Rebalancing Dual Wield

[Twily]

I feel like Quarterstaves are the best weapon for dual wielding in nearly every way, and think adjustments to help bring everything to the same level could be good.

Quarterstaff:
Simple Weapon
1d6/unarmed 20/x2
No AB penalty (+2 offsets the -2)
Monk UBAB
Finessable
Bludgeoning

All other dual wielding options have very limited benefits when compared to this, I've put some other commonly dual wielded weapons at the bottom that can be compared to the staff (most fall short of what the staff offers).

Quarterstaff gets the most AB, the average 1d6 base damage that most dual wielding choices have, while also using Bludgeoning damage(which in PvE mobs have the least resistances to).
Additionally, most Dex-based Quarterstaff users dip monk, which gives even better AB and even more attacks, and this generally makes up for where bludgeoning weapons fall short in PvP (especially if the user has sneak attacks).
The only thing that comes close is Kama with a monk level, but even this is slashing and -2 AB, where the only benefit is being able to use Flurry of Blows(which is an additional -2 AB).

Other two sided weapons can come close, but these require Exotic Weapon Proficiency, and fail to work with Weapon Finesse which restricts them to strength based characters. Most dual wielding characters are Dex based, which makes these rarely used.

On top of all of this, using a two-sided weapon instead of two weapons requires significantly less gold. You only need to buy one weapon, one permanent essence, half the number of temporary essences, and half the amount of repairing.

There's only two times I can think of where the quarterstaff is always worse.
1) Weapon Masters, who want the wider threat range or higher damage multiplier from other weapons
2) Can't pull out a shield for more AC
The AC is the strongest advantage other combinations have over the Quarterstaff, but is easily mitigated with the monk dip that most quarterstaff users take.
There are still trade offs, such as the monks needing wisdom to actually gain the AC they would have had from a shield and that this comes out of other stats which is true, but the trade off is well worth the massive damage increase in most cases. (more attacks + more AB = a lot more hits)


I'm not really sure how things could be rebalanced to bring everything on equal grounds, which is why I post it here instead of the suggestion thread(comments/ideas wanted!). I've had a few ideas, but most of them have implications that spread far beyond just dual wield.
(*) Nerfing Monk's wisdom AC(max of Monk Level/2?)
(*) Make the UBAB with staves only apply for characters with a majority monk levels
(*) Giving an advantage to using two weapons
(*) Reducing material cost for single weapons and/or increasing material cost for 2 sided weapons
(*) Making Two-Bladed swords Finessable
(*) Buffing Dire Mace
(*) Buff Light Hammer (Make it at least as good as a mace)


Lastly, we have the dire mace which was intended to be NWN's two sided bludgeoning weapon.
Compared to the quarterstaff, the dire mace has slightly higher base damage(easily offset by having a higher offhand damage die), isn't finessable, has the same threat range, doesn't gain monk's UBAB and requires Exotic weapons.
This makes it a worse weapon, that costs an additional feat.

Dire Mace:
1d8/1d8 20/x2
Exotic
No AB penalty (-2 is offset by +2)

---

Dual Rapier:
1d6 18-20/x2
Finessable
-4 AB
Piercing
Martial Weapon

Dual Shortsword:
1d6
19-20/x2
Finessable
Piercing
Martial Weapon
-2 AB

Dual Katana:
1d10 19-20/x2
Finessable
Exotic Weapon
-2 AB
Slashing

Dual Kama:
Exotic(free if monk)
UBAB
-2 AB
Flurry of Blows
1d6 20/x2
Slashing

Dual Kukri:
1d6 18-20x2
Exotic
-2 AB
Slashing

[WanderingPoet]

Keep in mind that the best quarterstaff (at least used to be, could have changed) 1d6 + 1d6 bludgeoning damage with +2 AB, not nearly as good as the masterly Damask 6 damage/3ab. The offhand is also unarmed damage which is 1d2 without monk levels. If the best staff is still +2 AB then dual wielding dale swords(or svif hammer, orc two-sided weapons) would have the same AB as a quarterstaff with higher overall and ability to use a shield.

