The Crossbow Expert Feat is a spell that allows a character to ignore the rule of using ranged spells when engaged in melee combat. This feat prevents a spellcaster from suffering disadvantage when making a ranged attack roll within 5 feet of an enemy, regardless of whether the attack is with a hand crossbow or other ranged weapons. The feat gives three benefits, one of which is specifically tied to crossbows and the last to only hand crossbows.
The old Crossbow Expert feat allowed for multiple attacks in a turn and safe use within 5 feet, ensuring continuous damage. However, it doesn’t interact well with spellcasting, as spells can take either an action or a bonus action. If a spell requires an action, it can’t use Crossbow Expert.
The second benefit of Crossbow Expert helps ranged spell attacks, as it allows a spellcaster to fire the weapon on each of those attacks and then again as needed. However, it should specify a different weapon, not the same weapon twice.
There are several ways to get attacks with bonus actions, including Crossbow Expert. The rules state that attacks add your stat to damage, and when using the Attack action and attacking with a one-handed weapon, you can use a bonus action to attack with a hand crossbow you are holding.
In summary, the Crossbow Expert Feat is a common build for spellcasters, allowing them to avoid the disadvantage of using ranged spells when engaged in melee combat. However, it doesn’t interact well with spellcasting, and it’s important to note that spells, special abilities, and other effects can apply penalties or bonuses to your attack roll.
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Does sharpshooter effect spells?
The spell “Sharpshooter” is applicable only to spells that require an attack with a ranged weapon. It is most effectively utilized in scenarios where the player has the advantage or is able to ignore cover. In such cases, the advantage effectively negates the -5 penalty. The Sharpshooter ability may be applied to multiple attacks, as it is applied prior to initiating an attack.
Does Crossbow Expert affect bows?
A crossbow expert is able to trigger a bonus action extra attack when employing a one-handed weapon, whereas a longbow is a two-handed weapon. Those utilizing the Longbow may wish to consider the Piercer feat, a robust half feat that is compatible with Rapiers. Please be advised that JavaScript may be disabled or blocked by extensions, and that your browser does not support cookies.
Does Crossbow Expert add modifiers?
Affirmative. The ability modifier may be applied to the damage of the bonus-action attack granted by the Crossbow Expert feat in D&D 5E. Attacks executed with a bonus action, including those enabled by the Crossbow Expert feat, inflict damage equal to the character’s statistics.
Do spells count as ranged weapon attacks?
Ranged attacks are typically disadvantageous if a hostile creature within 5ft can see the attacker and is not incapacitated.
What is the weakness of a crossbow?
Crossbow hunting requires proficiency in shooting, distance-judging skills, and dedication. Crossbows are bulkier, heavier, and more difficult to transport than firearms or conventional bows, and hunting at a closer range requires more stealth and effort. Crossbows have special safety concerns, such as the risk of injury if fired accidentally. They also have a slower follow-up shot speed due to their design. Crossbow hunters must become adept at scouting, tracking, and recovering game, which requires patience and perseverance.
Despite these challenges, crossbow hunting can be a unique emotional experience due to the close proximity to the game. The responsibility to achieve a quick, clean, and humane kill is crucial, and crossbow hunters must master specific techniques and learn the anatomy and behavior of the game being hunted.
Does grapple prevent spells?
In the context of 5e, the state of being grappled results in the application of the grappled condition, which does not impede the casting of spells.
Does crossbow expert give proficiency?
It should be noted that the “Crossbow Expert” feat does not grant proficiency in the use of crossbows. The “Weapon Master” feat is the optimal choice for those seeking weapon proficiency without the need for multiclassing. It should be noted that the game contains content that may not be suitable for all age groups. This includes material that could be considered mature in nature, as well as instances of nudity or sexual content. To update content preferences on Steam, the following steps must be followed.
What is the crossbow expert advantage?
The Crossbow Expert feat is a powerful weapon that allows users to ignore the Loading property, enabling multi-attackers to attack multiple times with the crossbow. It also allows dual-wielding a crossbow and another weapon, making minor attacks more deadly. This feat can be beneficial for anyone, but it doesn’t uniquely benefit spellcasters. For instance, spellcasters who can only cast one spell per action on their turn can’t use the hand crossbow as a bonus action if it’s in their offhand. However, if they have many bonus action spells, such as a Spiritual Weapon or Misty Step, this feat would still be helpful.
The prerequisites for the Crossbow Expert feat in D and D 5e are not explicitly written, but it requires the user to use a crossbow, have a crossbow and ammunition, and be intelligent enough to use one. However, the feat is advantageous and quite deadly in the right hands.
In summary, the Crossbow Expert feat offers numerous benefits, including allowing multi-attackers to attack multiple times, dual-wielding a crossbow and another weapon, and allowing users to use a crossbow and ammunition. However, it doesn’t have many drawbacks and is generally beneficial in the right hands.
Does Crossbow Expert work with spells?
The D and D rule, which states that a character using ranged attacks within five feet of an enemy will have a disadvantage, is often ignored or missed by players. However, the Crossbow Expert Feat allows a character to ignore this rule, allowing them to use ranged attacks, including other weapons and spells. This allows spellcasters to avoid using ranged spells in melee combat, even if they are not in melee range.
This is particularly useful for players using spells from the Dungeons and Dragons Evocation school of magic, as well as eldritch blast-using warlocks. This rule is particularly useful for spells from the Dungeons and Dragons Evocation school of magic.
Does proficiency apply to spells?
The proficiency bonus is applicable when a character is attempting something they are uniquely good at, such as attack rolls, ability checks, saving throws, or DCs for spells. For example, a character with an athletics proficiency will get a bonus when doing something that requires athletic skill. For example, a lean and agile ranger and a big, hulking barbarian might walk through a forest, but decide to jump across a large pit instead of walking around it. This allows the character to perform unique tasks and gain a proficiency bonus.
Does crossbow expert require two crossbows?
The one-handed crossbow is sufficient for the task at hand; there is no need for dual wielding or other equipment. The implement is adaptable and can be utilised in a variety of ways, thus rendering it a versatile and efficient weapon.
