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One of my players REALLY wants to dual-wield, and neither of us are really happy with the current state of TWF. However, we came up with a proposal that might make wielding two weapons useful while implementing a parry ability.

Here's our idea, let me know what you all think of it.

Parry - Standard Action - Melee
"You position yourself to block your attacker's next blow with your own weapon."

Requires melee weapon; in place of your melee attack for the round, you force the next melee attacker to roll his attack versus your own basic melee attack. If you are wielding two weapons, a critical roll on your melee attack allows you to make an attack roll with the other weapon.

Doesn't really make up for the sad +1 that TWF gives you in basic 4E, but definitely increases the usefulness of wielding two weapons.

No...Total Defense only gives you a +2 to your AC. This changes the attack dynamic completely, *and* allows someone wielding two weapons to ACTUALLY use their off-hand weapon at least sometimes.

AC = 10 + stat + armor + shield + 1/2 level
attack = ~10.5 + stat + proficiency + 1/2 level

Except that this is being thought of primarily as a method to improve usefulness of an off-hand weapon, so drop the shield from the AC calculation. Plus, from what you've shown above, I don't see how this is unbalancing plus it gives the capability to use the off-hand weapon on a critical parry.

The specific character is a dragonborn paladin, who wants to wield a blade and a blunt, and feels (reasonably to me) that he should be able to use a weapon in place of his armor to parry an attack.

GeneralHenry wrote:

paladin, that's not an easy one.

I don't think parry is a good fix. In plate armor he'd pretty much always be better off using total defense.

I'll assume longsword throwing hammer for now.
And I'm gonna assume he'll invest in TWF and TWD

hmmm... TWF is great to rangers, good for rogues, ok for fighters, but it's indeed pretty lame for paladins.

It gets him to a half way compromise between offense and defense. The good part is that it buys him a basic ranged attack (good for keeping a mark up at range)

so.. next question, would ranger multiclass help? I'm gonna assume he's str based so the stat synergy is there.

We're really just starting out, and honestly using the prebuilts from Keep on the Shadowfell as our first steps into the 4E world. So he definitely has the STR synergy. And you're entirely right about him being better off with Total Defense in plate armor - another reason this doesn't seem unbalancing...he chooses to swap a known AC (and likely higher score) for an unknown melee check.

Haven't decided whether TWF would be required for the crit effect, but as I think about it, it might be.

I do completely agree with that...was considering this with a Fighter/Warlord/Paladin class restriction as well. Though thinking about it, I don't know that it's overpowered for a Rogue, as it only permits basic melee attacks on a successful parry, and takes the place of their standard action.