Buff DEX melee, here's some suggestions

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gmahadhika
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Buff DEX melee, here's some suggestions

Post by gmahadhika » Fri Jul 01, 2022 1:55 am

I know, I feel like veteran Arelith players have PTSD against DEX melee builds. For good reasons. However, in the last couple of years DEX melee builds have been nerfed to the ground to the point that if you're playing melee -> then go STR. Kind of like Invisible Blade situation (before it got buffed again, not OP, but serviceable).

Therefore I propose this, if your character:
1. DEX is higher than STR;
2. Is using finesseable weapons.

Then:
1. Use DEX mod for AB (standard weapon finesse feat behavior);
2. Remove all STR mod to damage (minus STR would also be negated; or not depends on testing);
3. Have half of DEX mod to damage, rounded down (or even a quarter of DEX mod; again, need testing);

While we're at it, some would be quick to point out that DEX builds have high AC, and this would add damage on top of that. Moreover, DEX builds can still use shield to bump their AC even more.

That brings us to the next part, incentivize DEX two weapon fighting by:
1. The half of DEX mod to damage is not halved again for offhand attacks unlike STR. So a character with 16 DEX mod would still get +8 damage for offhand attacks, same as mainhand attacks.

Two-handing weapon finesse user would still retain half DEX mod to damage, but not multiplied by 1,5.

I think this would add more variety to combat styles. Most people is going sword and shield nowadays. With these changes, we can expect:
1. If you build STR, you better off using shield or two-handing weapon to either bump AC or damage (same as before);
2. If you build DEX, you wouldn't need to gear STR for damage. And you would be better off dual wielding rather than two-handing. If you do choose to use shields, consider that you need more damage instead of more AC.

I do hope some of these changes are considered to improve the server build variety. Please don't bully me, I'm a newish player. Do provide constructive feedbacks.

Thank you.

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Re: Buff DEX melee, here's some suggestions

Post by AstralUniverse » Fri Jul 01, 2022 6:27 am

I dont think dex should be as strong as str in melee. I think dex as a stat should be ideal for rogues, monks and archers but not also melee warriorish builds. If the game is balanced around melee dex being on par with melee str, no one plays melee str. We've been there. AC is too good. The dex meta was a thing because of UBAB dips and because CoT was giving way too much ab and damage in vanilla Wrath. Now we're in a good spot in that regard.
gmahadhika wrote:
Fri Jul 01, 2022 1:55 am
I know, I feel like veteran Arelith players have PTSD against DEX melee builds. For good reasons.
Svrtr wrote:

I've spoken with Kenji and warpriest will be allowed to take elemental avatar so keep this in mind too


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Re: Buff DEX melee, here's some suggestions

Post by Skibbles » Fri Jul 01, 2022 11:02 am

DEX Melee just had, basically, a free pre-epic feat granted to them all across the board (Finesse tax removed). If any buffs are to come it may be best to wait and see how the current situation settles.

I've definitely noticed a falloff in DEX melee builds, but I'm not sure if that's necessarily a horrible thing.

Looking at my current character sheet I'd gain 2 damage per strike on the mainhand, which is fairly significant for the ungifted human I'm playing, but I think just about anyone else is looking at 3-4 extra damage... quite a bit.

The offhand receiving such a huge damage increase too, I think, is just too much since a duel wielder could be raining down 8 attacks per round with haste as it is. This makes any damage adjustments, even by 1s and 2s, quite a precarious idea.

They're not horrible ideas, save for maybe the offhand damage increase, but I'm hesitant about any buffs simply because usually a buff results in a following adjustment that sometimes is worse than the original change.
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gmahadhika
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Re: Buff DEX melee, here's some suggestions

Post by gmahadhika » Fri Jul 01, 2022 12:50 pm

Thank you kindly for your responses, it means a lot.

In my mind, the goal is not to make DEX melee on par with STR melee. The goal is to make DEX melee somewhat relevant again, which in turns broaden players build choices without sacrificing kill pressure.

Even with the changes I suggested, DEX melee still suffers significant discipline checks for example. And lower overall damage still from STR melee. Again, if the damage increase is deemed too high, a quarter of DEX mod is good too.