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This is honestly the main reason why I despise that Dexterity completely overtakes the meta in this game, making any build that doesn’t have good Dexterity obsolete by default. The only exception to this is Fighters, Paladins and maybe Barbarians if they go for heavy armor and medium armor for the Barbarian respectively. You’re in melee so you need the higher AC, otherwise you’re gonna get your ass kicked by anyone and everyone that has melee attacks, ranged attacks and spell, while ranged characters can comfortably sit in the back without caring about what’s going on over 100 feet away. Retaliation with ranged attacks? Just go behind cover and then proceed to ignore cover with crossbow expert because screw the DM for wanting to have any sort of positioning matter at all. Dynamic battle maps may as well just be a flat chess board when crossbow expert comes into play. It doesn’t help that any Strength fighters are effectively crammed to being MAD if they don’t wear heavy armor, because you can’t have a negative Dexterity or you’ll be a punching bag. Melee characters already need good Strength, Dexterity and Constitution, while Dexterity fighters only need Dexterity and Constitution to be good in combat, and they can afford to wear light or medium armor, which is much less expensive than plate armor. This game punishes you for ever wanting to go into melee without some busted gimmick (like Sentinel Polearm master) because of how prevalent they made ranged attacks and AoEs. In previous editions, you still needed Strength to deal extra damage with ranged and finesse weapons, giving people a reason to care about Strength, but not anymore.
I feel like this is less comparing the power of a Magic Greatsword VS Hand-crossbow and more comparing the power of Melee vs Ranged in general. Ranged more or less wins everytime based on the Archery fighting style giving it an extra 10% hit chance compared to any melee build. That combined with bounded accuracy means it’s always gonna win in the longrun. Melee has GWM, ranged has Sharpshooter, Melee has Polearm-master, ranged has Crossbow-Expert, Melee has X, ranged has Z The major disparity is the fighting style
unfortunately 5e martials have to be fixed with magic items, and melee martials even more so. so i usually try to give players hybridized magic weapons, such as a +2 flametongue or slottable gems/runes that bestow properties like Vicious and give out lots of loot early. such as a goblin chieftain with a +2 club at very low levels. the fact that flametongue barely matches a generic handxbow and is melee is distressing but with enough buffs i can attempt to wrestle WotC’s silly design choices into something resembling balance.
Wow that damage sure solves doesn’t it? In fact, why would I ever play barbarian as an option at all if damage solves? But honestly, its a flaming sword. Its cool and speaking as someone who did play ranger for a whole campaign, ranged combat is just a tad boring by comparison to melee. And I don’t even like taking Great Weapon Master on Barb because I feel pigeonholed into it with its normal lack of damage upgrades. Trying a Gift of the Gem Dragon Barb one of these days. Hopefully it turns out good. XD
This article basically boils down to “Archery fighting style is really good.” Ranged and melee all have ways to add extra damage to their attacks or grant advantage on their attacks, but only one of them gets an extra baseline 10% hit chance. It’s not the flashiest feature, but it matters a lot more in the long run.
I think this is the first theory article of yours I can’t get behind. Yes, the flame tongue itself is kinda a trap item, but if you’re comparing archery and melee, it seems dishonest to discount other melee builds that use GWM and polearm master, hell, even a two level dip in barbarian – or magic intimate for an owl familiar – to counteract some of GWM’s downsides. In short: I agree ranged combat typically hoses down melee, but comparing one of the worst options without its major draw feat to an incredible option will always skew results.
5:46 You didn’t account for extra Reaction attacks Sentinel could give you here. Of course, this would require you to not get targeted down, and/or that you have another ally in melee so you can reliably activate the reaction. Even if you assume that you get to use your Sentinel attack on like half of the turns it could be used on, it should still be a decent bump to your DPR rather than none at all.
I always find comparing melee and ranged builds to be a little disingenuous. I just feel like there are different things that each excel at, and that’s intrinsically tied to class & subclass, which you (correctly, in this case) left out of the article. Plenty of features require you to be within a certain range of your allies for them to proc, and different tactics are required for both weapon types. Sheer damage output is far from the be-all-end-all of d&d, which is a big part of what makes it so fun!
The use cases for Melee vs Ranged are sorta rare due to the Archery FS & it’s general safety/ease of use. However, they’re still fun to find & experiment with. Certain Subclasses like Artillerist & Horizon Walker have features that use their Bonus Action pretty much each turn, & adding the CBE Bonus Action attack would either tax them too heavily for force them to make a Subclass feature redundant. Some Racial abilities like the Centaur charge & Longtooth Shifter can also take up your Bonus Action, & encourage a Melee Oriented playstyle. Some of these might be lower damage than CBE/SS, but they free up room to be flexible with ASI’s & Feats, letting us get experimental or salvage a weak stat array. My favorite build like this was the Longtooth Shifter Beast Barbarian, who could attack 3 times a turn at lvl 3.
Flame Tongue is actually a big help when dealing with magical darkness since, at least darkness created by the Darkness spell, only magical light created by a 2nd level or lower spell gets distinguished in the darkness. Magic items aren’t based on spell levels for their effects so a Flame Tongue created an 80ft radius area of magical light that overlaps Darkness.
Gator’s bonus action is not in use at all, and the possibility for reaction attacks is not included in the calculation (correct me if I missed it). There is also a tradeoff for a monster not triggering Gator’s reaction attack, which is usually voluntarily restricting their own movement and thereby their ability to attack other player characters. Every hit Gator takes by standing near the monsters is one less con save for the caster concentrating on the big important spell. Who would have thought that apples would not neatly compare with oranges.
Nice thing about the Flametongue Greatsword is that it is excellent for barbarians. Reckless attack nets almost twice the normal number of crits, and your damage numbers are great so you’ll get lots of kills. This means that Great Weapon Master will often get you that bonus action attack you’ve been searching for. Melee fighter to ranged fighter isn’t exactly a great comparison, since fighter isn’t usually the optimal class for melee. Melee barbarian vs ranged fighter is a more realistic comparison for somewhat optimized damage.
why the slasher feat and +2 strength tho? why not something such as Great weapon master or sentinel? I mean yes it would work better with a reach weapon but the – movement of the slasher feat is compareble to the sentinels ability to stop an oponent. Furthermore the -5 for+10 of the great weapon master feat would improve the damage, and they would profit more from the subclassfeature that gives advantage. I didnt do any calculations myself but i feel like this way the flame tounge build would be more viable in later levels 🙂
Magic melee weapons are the main reason I love Fizban’s treasury of dragons. Flame Tongue? Frostbrand? Vorpal Blade? Vicious weapons? Get that weak shit out of here! How is a weapon that deals 1d6 extra cold damage VERY RARE? Sure it gives resistance to fire but I am not attuning to a magic weapon for defense.
