 hit points)" instead of 'falls unconscious (hit points fall to 0, if positive)' or the like. Yes, in both cases the rules could have been more tightly worded to exclude such loopholes, but IMO that's really all it says about anything.

No, it really isn't. Even in a bog-standard vanilla scenario, if you ram someone with a rowboat at 2mph, it shouldn't be inflicting 4d10 damage. This thread is about weaponizing a stupid rule to highlight how stupid the rule is, but you're claiming that there isn't a problem with the base rule at all, and that just isn't true. This isn't about linguistic gaps, it's about the Saltmarsh authors writing a rule which doesn't match the rest of the game. Do you really believe that being hit with a crashing rowboat is about as lethal as falling off a 60' cliff?

Why in the world should I pay good money for bad rules? Either the bad rules will never get used, in which case I wasted my money, or the rules will get used and will make my game worse than the rules that I would otherwise have written myself.

I think the core problem here is that for some reason they decided to use the same chart for damage a ship does to an object/creature and the damage an object/creature does to a ship. Ships are tanky as heck, with their beefy hitpoints and (for the bigger ships) hefty damage thresholds, so it makes sense that they would have to put some big numbers on a chart intended to be used to figure out how much damage a ship takes when it hits something. Two rowboats hitting each other for 4d10 damage (50% chance of half) is fine: they each have 50 hitpoints.

The problem comes in when they use that SAME chart to note the damage taken by objects struck by the ships. We are but fleshy creatures, and 4d10 is a lot of damage.

IMO the true core problem is trying to use the same HP rules for killing creatures and destroying objects, and it's a problem which actually predates 5E.

Spoiler: Killing is not the same as destroying

Show

The thing is, if you stick a knife in my eye and reduce me to zero HP, I turn from a living human into a dead human--I can be killed by damaging only a part of me. But there's still a dead body there there. Boats are already unliving, so "killing" a boat by damaging its vital points doesn't mean anything per se, and there's really nothing you can do to a single part of a well-constructed rowboat which will destroy the whole rowboat. Death != disintegration, and if you choose an amount of damage which is appropriate for destroying a hypothetical living rowboat, and try to use those same numbers to model destroying an object, it won't make sense.

If you were determined to use HP to model objects, you could say that a rowboat has 6 sections, each with 10 HP, and when you get in a crash the 3 sections involved in the crash each take 2d6 damage and lose structural integrity if they hit 0 HP. The boat sinks if at least half of its sections are ever reduced to 0 HP. (This would also let an 8d6 Fireball destroy a rowboat, which also seems appropriate, but a Sharpshooter requires multiple arrows to sink a rowboat, which also seems appropriate.) In this case you're letting boats destroy other boats not by doing tons of damage but rather by doing damage to multiple sections.

This is the same kind of thinking you need to apply when players decide they want to tunnel through dungeon walls by attacking them with their weapons. "Fine, you beat on the wall for several minutes with your hammer. You're now looking at a stone wall with several deep cracks and gouges in it, several inches deep. If it had been a mimic you surely have killed it. You're not sure how thick the wall is, but if it's less than a foot thick you can probably reduce it from a wall to a couple of tons of rubble with another ten minutes' work or so, but it is very loud. Do you want to keep hammering away?"

I have also used rules like these to model truly gargantuan creatures: simply declare that the creature is so big that it cannot be slain at all except by damage to certain locations. There's no way an ant can kill a human by attacking its big toe, no matter how much damage it does to that big toe.

[Willie the Duck]

No, it really isn't. Even in a bog-standard vanilla scenario, if you ram someone with a rowboat at 2mph, it shouldn't be inflicting 4d10 damage. This thread is about weaponizing a stupid rule to highlight how stupid the rule is, but you're claiming that there isn't a problem with the base rule at all, and that just isn't true. This isn't about linguistic gaps, it's about the Saltmarsh authors writing a rule which doesn't match the rest of the game.

I think the rowboat is out bounds with the actual mass of the vessel (in other words, excessive), but I appreciate that the rules recognize that being hit by a moving ship will actually mess you up. That it's the same for 2 mph or 20 knots, and again that row boats specifically are included in that chart, are unfortunate side effects of a low granularity system. I do not think row boats should be included on a chart like this -- being hit by one is really unlikely to be able to kill anyone, except by knocking them out in water (which is always dangerous, but in that instance rowboat and tree branch are roughly similar in risk). It should be for actually large vessels where getting hit by them would be decidedly dangerous. Clearly the sweat spot for this system is two somewhat similarly sized vessels crashing into each other (or ramming The Alert into the head of Cthulhu).

However, my primary point of concern, which is clearly very different from your point, is that porting these rules (which, regardless of the accuracy of the damage numbers, were meant for vessels at speed crashing into creatures or each other) to someone walking around with a boat on their equipment list and depositing it into someone else's square is absolutely weaponizing a stupid/silly willful misinterpretation of a rule well outside of its intended scope or area of implementation.