As for feat tax, I'm all for weapon finesse feat tax again, if it means all if not some of my suggested changes are applied. After all, a feat tax makes sense for a feat that enables a single stat to affect AB, AC, damage, and a save.

These changes would also directly buff a lot of melee roguish builds, which suffers greatly from divine shield and epic dodge interaction nerf for example. Also, not all rogues are divine rogues.

I understand the difficulty to balance a game this scope. It is very hard. But I do hope the devs review DEX melee again after all the nerfs.

Lastly, I understand this is not a suggestion forum. I just need to get these ideas out of my system.

Thank you again.

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Re: Buff DEX melee, here's some suggestions

Post by Itikar » Fri Jul 01, 2022 1:32 pm

I would not touch damage of dex builds, sincerely. There are already some ways to off-set it to an extent, through dips such as fighter, swashbuckler or blackguard. Damage however is the domain of strength.

Perhaps one can consider the crossbow feat that they have on Potm, that adds half of the dexterity modifier to damage for crossbow only, but truth be told, it did not really strike me as a great feat.

Among other interesting things, NWN2 has an epic feat that lets the character use the highest modifier between strength and intelligence, for bonus damage. So a character could go dexterity for ac/ab and intelligence for damage. It was used by a small minority of swashbuckler/duelist builds, even though, one needs to remember that NWN2 ability buffs conform to 3.5 ruleset, i.e. they do not stack, so the context is a bit different.

In any case I would not be too opposed to surgical solutions such as the above examples, but I believe that giving dexterity damage by itself would be quite unbalanced.

A significant help that could come to dexterity builds, right now, in my opinion is the extension of uncanny dodge to some additional classes, so that they become more dexterity friendly. The one which could benefit from it the most right now is probably the shaman/monk synergy, which could gain uncanny dodge at effective monk level of 12. Ditto for shaman/ranger at effective level 10. It might be worth considering fighter too, perhaps, even though the class right now seems to be more structured around the theme of a heavy armored warrior. I would be a bit more cautious on the other hand with divine classes since they tend often to pick up divine shield, but in general, I think that making dexterity "simply work", or at least not endure too heavy penalties, for a higher number of class combinations would not be a bad thing.

edit: added link to the NWN2 feat.
Last edited by Itikar on Fri Jul 01, 2022 1:39 pm, edited 2 times in total.

Richrd
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Re: Buff DEX melee, here's some suggestions

Post by Richrd » Fri Jul 01, 2022 1:37 pm

Dex builds are good enough as they are.

If STR builds are too good (which I highly doubt) then just adjust them accordingly.

Stop the powercreep. Nerfs instead of buffs.

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Re: Buff DEX melee, here's some suggestions

Post by malcolm_mountainslayer » Fri Jul 01, 2022 1:40 pm

gmahadhika wrote:
Fri Jul 01, 2022 1:55 am

Then:
1. Use DEX mod for AB (standard weapon finesse feat behavior);
2. Remove all STR mod to damage (minus STR would also be negated; or not depends on testing);
3. Have half of DEX mod to damage, rounded down (or even a quarter of DEX mod; again, need testing);
This is barely any more damage than a dex build just investing in strength buff and items.

half of dex mod 14 = 7

Have a base str of 10 and buff it up by a full 12 and reach a mod of 6.

The only build that will massively benefit from this, is 8 or 6 dex starting monks and we should just leave that can of worms alone.

Going dex also has the advantage of not having to change when to sleep, availability of stealth options, availability of ranged options, better reflex saves and on.

But yeah lets hae the dust settle a bit on these recent free finesse.

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Re: Buff DEX melee, here's some suggestions

Post by Ork » Fri Jul 01, 2022 1:58 pm

DEX is fine.

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Re: Buff DEX melee, here's some suggestions

Post by garrbear758 » Fri Jul 01, 2022 3:24 pm

There are plenty of very good dex builds still. The weaker dex builds revolve around going heavy into one of two classes. Rogue and shadowdancer. Shadowdancer is long overdue for a complete rework, and rogue just needs 2-3 soft ab and changes to grenades to make them more useful (for example, the breach grenade has a save tied to the breach, which makes it less useful than a scroll. The breach should be saveless. There are other grenades that need tweaks like this as well). Assassin is in a good place. Monk is in a good place. Swash is in a good place.
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Re: Buff DEX melee, here's some suggestions

Post by Subtext » Fri Jul 01, 2022 4:31 pm

While I generally agree with OP regarding dex builds lagging a little behind lately, I do think that garr has a point and it is mainly "just" an issue with rogues and shadowdancers.