As much as a respect your content, its strange you only bring up BM when melee can also take advantage of Manuevers. Trip can grant advantage consistantly at lower levels, expecially with 18/19 str without slasher. With gwm you get two attacks, first attack trip, if success -5 gwm with adv to attack rolls. Your calculations are assumptions of bias’ which is fine, its just not practiced in strategy as many of your articles use to prove a point about spells like web, entanglement, or fog. Gonna say you need to really delve into BOTH options at their best strengths with their most optimal strategies. As you did with hand xbow. Please do a part 2
Shortbows and Longbows honestly should’ve had the Finesse trait, as damage could be determined by your total draw strength and/or how well you placed your shot. Crossbows are fine as is being Dex only, as it uses a set mechanical firing system and all the damage is based on how well you land your shot within a vulnerable area. Wizards has been avoiding it like the plague, but we really need an overhaul on the weapons and their traits. The writing in the PHB/MM/DMG are already showing their age.
The most powerful martial feats are just that powerful. SS, PAM, GWM, Crossbow Expert. If you play a fighter/barb/ranger without any, you are far behind in dmg. If you take a weapon, that gets bonuses from 2 of them (Hand Crossbow + Expert + SS) or (Glaive + GWM + PAM) you’ll hit stronger then anyone without those. I’m not a big fan of too powerful feats, which make lots of people do the same stuff using custom lineage.
I’m in a quandary, I’m a swarmkeeper ranger 5 /peace cleric 6 sharpshooter and crossbow. I have 18 Dex. I have a +1 hand crossbow, a two bird sling, and a dragon wings heavy crossbow which does an extra 1d6 of psychic damage. I also have a nature’s mantle that gives me a good bonus action hide if I can find a place that’s lightly obscured. Should 😅 A) hide,,use the dragon wings crossbow twice (once at advantage?) B) hide, use the two bird sling which gives me the potential of 4 attacks, one (or possibly two at advantage, depending on hitting and whether the first shot at advantage, the ricochet should also be at advantage) C) Use 3 shots of hand crossbow with no advantage (using my bonus action to take an attack instead of hide)
Really do feel this is kinda like I’m trying to think of the fallacy, none sequitur dk been a while, but the crux of the argument is really based on what is more efficient and the that will always be ranged combat why because we in modern times have figured killing people from a long distance is more healthy to myself vs stabbing range. Even range combat didn’t do more damage it would be the safer option especially when in DND most monsters are melee tanks. But this is where I kinda don’t get why these arguments even are a thing. Why the hell should it matter. Melee combat is objectively cooler in asthetic, there is a reason why when you think Mecha as a concept it doesn’t take long for laser blades to be involved why cuss it’s cool. This is a game if your having fun and feel cool than why does the constant comparison of ranged combat vs melee combat need to be talked about. The only thing it really does is make potential newcomers feel worse about choosing the cool options I have had that with my recent new comers that all come with this anxiety about not being able to contribute because they rather go with something cool than effective and it’s just sad that somehow ranged combat for me was so cool when I first got into DND and now I honestly kinda hate it to the core principal.
I don’t think the damage output of ranged martials needs to be rebalanced. I think people forget that the designers actually built in a limit to archery, etc. In the form of ammo. I haven’t heard from any DM who’s really strict on arrows, slingstones, etc. And that’s supposed to be the limit on that system. Melee does less damage, but a sword never runs out of ammo. Ranged does more damage, but you (in theory) have a finite number of those arrows. I honestly think that if more people actually enforced ammo mechanics as written, we wouldn’t hear about this as much. I don’t think it’s fair to eliminate one intrinsic weapon mechanic that would limit these things just fine and then blame WOTC for imbalance. Just my two cents.
If we’re not using GWM anyway wouldn’t he do better with a longsword & dueling fighting style? Heck if feats that provide a bonus action attack are what we’re comparing here then how about Polearm Master? That way Gator could go all spartan with a spear and a shield, pick dueling for a +2 damage with no accuracy penalty and weaponize his bonus action every turn same as Crossbow Expert does (and we give him a magic spear same as your +2 magic crossbow.)
Slasher is a terrible feat, even as a half-feat. You’d likely be better off taking heavy armor master and it would prevent more damage to you than the effect from slasher, while still being a half-feat. It may even be worth forgoing a half feat to take Sentinel for the potential of provoking more opportunity attacks. It’s like Wizards is afraid to give martials any good feats other than GWM and Polearm Master. Perhaps if they’d have gone through with publishing a feat like Blade Master then things would be different.
this is why I kinda hate the hand crossbow. personally I think in a high fantasy game all weapons should be equally effective cause its all about the visuals and feel for weapon selection and effectiveness should be dependant on the player and class not the weapon. allow great weapon master to be melee weapon master, and remove the bonus action attack on crossbow expert.
Pack Tactics, I have a few questions. If you state that damage itself changes based on your ability to hit then why do you say that the Hand Crossbow Build benefits more from Maneuvers? Assuming that we use the same White Room calculations you provided wouldn’t picking up GWM at level 6 outmatch the Hand Crossbow in pure damage? If you stated that the Hand Crossbow benefits more from a subclass like Battle Master because it has a lower chance to hit, then wouldn’t it be different because now the Flame Tongue has a lower chance to hit?
So rules as written you can’t actually dual wield hand crossbows, they’re kind of bad in that regard like slings. While you can ignore the loading property with crossbow expert, they also have the ammunition property. The loading property means you cannot use extra attack with crossbows without training, with crossbow expert you can use your extra attack feature and make two attacks. The ammunition property says you need a free hand to handle ammunition, so it must by context be empty. You’ve given yourself 50% extra attacks by using two weapon fighting that you by standard ruling wouldn’t be able to make. 96 ranged attacks vs 64 melee attacks. By all means don’t let this get in the way, have fun, play your game and make it worth your time, I played a dart sharpshooter dwarf barbarian ancestral guardian. The darts were not the sole focus but we got into a fight one session that I couldn’t really do anything so I took the feat and later on it became a moment for party enjoyment. Point is anything can be fun with the right group of people, it doesn’t need to be meta or OP.