I know you said most of the quarterstaff users take monk levels, but that still means they're limited in build - a monk/weapon master would need fighter levels to get all the dual wield and weapon master feats, for example - which means no rogue levels. Most likely this means no weapon master, as they'd likely want rogue for sneak attacks to get more damage, which drops their BAB and thus AB anyhow.

I do like the idea of the UBAB with staves only applying with majority of monk levels though - as it means that they're sacrificing AB to get easy to use staves. Alternatively drop the AB penalty to the exotic weapons.

What about giving non-finessable two-sided weapons more strength damage? That is, the main hand/offhand currently are 1 x str/0.5 x str. What about making it 1.5 x str/1 x str? This would be .5 more strength than your typical dual wielding to make up for the additional feat and actually needing str, without being able to use shields.

[flower]

Isnt it possible to put +5 enchant onto staff?

That would add bonus able to penetrate DR spoells, add 5 dmg.

[BegoneThoth]

Yeah, adding +5 rapiers to the item pool would help dual wielders a lot.

[Baron Saturday]

Masterly Damask quarterstaves are a thing now. I also believe that offhand was fixed to do 1d6, not unarmed damage, but I could be mistaken.

I don't know, I feel like they're fairly balanced - their low base critical threat range and multiplier is a big point against them (a quarterstaff WM w/ keen only gets 16-20x3), as is not being able to swap to a shield easily. Monks also have to sacrifice Flurry of Blows, trading greater APR for higher AB.

[Sockss]

Yeah, adding +5 rapiers to the item pool would help dual wielders a lot.

lmao +1

But, in all seriousness Qstaff is not the best at dual wielding.

It's great if you're a dexer, without sneak attacks - or you rely on not flanking.

Otherwise:

Kama's are superior for flankers (With 10 APR you have 4 attacks in your first flurry which is very good).

If you're STR based, almost everything else is better.

The option of swapping a 1h dual-wield out for a shield is very good as well.

Also, as a PSA, don't dual-wield medium weapons.

[Hunter548]

Pretty much the only area they're comparable is with monks, too. Dexers do more damage with handaxes or shortswords, let alone kukris. Hell, they're not even 100% better than kamas given you can't use flurry of blows with them.

[Twily]

I understand what people are saying, and that quarterstaves are best only with monks, but that's part of the issue.
A monk dip is all that's needed to get the full benefits of the QStaff, and considering it also gets 20% speed increase, WisModtoAC, ImpKD, +2SaveVMind, DiseaseImmunity, +2AllSave+1/2monklevel(if taken preepic) and +1AC with just those typical 6 monk levels, almost every dex based dual wielder I've seen lately has monk.(spellswords, fighters, actual monks, rogues, etc)

Statistically speaking Quartstaff is quite a bit ahead of all other choices(if you have monk). I've got a program that does the math for me and plots averages as well as spreadsheets/charts and I'll gladly run some builds through it and post the results if anyone wants me to.


(as far as the kama V Qstaff comparison goes, Quartstaves do an average of around 10% more damage when against foes of 42 AC, going up to nearly 30% more, before dipping back down to around 10% at 58 AC, if the attacker has 42 AB with the QStaff or 38 AB with Kama in Flurry. Kama only takes the win when against foes of AC high enough to require 20s, and when AC is <37, at the listed AB. This is assuming QStaffs offhand is d6, and the same build for both. Keep in mind Kama also suffers from the double coin cost as well. Even against foes of <15 AC, the kama is only doing around 12% more damage
(PS: This also doesn't factor in DamageImmunities, of which is very frequent for Pierce/Slash when compared to Bludgeoning)

[Sockss]

https://tinyurl.com/ybzqkba7

So, Kama's better sans sneak attack (The gap will increase with sneak / damage increases). (Note: Used haste and -2 AB in this calculator on Kama, to show flurry of blows. +2 on quarterstaff to reflect Arelith changes. 16 BAB to avoid some of the calc bugs with APR)

Additionally:

Higher attacks in the first initial flurry aren't plotted with these things, higher attacks benefits stealth-attacking heavily (Target loses a chunk of AC, additionally you gotcha sneaks, on the first flurry out of stealth).
Swapping in a shield and not suffering an AB reduction is great.
A strength build would opt for the increased range and multiplier.
Dex PvP builds may additionally opt for the increased range and multiplier. (Lower av. damage but more consistant / higher spike damage)

[Twily]

That chart isn't right.