I don't quite think though that rogue is necessarily lacking AB potential in that regard but it's more an issue of being feat-starved. There's too many boxes to check to allow for customising in any direction. I think having a few extra "special" feat options available along with extra feats would go a long way...
For example:
Insightful Strike or Defensive Dual Wielding selectable as feat
New feat for the mentioned int mod as extra damage for crossbow users...stuff like that.

Second, I also agree with the grenades. They are super cool in theory, in practice they feel a lot more meh due to existing/low saves so there's some agreement with garr too.

As for Shadowdancers, yeah. Don't get me wrong, I like that they have an easy PvE life and I don't think that necessarily has to go but outside of hips they don't bring anything to a real gunfight (pvp). But ironically too, SD performs much better as pve lawnmower as part of a strength build.

What I wanted to say a few times. I feel like Vigilante is the almost perfect representation of what a path-based rework to rogues would look like and I think I even made a suggestion like that a few months ago.

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Re: Buff DEX melee, here's some suggestions

Post by MissEvelyn » Fri Jul 01, 2022 5:33 pm

The only thing I truly desire for all my non-Strength characters (which is 90% percent of them) is to be able to carry more weight. However you want to rationalize adding DEX to weight (better inventory management skills, agile packs, something else), I'll take it.


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Re: Buff DEX melee, here's some suggestions

Post by Waldo52 » Fri Jul 01, 2022 6:01 pm

garrbear758 wrote:
Fri Jul 01, 2022 3:24 pm
There are plenty of very good dex builds still. The weaker dex builds revolve around going heavy into one of two classes. Rogue and shadowdancer. Shadowdancer is long overdue for a complete rework, and rogue just needs 2-3 soft ab and changes to grenades to make them more useful (for example, the breach grenade has a save tied to the breach, which makes it less useful than a scroll. The breach should be saveless. There are other grenades that need tweaks like this as well). Assassin is in a good place. Monk is in a good place. Swash is in a good place.
Rogues really, really need this AB increase.

Please give us paths or a new class feature or two just to keep things fun! We've waited so long for stuff. :(

Dex ranger probably needs some love too

gmahadhika
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Re: Buff DEX melee, here's some suggestions

Post by gmahadhika » Fri Jul 01, 2022 10:01 pm

Thank you again for your responses.

It is possible to gear STR to +12 on a DEX build, but I think we shouldn't have to. For example, STR builds wouldn't want to gear for DEX. If they are, it's just a measly 1 or 2. DEX builds however, would have a harder gearing because they'd still want to gear STR for damage, and that damage increase is so low that it is hard to justify it over unisaves.

I understand where you're all coming from. Let's just hope the new vigilante class shows that DEX builds can also have high AB and damage without having to sneak attacks.

Thank you.

EDIT: I guess the other simple solution would be, make SW's Insightful Strike not capped by SW level. Therefore a SW dip would fix rogues damage.

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Re: Buff DEX melee, here's some suggestions

Post by AstralUniverse » Fri Jul 01, 2022 10:50 pm

Waldo52 wrote:
Fri Jul 01, 2022 6:01 pm
garrbear758 wrote:
Fri Jul 01, 2022 3:24 pm
There are plenty of very good dex builds still. The weaker dex builds revolve around going heavy into one of two classes. Rogue and shadowdancer. Shadowdancer is long overdue for a complete rework, and rogue just needs 2-3 soft ab and changes to grenades to make them more useful (for example, the breach grenade has a save tied to the breach, which makes it less useful than a scroll. The breach should be saveless. There are other grenades that need tweaks like this as well). Assassin is in a good place. Monk is in a good place. Swash is in a good place.
Rogues really, really need this AB increase.