This is a perfect example of why I tend to purposely compare Melee to Melee and Ranged to Ranged. The fact that ranged attackers can potentially straight-up out-damage their melee counterparts is a part of the system that I think is just plain retarded. So with Optimization In General I tend to focus on comparing like to like. Like alright I’ll admit that PAM Vs Longsword builds both using a shield, PAM wins by a fair margin in most cases, and the closest alternative takes 2 feats instead of just 1 (Which is a Tavern Brawler Dual Wielding build I’ve thought up in the past, though it’s arguable that by RAW this doesn’t even work.) Or to point out that PAM + GWM is basically THE melee build for damage-op (Though some optimizer pals of mine have noted that most of the time the opportunity cost of taking both of them can end up not being worth the trouble compared to just doing 1 or the other) But if you try to come in here when I’m building a strength based melee fighter and tell me that I should play a ranged boy with a hand crossbow instead because it has better DPR, I will smack you.
Ehhhhhhhh. While hand crossbow expert is great, you only end up with 60 foot range, (EDIT:120 range, I was wrong. So generally far enough) meaning that the advantages of being at range are smaller than they would be with say a longbow. Moreover at lower levels you’re going to be locked into light armor and dexterity, which gives you only 15 AC at 5th level here while the Great Weapon guy could have 18 or 19 with defense style. You talk about lower-to-hit making you benefit more from to-hit bonuses, but the same could apply to a GWM build (which will often be getting a BA attack from the cleave effect) Of course on the other side winning intitiative is basically the same as getting an extra turn, so meh. Something I’d really like to see you talk about is how DM encounter design impacts balance. Cramped hallways benefit ranged characters because of fish in the barrel techniques, but limited visibility (because of say steam vents or hanging vines benefit melee a lot. I know you’re a player focused website but its useful to consider how your DMs style might be impacting what you perceive as strong.
Yeah a problem with how 5e is designed is that melee has way too many downsides with not nearly enough upsides. The only melee that I imagine actually keeps up with ranged are rogues,(though without action surge and all those extra attacks I don’t even know that for sure) But more importantly, they did strength pretty dirty by removing the 1.5x modifier for two handed weapons, all while dexterity still has so many other uses like for AC and initiative and skills and such. Hell I wonder if it would even be that broken to give strength characters 2x str mod on two handed weapons. Strength should make you feel powerful after all. And of course this all still pales in comparison to magic of any kind, which I believe boils down to the fact that it’s a system designed around a very specific limited number of resources, that is entirely thrown out of balance if you literally have any more or fewer combats per day than recommended. And outside of dungeons most games only run one maybe two encounters a day
There is a very big flaw in this article. You are comparing them using the same scenario. If all battles were the same then yes, you do have a point, and the hand crossbow is overall better. However that isn’t the case. Battles vary, and a close range attacker has a different function to a long range attacker. If the same fighter used a long ranged attack, they need to make sure someone is distracting the enemies, otherwise you will have disadvantage on all attacks cause you have at least 1 enemy next to you. The weapons have different purposes. The purpose of a close range attacker is to distract the enemy from going to the long range attackers. Their goal is to deal just enough damage that the enemy HAS to take you out first. The sword helps with that over a crossbow.
Yes crossbows are awesome and do better dmg and have a range advantage, but it’s not on fire. My inner 12 year old tells me to pick the literal ON FIRE greatsword because I thought Thoros of Myr was awesome. I’d use crossbows a lot more if I could think of a cool concept for it… Other than something like Valla from Diablo.
One of my players built an elf fighter (samurai) with archery as his fighting style. He took the feats sharpshooter and elven accuracy. So if he gives himself advantage with his samurai subclass, he can roll triple advantage, and if he uses sharpshooter his attack bonus becomes +6 and his damage becomes 1d8+18. He can also shoot from 300 feet away and ignores half cover. I have no idea how to stop him.
Let’s not forget the prevelance of fire resistance or immunity compared to magical physical immunity. Your crossbow with magical ammunition is much more likely to maintain it’s damage against a wider variety of enemies. Mounted, it becomes hilariously one-sided given mongol strats. Meaning you have increased safety compared to the flametongue on top of the safety you already had just from being ranged. The main balancing point for ranged vs melee was meant to be that ranged has to track ammunition. Which is understandably homebrewed away at most tables because it’s, frankly, tedious. On a related topic, the original balancing point for magic versus martials was two fold; early on they were squishy, and could very easilly die in one or two hits since back then you died at 0 hp. Secondly, casters actually CONSUMED their material components, and would regularly have to replace them on top of having to fumble around into their bags to get out the right things between rounds. It was frankly very slow to actually do magic mid-combat unless you were exceedingly organized and had a great many pouches where you only kept specific items. Not to mention, some items would be entire adventures to acquire in and of themselves.
recently did a level 15 one shot, free choice of magic items up to very rare rarity. going bm fighter 11/bear totem barb 4 with a belt of giant strength and a flame tongue greatsword resulted in extremely high damage output and tankiness. reckless attack for advantage with gwm and gwf, +2 damage from rage at 3 attacks a round with a +12 (+7) to hit resulting in a minimum of 31/max of 43 damage per hit up to three times a round plus action surge was incredibly strong even though the enemies were iron golems who healed themselves on the fire so i had to turn the fire sword off lol. anyone got some opinions on things to achieve even higher dpr with some tweaks?
I player a fighter/sorcerer onfebthat used a flametongue. Using metamagic and blade cantrips I could get limited use very high damage. My biggest early game burst (level 5) was twinned spell booming blade with another quickened spell booming blade. Since I was a battlemaster I also added on maneuvers. He was a beast, but relied a bit on party play at times.
I think you really don’t stress the advantage of ranged combat enough in this article. Kiting enemies or simply ensuring to not waste actions on dashing is very valuable. Half the characters I’ve played were Barbarians. Screw magic, who cares. But not having range, that is the thing that negatively influences realistic combat scenarios.
That flametongue will be hitting critters with normal weapon immunity. It will also light the room. I hear you on the pure statistical factors ( knowing full well that is your jam) but I also think that especially in the hands of the tank this weapon is better than a missile weapon. The damage might also be catastrophic if you pick a subclass that widens the critical damage window. You are talking 4d6 for the sword and unless I’m wrong 4d6 for the fire.
I am always disappointed when people see this math and say things like, “those feats are too powerful” Played in too many games where dms nerfed or banned these feats. The real answer is to give cooler more unique and powerful magic items. Martials don’t want to get pigeon holed into using one thing their whole adventuring career, but they have stiff competition with spell casters who they need to protect and enemies whose health skyrockets every cr. Give our boys cool swords and bows and let em know you’re going to keep coming up with more cool stuff for them to find. Good vid, gotta watch out for those lawn mowers
Ah yes, the good old let‘s drop that whole ‚ammunition‘ talk out of the game. Since there is no reason to either a) not just limiting ammo by saying „I am sorry young ranger, but my store only holds these 50 bolts at this time. I need time to make more, and frankly you‘d have to pay at least half up front for a custom order.” or b) if the players stay at a single place to farm ammo, worsening the plot as they waste time, I‘d agree that ranged is better, until you run out of bolts for your now very bad club.
