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Nov 14, 2012 -- 9:00AM, Aesurtiel wrote:

I don't thnk FoB should be allowed to make weapon attacks. Weapons attacks have bonuses from magic or even for being masterwork. 

Bonus only applies to the first attack, so I would think its balanced with other manuevers (as they all get them). I presume there are some unique things like tattoos that will give magic item like bonuses to monks. Otherwise who wants to play the class that never uses magic items?

 

Nov 14, 2012 -- 9:29AM, warrl wrote:

There are different sorts of extra attacks...

A trained two-weapon fighter's basic attack is (potentially) divided in two. The combination of the two, plus opportunities for enhancements to it, should be balanced against the basic attack of fighters trained in other styles. If the TWF got as his basic attack a standard single-weapon attack with all the regular options plus a second attack that offered anything at all, it would be the clearly-best style and there should not be a clearly-best style. If he has to spend an expertise die to get that second attack but this is clearly better than other uses of the expertise die (as a second regular attack would be), same problem.

So no, the TWF's dual attack should NOT be two regular attacks.

Other extra-attack situations, that are NOT "your basic attack action is two attacks", are different and probably at least some of them should be full normal attacks.

OK, but here's my issue: when I read "two weapon fighting" I think I attack with two weapons. I see that weapons do damage, I expect to be doing damage with both weapons. I look at a two hander, and I see that it does more damage than a one hander. So my expectation is that two weapons will do the equivalent of a two hander, but over two different attacks.

Since weapon damage is figured as weapon die + ability, I expect that my two weapons will deliver attacks at weapon + ability and there will be suficient penalties, either through accuracy or damage, to make the damage about even with the two hander.

That means two things that make what you're saying unpalettable: 1) an 1h damage roll divided by two is nowhere near the equivalent damage of a two hander. Even if both attacks land on one opponent, the damage is the equivalent of a one hander, which means there's no reason to dual wield. I'll have that shield, thanks. 2) any damage roll that is as variable as 1 or 10 feels like it's not really worth the bother. 1d8+2 delivers a much more consistent damage than 1d10 and it makes me feel like the attack roll is going to always give me something and 3 damage on a min roll is still a downer. There's enough variance in the results to make the die rolling fun, but it also assures the subsequent attack rolls feel important.

Also, maneuvers present that modify attacks are almost universally one-off die increases. Only one spell adds a bonus to weapon damage that is not attributed to an attribute (divine favour) and the TWF rules as they're written allow that bonus to be applied to both weapon damage rolls anyway, which means that what I want will not increase the ceiling (currently) by adding another attack roll like you can in 3e.

Finally, magic items are not a consideration. Mearls has said explicitly that magic item bonuses are not part of the core balance, which means if you give someone who uses TWF or flurry some kind of magic item that boosts their damage rolls you have only yourself to blame. It's the DM's job, not the ruleset's, to make sure magic is given in moderation and in such a way that the game isn't broken.