Give me a few moments and I'll make one.

[Astral]

Yeah, adding +5 rapiers to the item pool would help dual wielders a lot.

Problem is this will effect all rapier users, including 20/7/3 cookies who are already super tier.

A monk dip is all that's needed to get the full benefits of the QStaff, and considering it also gets 20% speed increase, WisModtoAC, ImpKD, +2SaveVMind, DiseaseImmunity, +2AllSave+1/2monklevel(if taken preepic) and +1AC with just those typical 6 monk levels, almost every dex based dual wielder I've seen lately has monk.(spellswords, fighters, actual monks, rogues, etc)

But it's a class investment, cant wear armor/shield at all and has to be lawful. Its a not exactly free.

[Sockss]

Yeah, adding +5 rapiers to the item pool would help dual wielders a lot.

Problem is this will effect all rapier users, including 20/7/3 cookies who are already super tier.

Pretty confident he was trolling!

[Astral]

Yeah, adding +5 rapiers to the item pool would help dual wielders a lot.

Problem is this will effect all rapier users, including 20/7/3 cookies who are already super tier.

Pretty confident he was trolling!

My bad then. My trolling radar hasn't been used for a long time.

[Twily]

Pay the most attention to the relation between the lines verticaly.
IE, on the far left the lower line about 7.5 squares up from the bottom, where as the top line is roughly 9 squares up, meaning 7.5(over)9, or 8.3(over)10, which means 1.7(over)10 or 17% more damage to kamas)
Where as at the 45 mark, one line is at approximately 1 and the other is at 1.3, 1(over)1.3= .8(over)1.04 = .24(0ver)1.04, or roughly 20% more to staves

Kama:
25/22/19/16/13/10/25(mainhand)+25/22(offhand)
Quarterstaff:
29/26/23/20/17/14(mainhand)+29/26(offhand)

Damage for both:
1d6(weapon)+2(str)+6(mdamask)+4(ess)+1d6(tempess)
And changing it to +1 str for the offhand.

The lines follow the same curve regardless of AB- if you add 10 to AB, add 10 to the AC at the bottom, and you have the same result.
The app I use doesn't go above 50 AC, so I kept the AB lower so the full curve can be seen

The website you used originally does work in many cases, but I swapped over to this app after having issues regarding monks with it. (if you look at the ? for UBAB it doesn't even have that right sadly). The app has me just punching in the raw numbers and then just plots averages, rather than calculating the numbers like AB/Damage for me(simplicity can be nice sometimes XD).
Even this app isn't perfect though, it doesn't properly calculate threat rolls, and results in displaying higher damage than it actually is. When dealing with weapons that have the same threat range/multiplier, it's not an issue though(because it increases both by the same inaccurate amount).

[BegoneThoth]

Yeah, adding +5 rapiers to the item pool would help dual wielders a lot.

Pretty confident he was trolling!

My bad then. My trolling radar hasn't been used for a long time.

I'm not trolling, adding +5 rapiers will help dual welders a lot. It will also help other builds.

[Sockss]

It is a bit of an issue! Considering the APR difference (However you'd just see a wider differential at each point)

Willing to concede that the online calc I used is wrong, or I was using it incorrectly. (The average damage of the app is incorrect as well. You're at 160.55 average dpr with Kama's pre-crit factoring. Which would bring it above 160!)

But, again, the calculators ignore first-flurry bonuses / sneak factoring.

(A +2 AB and removal of Tumble/Dodge & dex (maybe) on an extra attack (4 as oppose to 3), including any sneak bonuses, is pretty big)

Qstaves are the best choice for a dex monk, non-stealth fighting something. Outside of that niche, not so much.