Flametongue fits better on something that likes to hit hard in fewer attacks, compared with ranged. For instance, a Paladin with a Flamebrand can use it to do consistant damage with a one handed weapon, without losing out on the benefits of a shield. My pally just got insanely lucky and ended up with Prayer Beads, which lets him cast Bless as a bonus action, so his accuracy by itself is better then Archery fighting style. Not sure how this would factor in but there’s numerous other ways to cheat out Bless as a bonus action without a magic item.
Advantage of range fighters is we dont havevto chase creatures around rhe battlefield, let alone flying creatures. I’ve played a dwatf gighter with all the mobility feats and still felt i spent every other roound chasing while my archers or crossbow charactersccoukd enfage every round. But obe charachter im thinking had both a heavy crossbow and a gand one
This article makes 0 sense to me. Why would the fighter not have taken great weapon master if the level you are comparing them at is level 5? Archery gives an extra +2 to hit but the melee has 20 str so the to hit is the exact same. If its worth it to use sharpshooter for the extra damage on the ranged why isn’t it on the melee? You also only get the hand crossbow’s extra damage on one attack if you’re not using action surge because you only get 1 bonus action a turn, and you have to roll to hit with the hand crossbow while the flametongue’s damage just happens. without using action surge the extra damage from the hand crossbow is only 1d6 while the flametongue’s is 4d6, and with using action surge it’s 2d6 to 8d6 AND YOU HAVE TO HIT BOTH THE HAND CROSSBOW’S ATTACKS. I don’t know if I’m just missing something here but in this white room comparison I don’t understand why the melee built the way he did and why he doesn’t pull ahead more. Also, why not compare the 2 at level 11 where you get another extra attack so the melee’s flametongue will be putting in even more work?
Why not both ? Gave one of my players a homebrewed crossbow which deals +1d6 ice damage extra damage per hit. Vhuman + free feat and he is currently a level 8 bladesinger + lvl 1 Hexlock that attacks 4 times a turn (2 EB and 2 shots of his weapon per turn). Throw the Artificer with Sharpshotter, the Bloodhunter with a lighting based weapon and the second Bladesinger with a Double-edged Scimitar Flametongue and literally nothing survives much more than 2 rounds (they can literally one shot horders of CR 1-3 creatures per round). Fun Stuff.
There are other things to consider with this that vary heavily in the adventures and/or campaign. The first is ammunition, the Hand Crossbow has the potential issue there depending upon how often you can restock and what you pick with things (If you use a bow or crossbow, you really do want proficiency with the tools for your weapons ammo or the weapon…Xanathars lets you, at least, restock some ammunition there). The second is utility, the flametongue’s advantage is a LOT higher depending upon the setting. In something like the Arctic, having that sword is a ready source of heat…and for the few races without darkvision, it’s invaluable there for light that doesn’t take up a hand to do. The Hand Crossbows main advantage is concealability. Handcrossbows also hit the other issue where there isn’t much in the way of magical options there for cool toys that all ranged weapons seem to have…
I found at my table melee does better do to how I set up maps I make it so enemy’s can hide behind cover and I believe it makes it fair and I use the half cover for creatures of same size and 3/4 for one size bigger then full for 2 sizes larger unless you use you hide behind the creature moving it up one stare respectively found it balances out the ranged and melee well
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So this brought up a legitimate RAI for me. Damage resistance and immunity for piercing can be usually be overcome with magic attacks. However its the ammunition that’s actually dealing the damage, and not the weapon itself. Now since forever I hand waived away that because the ammunition benefits from the weapon that it counts, but I just realized we also have magical ammunition. It hardly seems fair that ranged attacks can ‘double up’ on the bonuses from magical equipment, especially when it doesn’t seem +1/2/3 ammo doesn’t require attunement. Just think of late game firing +3 to hit/dam ammo from a +3 to hit/dam weapon. Magical ammo even has the direct rule that after it has hit a target it is no longer magical. Is this just another badly defined rule to throw onto the pile, or is there some key component that I’m missing?
It seems to me the real moral of your article is that pidgeonholing a martial to one weapon type screws them over in a situation where they cannot contribute with that weapon regardless of DPR. I too will pack javelins on my melee martial and a dex weapon that doesn’t need ammo on my bow martial. Thanks kobold.
I would say that the best aspect to a flame tongue is that it is a magic weapon, meaning it can do damage throughout the game. If you get a cool hand crossbow and then it isn’t magical, it lowers potency of your attacks towards the end of the game. Just look at poor percy from CR being unable to harm the final boss
Correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m pretty sure adding Sentinel would greatly raise the DPR of the Flametongue Greatsword Fighter. Adding a Reaction attack into the mix is extremely potent, especially before the Fighter gets their third Extra Attack. Not arguing against the main point though. The ranged build in this article is not only nearly as potent as the melee build but also has the benefit that they are harder to hit and less likely to be attacked.
A barbarian using great weapon master & reckless attack, or a paladin using smites, or a monk with a flametongue monk weapon, or any character with flanking & GWM all completely invalidate this comparison. And anyway, the flametongue still did more damage lol, that’s only gonna increase as the fighter gets more attacks. This article is very flawed. Ranged is good sure, but it is heavily overstated here.
Alright, Hand Crossbow. Sure, why not !? Hahaha; It’s the best weapon ever made. Let’s have a whole group full of Hand Crossbow users! Every class represented, what diversity! While they are shooting a dozen piercing rounds every second instead of using any other class trait other than their armor proficiency. Why do anything else?! This group (who definitely aren’t gunslingers…) only needs to pay 10 gold or so for the hundreds of rounds of bolts fired every game. Glad the DM decided to give us all magical hand crossbows at level 6, even though it didn’t make any sense for us to only find that one type of weapon as treasure. ..oh well! You want to use a different weapon for some reason? Sure, RP characters are fine (…)
yes you may be able to get more ASI over time with the bow…but flame tounge has 20 Str by level 4…he can wear plate armor, he can wear any magic armor…and invest in more in other asi to truly take advantagr if battle master manuvers in a close range fight. And if he takes sentinel he deals 35DPR, while being tanky, and locking people down for more versatility in combat control. So…neither is bad, but…as an average melee range enjoyer…i will say…flame tounge us cool…but flame bonus damage is alright, but that sun sword…i mean…not lightsaber…now thats a weapon! Dex or Str modifier, radiant damage, might as well dip a level into roughe to get more manuver ability, and a little sneak damage boost if you can take advantage if it ..but bonus action manuver ability as a fighter is very nice, lets you disengage or dash with very little penalities and just he an absolute unit as a battle master. Plus its a sunseord who doesnt want a damn lightsaber.
