[RPG] Is this recommendation for a fighter to take the Weapon Master feat entirely useless

dnd-5efeatsfighter

Tasha's Cauldron of Everything includes some recommendations for building a Battle Master fighter. The introduction to the section says:

Below are recommendations for how you might build a Battle Master to reflect various types of warriors.

Each of these builds contains suggested fighting styles, maneuvers, and feats. Those suggestions are from the Player’s Handbook, except for the ones followed by an asterisk, which indicates an option introduced in this book.

Two of these builds (Duelist and Gladiator) list the Weapon Master feat as a recommended feat. Weapon Master says:

  • Increase your Strength or Dexterity score by 1, to a maximum of 20.
  • You gain proficiency with four weapons of your choice. Each one must be a simple or a martial weapon.

The Proficiencies section of the Fighter class says:

Weapons: Simple weapons, martial weapons

Fighters are already proficient in all simple and martial weapons.

Am I missing something here or is the Weapon Master feat a complete waste of an ASI1 for a fighter? Is there some way that taking the Weapon Master feat as a fighter is not entirely redundant?

1Ability Score Improvement

Best Answer

It's almost useless.

Option 1: If you're taking a feat instead of an Ability Score Improvement (ASI), the ASI is always better than this particular feat. You already have proficiency with all weapons, so 2 attribute points is better than 1.

Option 2: If you pick Variant Human, you take a feat at level one. If the player's desired attribute (STR or DEX) is an odd number, a half-feat like Weapon Master is useful. But there are other half-feats (e.g., Athlete) that will give you more stuff along with the single attribute point, so Weapon Master is also useless.

Option 3: If you start with another class and dip into fighter, you get these proficiencies: Light armor, medium armor, shields, simple weapons, martial weapons. So you're back to option 1, ASI will always be better than the feat.

The only case I found (thanks to cezaryx) where this feat can be sort-of useful is if you're in a world with some exotic yet simple/martial weapon that cannot be learned quickly otherwise. For example, if your world has Firearms, and the DM has not granted your fighter proficiency with them (despite your proficiency with martial weapons), and you cannot use downtime to learn them (or you need to learn them very quickly), then these are eligible for the feat.

It's up to [the DM] to decide whether a character has proficiency with a firearm. Characters in most D&D worlds wouldn't have such proficiency. During their downtime, characters can use the training rules in the Player's Handbook to acquire proficiency, assuming that they have enough ammunition to keep the weapons working while mastering their use.

That being said, as a DM, I would not force my player to take this feat, and I'd either arrange the downtime or just outright grant that Fighters with proficiency in martial weapons would have proficiency in firearms. But to each their own.

Aside from this small niche case, I can't think of any other where the feat is not completely outclassed by something else, for a Fighter.

Related Topic