So, in reference to the initial point, they're not the best in nearly every way!

[Hunter548]

I think it's worth noting you can also force flatfooted starus pretty easily with darkness wands, which is another point in kamas' favor.

Also worth noting that not every dual weilder has or even can fit monk levels. Rangers are vastly better when strength based, at which point a qstaff is awful for them. Assuming the rest of the dual weilders are then rogue based, they probably want fighter and a third class. That third class could be monk, sure, or it could be shadow dancer, assassin, Champion of Torm, etc etc. Not everyone has monk, and the quarterstaff is worthless to you if you don't.

[Twily]

These charts are the chance to land hits as well as average damage in the first flurry for both weapons
This is giving kamas a 25/22/19/16 and staves 29/26/23

Even if you catch the enemy flat footed and attack in single first flurries, you on average still will do more damage in those AC ranges with the staff, by a significant amount(even double in some cases).
The reason the lines are closer on the last one is due to the Flurry of blows attack that occurs at the end of rounds, which is what helps catch it back up to the staff.

I also remembered to set the crit multiplier to 1 this time*, so that should remove the very minor inaccuracy in the last one.
*Seeing as the two weapons have the same crit range and crit multiplier, and the app doesn't properly handle crits

[Twily]

Even without monk levels on a dex based character, the QStaff still can hold up just as well as other combos.

It's average damage is lower than choices like kukris, but the crit damage Kukris get is a very limited bonus for dex characters as often times kukri users are getting their damage from SA or DA, which aren't multiplied by crits.
Even short swords will do more damage on paper, but once put into Arelith they'll quickly fall short in later levels.

I had two dex characters that I got to L30, both with the same exact build. I had made charts to confirm their damages were similar on paper, with the rapier being a bit ahead as expected.
One used a blunt weapon, the other used a piercing weapon.
By L30, the blunt weapon character was doing around 50-75% more damage per hit on average.

This is because the critical hits bonus was limited, especially after accounting for threat rolls, and the fact many higher level mobs have very noteworthy piercing or slashing immunities(not to mention crit immunity), something that I believe was done to help counter the superiority that weapons like Scimitar and Rapier have over blunt weapons.

After accounting for all of this, as well as the fact the staff gets +2 AB, means it actually holds up just as well as other weapons for dex dual wielders even without monk levels (in PvE at least)


This is why I suggest some rebalancing.
The staff is not far below other options when you lack monk levels(the gap is smaller than something like Club and longsword, due to the fact staves are the only finessable double-sided weapon, which get +2AB).

Getting monk levels however, drastically raises the power of the otherwise fairly balanced weapon.
Meanwhile due to how restrictive weapon finesse can be, there's only a handful of other choices*.

Other weapons like mace and light hammer are made almost entirely obsolete by the staff(which gets higher AB, and requires only a single weapon instead of two) regardless of whether or not you have monk levels.
Sure, you can use a shield with the mace or light hammer, and this is valid if you don't take monk, but monk can gain that same amount of AC while also increasing damage signifiganty, so most would take it

And if someone cares about AB with their dual wielding more than things like crit or average damage, staff is really the only choice regardless of whether or not they have monk levels. It's the only dual wield finessable weapon that gets the +2 AB for being large.


(although, the piercing/slashing weapons are still better in PvP where things like crit and damage immunties are rarer, I won't deny that)

*
Shortsword is outdone by kukris, a good choice for someone who has no spare feat
Kukris can be very good if it's a weapon master build, costs a feat.
Handaxe can be very good if it's a weapon master build.
Kama is outdone by staff in many situations, and requires monk to be better than Shortsword.
Katana costs a feat, only a little better than shortswords.

[Sockss]

"Even if you catch the enemy flat footed and attack in single first flurries, you on average still will do more damage in those AC ranges with the staff, by a significant amount(even double in some cases)."

This is true, but the effective AC range in which the staff outshines the dual-kama's is shifting forward dramatically, into a high AC range - which for the majority of characters is unachievable.