Range attacks are many times better because we’ll they attack from range. But if you don’t always have chance and luxury of being at range and not in close combat. All those crossbow builds are good but much less good when someone starts hitting them in the close. From my experience every team need mix of ranged and melle combatants. DPR is not one and only stat that matters.
Also because I’m a pretentious bitch I’m going to suggest a way to rebalance ranged… mostly by taking away something from Sharpshooter (Though to be honest I think the real issue is Archery Fighting Style but you’ll see why I don’t touch that) Replace the Deadly Shot equivalent in sharpshooter with a sort of “Hindering Projectiles” feature… like once per round you can force an enemy you hit with a ranged attack to make a strength or dexterity (their choice) saving throw or have the arrow be stuck in them. giving them a -2 to attack rolls and concentration checks (or possibly a half-PB penalty) until the enemy takes an action to pull it out (or maybe just have it last 1 round for balance). And not touching Archery because it basically changes how it works entirely. Archers don’t get the massive bonus damage, but instead can make the entire party harder to hit.
I think it gets really unhealthy for the game how much ranged combat gets better than melee combat, and how much CBE and PAM make a single melee and single ranged weapon better than the rest of the weapons in nearly all situations. IMHO, the tiers of dpr ought to be topped by melee without reach or shield (so 2h or dual wield), then melee with shield or reach, then ranged weapons, then Warlocks, then the rest of the casters. Half casters a tier below martials with the same weapon, since they get spells.
The more I see articles about 5e martials, especially about melee, the more I notice 3 things: 1) Dex modifier in damage is a bit of an odd choice from 5e. It allows ranged weapons to have their cake (being a more safe option to shoot someone down) and eat it too (deal good amounts of damage). The game logic would dictate that melee would be more risky since you are more prone to be dealt damage, but you would deal a higher amount of damage to balance this risk. With how 5e does things, the only disadvantage you have by using a ranged attack is the lower damage die, which can be compensated by Sharpshooter. 2) Crossbow Expert’s third bullet point was a huge mistake to 5e’s balance. Now everything must be compared to a dinky little toy that with one feat can make an extra attack with full benefits by little cost. Sure, certain subclasses use bonus actions to increase their damage like Horizon Walker Ranger or Samurai Fighter, but most of times, if you have a trait that triggers on hit, you added another trigger of it by the price of one feat. And usually those options are better than what you can do with these bonus actions. 3) Unless your name is Paladin, you have very little reason to go melee as a martial. Casters can reach better AC (although by spell slot cost and only temporarily), ranged martials can deal more damage than you and the only thing you can do is use the optional attacks to trip and shove, and trip mostly benefits melee, making a bit of a selfish option. Paladins at least need to be at melee due to Smite only working on attacks with a melee weapon, but honestly any other class can work better as a ranged combatant.
Wow, this was all just a mess of misleading nonsense. Yes, a power-gamed crossbow user is going to beat out a non-power-gamed great sword wielder. But if you were to actually put as much effort into finding advantages for the Greatsword user as you put into finding advantages for the crossbow user, they would come out better. Let’s throw a few things out. Fighter can get infinite melee advantage by playing something like, say, Kobold for pack tactics. So long as they have a melee buddy, they’re constantly rolling bonus dice. Now their dice average with GWM come out much better and they’re getting the +10 damage on top of the 4d6*str of Flametongue Greatsword. Or, maybe they take battlemaster and use their ability to knock enemies prone for that juicy advantage. Or their DM is allowing flanking rules. Being in melee gives them more utility as well than a ranged fighter. First off, it gives them the ability to pin enemies, especially if they have sentinel, by threatening opportunity attacks. This means these enemies have a much harder time chasing down vulnerable casters. Alternatively, the fighter could be fucking casters up themselves by taking Mage Slayer, allowing them to potentially entirely neutralize enemy casters. High strength also means they’ll be able to grapple in the case the party wants to take something alive. Being up close also means they can use the terrain in creative ways a ranged fighter just can’t, like pushing enemies off cliffs or blocking choke points. They still don’t have as much utility as a pole arm master or a grapple-fighter unfortunately, but still way more than “I just shoot stuff.
This is only true if you play variant human and want to drop 2 feats on the same thing before level 5. Also, you can set off the rogues sneak attack, benefit from enemies being prone (trip attack manuver) get opportunity attacks (with sentinel that you brushed off, these are absolutely HUGE, you can lock down tough melee enemies and keep them from trampling your squishy friends), and cover is actually worse for sharpshooters than regular melee people because you can just use your movement to flank, bypassing the cover and giving them disadvantage to their ranged attacks. This works on enemies in full cover, unlike sharpshooter, and doesn’t cost a feat. Also saying it’s a great sword is kind of unfair because longswords are more common and actually better, because you get 1d8 +2 AC and damage vs roll 2d6. The damage matters less when you are adding 2d6 on top of everything. Also, your bonus action is always spoken for while gator can use other things, and has more potent action surges.
You make some good points but left out quite a bit. First not sure if the expected dmg includes crits, because all of that 2d6 dmg from the flame tongue gets doubled as well. Sharpshooter is a flat bonus so does not. As for the battle master being better for hand cross bow because it improves accuracy, It does and is good with Sharpshooter… but that would allow the Flame tongue wielder to use other maneuvers like Menacing or trip… not only dealing more dmg(an extra d8) but also adding conditions like prone, or frighten possibly providing advantage, increasing chance to hit and crit. If nothing else adding the dmg will increase the spread even more. As you can only use one maneuver per attack you can not Precision and use any other damage increasing maneuver. Looks like you were making an argument for the crossbow being a good choice and not exploring how powerful both are objectively.
One of the things that cracks me up about ranged builds is that folks always assume they’ll be guaranteed optimal conditions for their chosen weapon use. Throw rain, snow, strong wind, low visibility, darkness, and/or cover at them and the bows start to lose a little lustre. By no means should this be done every encounter, but maybe change it up a bit and have a storm in that homebrew world from time to time.
