[RPG] Is this homebrew trident weapon and associated feat balanced compared to the published weapons and Feats for Weapons

dnd-5ehomebrew-reviewweapons

Currently, the martial weapon trident is strictly inferior to the simple weapon spear. Here is my homebrew fix for it:

Trident (Martial Meelee Weapon) Cost: 15 GP Weight: 5 lbs
Damage: 3d4 piercing Thrown (0/15), Heavy, Two Handed, Special

Special: This weapon can be wielded with one hand if the other hand is
wielding a net.

And its accompanying feat:

Trident Mastery
Prerequisite: Proficiency in tridents.

You gain
the following benefits when wielding a trident:

  • You have advantage on attack rolls made with tridents while under water.
  • When you throw a net as an action, you can make one attack with a trident as a bonus action.
  • When you are attacked by a weapon that has the reach property and are not
    incapacitated, you can use your
    reaction to add your proficiency bonus to your armor class against all
    attacks from the creature that attacked you until the beginning of
    your next turn. If this increased armor class blocks the triggering
    attack, the creature must make a DC 15 dexterity check or drop the
    weapon.

Is this balanced compared to the official weapons? Does it have any "broken" combinations with any feats or abilities? Is the feat broken?

Best Answer

The weapon is overpowered

Your homebrew trident deals more damage than any existing nonmagical weapon- 7.5 on average, vs. 7 for the greatsword and maul. Additionally, this weapon works better with the Great Weapon Fighting Style, which adds an average of 1.5 damage to 3d4, versus 1.33 to 2d6. The damage dice alone would be unbalanced, but on top of that you've also added the ability to throw the weapon (albiet with disadvantage) and dual-wield with a net. Almost every great weapon build would prefer to use this trident than any published weapon, with the possible exception of Half Orcs that want to add additional damage dice on critical hits.

I suspect you imagine this trident and trident master feat being used together, as an alternative play style to other common weapon-feat combinations such as Great Weapon Master and Polearm Master. However, I think you should consider that many characters will just buy a trident and use it instead of a greatsword with GWM. Especially since...

The feat is too situational

The first bullet point won't matter at all in most campaigns, but may become overpowered in an underwater adventure.

The second bullet loses utility as a character gains extra attacks. At low levels, throwing a net and then attacking with a trident could be quite powerful. However, once a character gains an extra attack, they are forgoing that extra attack every time they choose to throw the net. This could still be situationally useful, but is unlikely to be as good an option as just attacking twice, especially since nets always attack with disadvantage. If the feat was selected by a fighter, the net option only gets worse as they gain their third and fourth attacks.

The third bullet is useless in most encounters, but could be overpowered if the character fights large numbers of enemies with reach weapons.