Consider that a standard AB of a monk dexer at full APR will be approximately 42 (16 (Preepic BAB), 5 (Epic AB), 14 (Dex Mod), 1/2/1 (Feats wf/ewf/ep), +3 weapon.) (44 for Qstaff, 40 for Flurrying kama monk).

Now consider the potential effective AC bonuses from flatfooting a high AC target. (2, +Tumble (6), +4 (at least, Dodge), +~2 (Dex). So ~ 14.

You're looking at a the quarterstaff being more effective from (Without actually calculating it, so this is guess work), around 59ish to 76ish AC.

This is further pushed forward with any further AB increase, whether you want to max it out with a TS pot, or you have big self buffs (as is the case with cleric/monks).

This holds true to the whole combat round too, in that Kama is superior if you have significantly more or less ab than your opponents AC. Qstaff has the middle-ground, sure, but the middle ground is entirely variable.

Regarding dexer damage with criticals. Critical is still very important for a dexer, you're not too dissimilar in damage output to a strength based character (providing you haven't completely crushed your initial strength into the ground and you gear/buff optimally). Of course, the less critically multiplied damage you have (Low str score / no EWS etc.) the less you'll see a difference.

Having very little base damage will make the +2 AB of the qstaff better; but with more base damage, you'll see it worse off!

[Seven Sons of Sin]

I think the conceptual problem is that rangers are often earmarked (on paper) to be the best dual wielders among all classes. However, in reality, monks can gain the highest APR while dual wielding, arguably are better dual wielders, and don't necessarily (but often do) take ranger levels.

I know it would be difficult to balance, but I often wonder if we can make rangers better at dual-wielding.

Maybe if a character is dual wielding with ranger levels (and is not utilizing monk APR), they gain increased AB, or damage? Maybe ranger 9 allows you a +2 AB bonus while dual wielding (effectively nullifying the -2 penalty for wielding medium weapons)?

Overall,
1) rangers should be better at dual-wielding, preferably without having to rely on monk APR
2) dual wielding is very homogenous because you can't use medium weapons reliably. make dual wielding more diverse by allowing rangers to be better at dual wielding medium weapons than anyone else

Further, depending on the scale of benefits, I really would love to see the Ranger better boiled down into 2 subclasses -
1. "the Hunter", which is an archery-focused subclass, and collapses the Sniper/Archer paths into one class, and does not receive any of the dual wielding benefits.
2. "the Stalker", which is the two-weapon subclass, and gains all the current boons to dual wielding, in addition to more benefits

Both subclasses gain access to the general Ranger benefits like HiPS, etc.

[Hunter548]

Rangers are already very good at dual weilding. A lack of AB certainly isn't there problem - and taking ranger levels on a monk is silly in the extreme. Rangers have problems, sure, but a lack of AB isn't one of them. Even if you give them 2 ab, there's still no reason for them to dual weild rapiers or whatever, because you'd still have less ab than you would otherwise.

[flower]

i cannot see why rangers should be "best" or "better" at dual wielding.

They already get dual weapon feats for free. The only thing which limits them is it is tied tightly to the light armour.

But with new leather for rangers this ceases to be an issue.

[milosr]

You guys are doing it wrong.

Everyone knows the only correct way to dual wield is the following:
1)Make a STR based Svirf
2)Get two Svirf hammers
3)Laugh your Snuggybear off since you managed to pull off dual wielding without completely gimping yourself

P.S Despite the silliness, I really think that Svirf hammer builds can reach potentially ridiculous AB/DMG, while still maintaining decent a AC (with shield). I'm rocking a purist fighter dual wielding svirf, and I can tell you that I am pretty amused. The fact that you don't have to flank to deal damage while still having 7/8 attacks per round at 5+ enchant is amazing. Most mobs have x/5 dmg reductions...so its kinda like...trying to cut butter, with a sledgehammer...or something like that.

[Freyason]

Wouldn't using 2 light hammers with svirf give you -4 Ab to both? it's like 2 rapiers with human hehe