The problem with fighting at range is that you are not defending the casters most of the time (also the fact that most parties ignore the advantages of range and rush melee, leaving you in a weaker position, but that is not a build problem) Damage is good but a party needs survivability, or else the first enemy that can ignore the advantages of your range, for example a really fast or a ranged enemy, will attack the fragile casters as there is no hulking mountain of muscles in front of him. With fighters i prefer a lot more tankiness than damage, as a rogue or a ranger or the caster can do that. A flaming sword is mostly worst in damage than a crossbow but wielding range weapons is not the tank role, and for a tank a little bust in damage from something like a long sword flame tongue is really good. Crossbow are better for second line martials but every party should have a Frontline and for that Frontline a flame tongue is a useful items that lets them keep a mediocre DPS while still investing in tankiness (inspiring leader, tough ecc.) In essence I think flame tongues are useful and actually really good if you where gonna stay in melee anyway (and if ranged is the better option at the moment you can just use javelins, they’ll do a lot less than crossbows but the point of range is that you can attack the enemies and they don’t, so damage is relevant only if the enemies can eventually catch up, and why would they want to get in melee with the tank? Lol)
Yeah no u are quite bias this time pack tactics Precicion attack makes u a better hitter yeah but the other maneuvers give the melee fighter a severe damage buff. In combination with trip attack and the heavy weapon master feat you get a steady income of advantages with then superior damage. Also u would need two magic hand crossbows AND you limited yourself on that playing stile and no longer have bonus actions. Also fighter classes like the cavalier and the rune knight get more out of the flame tongue Also level 11 is again in favor of the flame tongue especially if u have great weapon master and have any combination in the party that gives u advantage or trip attack landed. Pack tactics i dig ur content but i must disagree this time
4:43 If they wanted loading property to be one attack per turn, they’d have said that. Just write “Once per turn”. That’s less words. Also guys, when talking about equipping hand crossbow B, remember, you have object interaction. I mentioned that in the article 3:25. The reason why I didn’t go into too much detail about it is because you know how it works. It’s like the old rule.
The problem I have with the Loading property is that it uses the word action in the list. Combined with the last part saying, “regardless of the number of attacks you can normally make”, makes me wonder if it should say “You can fire only one piece of ammunition from a Loading weapon when you use an ATTACK ACTION, a Bonus Action, or a Reaction to fire it, regardless of the number of attacks you can normally make.” This change might not be right, but it would make sense with that last part. There is also a similar problem with equipping and unequipping weapons part of the Attack (Action). It says “You can either equip or unequip one weapon when you make an attack as part of this action.” This also uses the word action at the end which could indicate that you could only use it once per Attack Action and not during a bonus action or reaction.
3:44 there’s no such thing as “swapping” weapons, that’s two separate things (unequipping one weapon and equipping the other one) that you just convinetly name as one thing to mask the fact that your attack action only lets you unequip the first weapon while the bonus action attack doesn’t let you equip the other one.
The conversation around weapon juggling brings to my mind the image of a warrior, with two identical short swords on his hips and a shield strapped to one arm. He draws one short sword and charges an orc, swinging and hitting. He then clumsily sheaths his sword without the extra hand to guide it in, and draws the sword from his other hip, again clumsily because its on the wrong side, and swings again. Yes this is immersion breaking and I won’t entertain it at my table
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Somebody please correct me if I’m wrong. Is Crossbow Expert seriously nerfed? It feels that way. I’ve never used it so my memory isn’t perfect but i remember being able to use Attack, extra attack, and bonus action all with the same Hand Crossbow. Now you only get the bonus action Attack if you actually dual wield? So instead of focusing on getting 1 magical weapon, you definitely need 2? I guess it also got buffed in that before you still needed a free Hand to load it, but now you don’t. There’s probably some sword and crossbow vibe combo that works alot better now. Slash, slash, shoot.
With Sharpshooter you can ignore the Loading property, but you cannot ignore the Ammunition property. That states you still need a free hand to load a one-handed weapon. This doesn’t mention two-handed weapons because it was clarified before that you can hold a two-handed weapon in one hand if you’re not attacking with it. So using a shield and crossbow won’t really work (unless you have a whole bunch of preloaded crossbows). Crossbow Expert on the other hand says you can load a “crossbow” without a free hand as long as you’re holding a crossbow.
The one flaw I see is the Light Property with Extra attack. You attack with hand crossbow a and b as part of your action attack in the instructions you give. You have used both weapons as part of the attack action and so both would clearly count against the “Must be made with a different Light Weapon”
3:35 : I had to go through this again, so whoever else is still confused, with 2024 we can (un-)equip a weapon for free during each attack from the Attack action AND have a free object interaction per turn, which must be used during movement or your action. So: start with A in main hand. Shoot and unequip with your normal attack. Use bonus attack to equip B and shoot. Use free action to unequip. (if you have different crossbows, with this you can do your normal action attack with A, always) or never mind i think that is incorrect. The free (un-)equip is only during Attack (Action). if the off hand bonus action attack rules don’t say you can do this i guess you have to use your free action to equip B and then shoot. so next turn you would start with B in your hand. edit: Hm and 5:10 is weird also, isn’t it? with extra attack you can use the free (un-)equip during attacking (action) twice. so it’s even possible to “Start with A in hand, Shoot (1st attack), Shoot A again (Extra attack) (because why not? normally that would be your “better” crossbow) & free unequip during attack, free interactions equip B and shoot (bonus action)”
You need to do one on Divine Intervention. It got soooo broken. Hallow as a single action once per day for free. Instantly give anything you are fighting vulnerability to piercing damage with no save. Make everything frightened no save. That”s not even getting into prayer of healimg which becomes a 1 acrion short rest in the middle of combat. It’s crazy that they printed that
But Kobolod, longbow + great weapon master deals more damage at lower levels and allows you to get your 15 str for heavy armor earlier. Also when you’re done shooting you can just equip a shield. Hand Crossbows are bad now. At high levels you can switch to heavy crossbows but at lower levels longbows seem better
I absolutely hate the crossbow expert change. Yeah we can dual wield hand crossbows now but we’re doing the same amount of damage and need 2 weapons instead of one to get the bonus action attack. This means your hands are gonna be full and in some builds that will restrict your spell casting. You might be able to get around this with the weapon draw/stow rules and the immersion breaking technique shown here but it’s such a pain. It shouldn’t be necessary. All of that just so a few people can cosplay as Demon Hunters from Diablo.