Please give us paths or a new class feature or two just to keep things fun! We've waited so long for stuff. :(

Dex ranger probably needs some love too
I say this as someone who wants to see Rogue buffed; Ab is not the way. Rogue's ab is fine and any more than this ab would really become too oppressive in the hands of someone who understands how to optimize their use of the (admittedly terrible) nwn stealth/detection system.

However, reverting the nerfs to grenades is something I've suggested before and strongly agree with.
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Re: Buff DEX melee, here's some suggestions

Post by Svrtr » Sat Jul 02, 2022 3:24 am

Its been said before, but Ill say it again

A build that invests in a stat to get Ac, AB, reflex save, and damage is obscene

Uncapping swash's insightful strike could mean for 3-4 levels you can get 8-9 bonus damage, on top of buffing STR or getting EWS.

I'll often say "When dex is the meta the meta is almost certainly unhealthy" and this is precisely why.

I do think rogue needs a bit more AB since 24/6 caps at about 45 or 46 and 19/5/6 at one more, two more with WM.

This on top of dex being able to access its capstone feat, edodge, where dev crit is (rightfully) disabled for STR means that if dex becomes competitive for damage again it'll just be a shift towards what it was before, if slightly less egregious now.

Small damage buffs may be fine, but I have a gut dislike of it on principle of dex giving everything it really needs. Dex isn't in a bad spot overall though, as said above though rogue and SD can just feel sad, especially against sneak immune enemies. I suppose giving a feat a small chance to overcome sneak immunity like inquisitor pal with crit immunity could be interesting, but I'd still want to look at all the numbers before suggesting such

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Re: Buff DEX melee, here's some suggestions

Post by Skibbles » Sat Jul 02, 2022 3:44 am

I have a DEX Ranger that has a strange off-build and subrace, so it's hard to comment on their overall balance, but it doesn't seem in need of a sweeping buff in my case.

I think the class does require significantly more item investment than other average PCs, as certain class combos can require quad-stat itemization; very difficult, obviously. Gearing over a long period of time is fun for me, so this doesn't subjectively bother me at all.

Blood frenzy/silver bell wind up can put out incredible damage (4-5 magical, in fact), over 50 AB dual wielding, that can often send PCs running from the sudden kill pressure and the wonderfully splooshy magic dmg vfx.

Never been knocked down, but I'm going with the standard ESF Disc and items, so I don't think there's really anything weak about that either since this is par for the course feat/skill tax for nearly every build ever.

I can see how it might feel that being DEX gives neither the AC it used to combined with lower average damage, but I'm very hesitant to repeat this authoritatively when I'm sure someone like Kenji has graphs and stuff that indicate the truth of the matter, but we shouldn't forget that Ranger and Favored Enemy are heavily reliant upon one another so the real source/feature of DEX ranger damage doesn't have much to do with ability scores in the first place.

If DEX ranger buffs were announced as 'soon*' I'd honestly just be gritting my teeth in apprehension. Such things come with a price.
Irongron wrote: [...] the super-secret Arelith development roadmap is a post apocalyptic wasteland populated with competing tribes of hand-bombard wielding techno-giants, and strewn with the bones of long dead elves.

So we're very much on track.

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Re: Buff DEX melee, here's some suggestions

Post by Shadowy Reality » Sat Jul 02, 2022 6:44 pm

All I would do is not make Discipline as bad as it is. Maybe add half Dex mod to Discipline.

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Re: Buff DEX melee, here's some suggestions

Post by AstralUniverse » Sat Jul 02, 2022 7:16 pm

Dexers are about to face a very harsh invoker meta with true sight and balagrn spam. Good luck to us all.
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I've spoken with Kenji and warpriest will be allowed to take elemental avatar so keep this in mind too


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Re: Buff DEX melee, here's some suggestions

Post by Edens_Fall » Sat Jul 02, 2022 10:22 pm

Shadowy Reality wrote:
Sat Jul 02, 2022 6:44 pm
All I would do is not make Discipline as bad as it is. Maybe add half Dex mod to Discipline.
This would be a nice Idea. Having to counter Knockdown Spamming in a fight againist a STR based Fighter has been a hassle. Edodge only saves you once, and all they have to do is hot key KD and spam away. Once your on the ground bye, bye DEX AC.

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