Do you really believe that being hit with a crashing rowboat is about as lethal as falling off a 60' cliff?

Max, you are better than this. You, me, everyone I can think of on these boards recognize that falling damage is borked beyond recognition. Using it to prove some other point about relative damage is inherently flawed. I am disappointed.

IMO the true core problem is trying to use the same HP rules for killing creatures and destroying objects, and it's a problem which actually predates 5E.

Spoiler: Killing is not the same as destroying

Show

The thing is, if you stick a knife in my eye and reduce me to zero HP, I turn from a living human into a dead human--I can be killed by damaging only a part of me. But there's still a dead body there there. Boats are already unliving, so "killing" a boat by damaging its vital points doesn't mean anything per se, and there's really nothing you can do to a single part of a well-constructed rowboat which will destroy the whole rowboat. Death != disintegration, and if you choose an amount of damage which is appropriate for destroying a hypothetical living rowboat, and try to use those same numbers to model destroying an object, it won't make sense.

If you were determined to use HP to model objects, you could say that a rowboat has 6 sections, each with 10 HP, and when you get in a crash the 3 sections involved in the crash each take 2d6 damage and lose structural integrity if they hit 0 HP. The boat sinks if at least half of its sections are ever reduced to 0 HP. (This would also let an 8d6 Fireball destroy a rowboat, which also seems appropriate, but a Sharpshooter requires multiple arrows to sink a rowboat, which also seems appropriate.) In this case you're letting boats destroy other boats not by doing tons of damage but rather by doing damage to multiple sections.

This is the same kind of thinking you need to apply when players decide they want to tunnel through dungeon walls by attacking them with their weapons. "Fine, you beat on the wall for several minutes with your hammer. You're now looking at a stone wall with several deep cracks and gouges in it, several inches deep. If it had been a mimic you surely have killed it. You're not sure how thick the wall is, but if it's less than a foot thick you can probably reduce it from a wall to a couple of tons of rubble with another ten minutes' work or so, but it is very loud. Do you want to keep hammering away?"

I have also used rules like these to model truly gargantuan creatures: simply declare that the creature is so big that it cannot be slain at all except by damage to certain locations. There's no way an ant can kill a human by attacking its big toe, no matter how much damage it does to that big toe.

On that we agree. Boats tend to work better using damage states. Something like breached/sinking/split/destroyed, or the like. Other vehicles and structures as well. There are a number of systems that work better than most D&Ds in this regard.

[Laserlight]

Absolutely! I also like the idea of a boat dueling league, forced to go underground due to its lethality.

In Passignano, Italy, there's a boat race, the Palio delle Barche, which involves several crews each carrying their boat through the narrow medieval streets, including one spot which involves going up a set of stairs, around a corner, and through a door--and the boats are too long, so the crew has to toss it through an opening in the wall. It is possible that the other crews, who have to get their boats through the same spot, stand politely by, giving each other plenty of space and graciously waiting for an opening, before they proceed in a stately and dignified manner around the course...and if that were so, then "ramming other crewmembers with your rowboat" would be mere idle speculation.

[Trandir]

Ok I got an idea that will make everybody happy: Swarmkeeper ranger (or any other class after you cast fly on them) with a rowboat and strong enough to carry it.
It flyes into the battlefield crashing against the enemies.

[MaxWilson]

However, my primary point of concern, which is clearly very different from your point, is that porting these rules (which, regardless of the accuracy of the damage numbers, were meant for vessels at speed crashing into creatures or each other) to someone walking around with a boat on their equipment list and depositing it into someone else's square is absolutely weaponizing a stupid/silly willful misinterpretation of a rule well outside of its intended scope or area of implementation.

FWIW I agree on this point. We just disagree on whether or not that was crucial to Damon_Tor's point: I think he was mocking the Saltmarsh rules, and you apparently think he was looking for ways to theorycraft increased damage in combat. Yes/no? Only Damon_Tor can say for sure which they intended.

Max, you are better than this. You, me, everyone I can think of on these boards recognize that falling damage is borked beyond recognition. Using it to prove some other point about relative damage is inherently flawed. I am disappointed.

I don't even know what you're trying to say here. Using the rules for getting crushed by enormous forces/momentum against flat surfaces (e.g. falling rules) to represent getting crushed by enormous forces/momentum against mostly-flat surfaces (boats) seems frankly seems like the best correspondence you're going to find in 5E. I'm disappointed that you see the need to frame your disagreement in personal terms, as if it were as some kind of a moral or intellectual failing in the person you're disagreeing with. Can't you just state your reasons for disagreement and leave it at that?

[Damon_Tor]

FWIW I agree on this point. We just disagree on whether or not that was crucial to Damon_Tor's point: I think he was mocking the Saltmarsh rules, and you apparently think he was looking for ways to theorycraft increased damage in combat. Yes/no? Only Damon_Tor can say for sure which they intended.

"Mocking" is a strong word. Satire, perhaps, a modest proposal.