I found more single target ranged damage for rangers with Swift Quiver. It no longer has a setup time, making it pretty good with a heavy crossbow. It’s even better with Magic Weapon (which now gets its +2 bonus a level earlier): Level 17 Ranger Attack +13 Enemy AC 19 Swift Quiver: 4 attacks GWM CBE DPR 50 w/ 2nd lvl MW 57 w/ 3rd lvl MW 64 Until you get Swift Quiver, it looks pretty bleak. I’m having to use Hunter’s Mark and Magic Weapon to squeeze out an estimated DPR in the high 30s.
if u juggle u attack with crossbow a and b using extra attack so would you not need a crossbow c for bonus action as it needs to be a weapon u did not use to attack or is the wording loose enough for your interpretation to work? this also causes you to need to pull it out requiring you to use your off hand. This is all solved if u get crossbow expert but an interpretation of the wording i thought i would bring up
im actually running a ranged fighter based on this similar thing but im pissing off my dm just a little bit more because im rocking fey touched with hex and also doing a more advanced weapon juggling thing which we think should work with a longbow+hand crossbow+thrown dagger typical turn using nick and also the longbow weapon mastery. wont be as strong as just shooting 2 crossbows, but i think forcing the dm to keep track of the slow WM and the free bonus action to do other shenanigans will make it worth it for me
Some of this way be subject to DM fiat. I could see interpretations where the loading property prevents multiple shots if any action, bonus action, or reaction is used. I could also see more than a few DMs shutting down excessive weapon juggling. Which is to say, have an open and honest conversation with your DM if you intend to make this a regular part of your rotation.
Nick + Vex + Thrown Weapon Fighting + Two-Weapon Fighting is better and lets you hold a shield and do Defensive Duelist. (Going in the order of Dagger first for Nick and then Handaxe/Dart for the rest of your attacks). For maximum damage you want to be attacking with Strength and dipping at least Barb1 on your Fighter build for the Rage bonus on every one of your 3-10 attacks a round.
Thanks for making this article. Excellent discussion ranged weapons and what they can do under the 2024 rules. HCBs with a shield will be really good defensively. It’s just disappointing the damage is so low. Here’s what I’m seeing for level 17 ranger DPR: Heavy crossbow: 2 attacks w/ GWM DPR: 26 w/ HM: 39* Hand crossbow: 3 attacks w/ CE (assumes advantage always) DPR is 25 w/ HM: 36 (setup cost is only 1) I hate to say anything nice about Hunter’s Mark, but it’s worth considering If you’re not using concentration for something else. The damage is still isn’t super exciting. My son and I have been brainstorming fixes for 2024 rangers and ranged builds. Our favorite idea is to homebrew sharpshooter to give it the GWM proficiency bonus. I don’t know if many DMS would go for it, though. *I fixed this. I had forgotten that at level 17 Hunter’s Mark gives automatic advantage.
I feel like this is a stretch of the rules. The loading property starts off by saying “Because of the time required to load this weapon…” So magically hand-waving that away by saying well it’s a different crossbow is kind of like the same shenanigans as the peasant railgun stuff. The best example I can use to prove this is the “Two-Handed” property on weapons. It reads “This weapon requires two hands when you attack with it.” which means you simply need to possess two hands and not that you need to be holding the weapon with both hands otherwise why didn’t they simply say this weapon requires “to be held with both” hands when you attack with it. Don’t believe me then read Versatile where it clearly states, “This weapon can be used WITH one or two hands.” If they intended Two-Handed to work the same, why didn’t they say the weapon requires use WITH two hands instead. We all know what it means, creative grammatical interpretation simply shows how to violate the rules as they should be implemented.
I have a Rogue character that is focused around Crossbows and Mobility in combat. Recently I have looked at his feats and for some reason have no idea why I chose some of his feats in the order I had… Also thought I had Crossbow Expert (Big part of his build) but for some reason it was not actually selected. Maybe I was playing around with alternate builds and forgot to change some back… But he definitely could be optimized a little bit more. Not looking for perfection, he’s strongly RP based, but I feel I still made a very strong Combat character outside of dice-driven RP scenarios…
10:58 for the last time, the loading and ammunition propiety are not the same, you ignoring loading doesn’t make you able to load without a free hand, hence you can’t equip shields. aside form that, this exploit is RAW, but I can see many DMs banning it as it is clunky, not RAI and immersion breaking to some, so please talk about it with your DM (and to sugar the pill, if you show this article, please assure them that you understand there is a mistake in the Xbow Xpert feat part)
Hey pack tactics amazing article, I just wanted to ask if you could do like an in game optimisation for fights, like a turn by turn explanation of what the optimal spell is, who to focus fire, that type of thing. It can be of the 2024 or 2014 version. Thanks for the great article and keep up the great work.
My takeaway from this article is that one of my biggest issues of 5e prior to the new edition (sharpshooter + crossbow mastery being so superior to sharpshooter with bows that ranged weapon users are heavily incentivized to use crossbows over bows) has only become worse, and what’s more, 5e 2024 in general is unwieldy and overly complicated. Hard pass.
I could be wrong, but I think Dual Wielder feat also works. Hand crossbows are light weapons, so the two weapon fighting style works with them which eliminates the need of Crossbow Expert. So instead you can to take the Dual Wielder feat, With that feat and extra attack you can use hand crossbows and daggers to attack 4 times a round. shoot hand crossbow, throw dagger with nick, shoot hand crossbow from nick, bonus action throw dagger from dual wielder, all adding dex modifier from two weapon fighting style. You do still need two hand crossbows Quick draw from dual wielder and the thrown property mitigate the drawing and stowing
This is seriously the dumbest thing. Duel wielding just shouldn’t be a thing with a crossbow. If you really want to duel wield range weapons ask your DM to add guns with magazines to your campaign… If someone was trying to pull this crap at my table I would have them make an acrobatic check every damn time.
There is one thing I think got glossed over. Part of the loading property states “You can only fire ONE piece of ammunition… when you use an action, bonus action, OR a reaction,..” You then go on to say that “You can shoot 3 times without crossbow expert. Loading isn’t a problem.” And show A as attack, B as bonus attack AND Bonus action. This is now shooting more then 1 ammunition with 1 crossbow. You might need a 3rd to actually pull this off.