Chapter 5: Equipment

Starting Equipment

When you create a character, you receive equipment based on your class.


Armor and Shields

Heavy Armor. Heavier armor interferes with the wearer’s ability to move quickly, stealthily, and freely. If the Armor table shows “Str 13” or “Str 15” in the Strength column for an armor type, the armor reduces the wearer’s speed by 10 feet unless the wearer has a Strength score equal to or higher than the listed score. 

Stealth. If the Armor table shows “Disadvantage” in the Stealth column, the wearer has disadvantage on Dexterity (Stealth) checks. 

Shields. A shield is made from wood or metal and is carried in one hand. Wielding a shield increases your Armor Class by 2. You can benefit from only one shield at a time. 

Weapons

The weapons listed in the weapon table show you the statistics of the various weapons in the game.

Properties and Abilities

Some weapons have special properties and abilities. You can find detailed information about them below. Weapon properties are always active passive features. Weapon abilities are special abilities that you can trigger if you are proficient with the weapon. You must spend 1 exertion point to activate the weapon abilities. If your class doesn't grant you exertion points, you cannot use the weapon abilities unless some other feature gives you exertion points.

Weapon Properties

Finesse. When making an attack with a finesse weapon, you use your choice of your Strength or Dexterity modifier for the attack and damage rolls. You must use the same modifier for both rolls. 

Heavy. Creatures with less than 15 strength have disadvantage on attack rolls with heavy weapons. A heavy weapon’s size and bulk make it too large for a weak creature to use effectively. 

Light. A light weapon is small and easy to handle, making it ideal for use when fighting with two weapons. If you are wielding a weapon with the light property, you may wield another weapon with the light property in your offhand. When you take the attack action and attack with the light weapon in your main hand, you can attack with the light weapon in your offhand as a bonus action

Loading. Because of the time required to load this weapon, you can fire only one piece of ammunition from it when you use an action, bonus action, or reaction to fire it, regardless of the number of attacks you can normally make. 

Range. A weapon that can be used to make a ranged attack has a range shown, listed by two numbers. The first is the weapon’s normal range in feet, and the second indicates the weapon’s long range in feet. When attacking a target beyond normal range, you have disadvantage on the attack roll. You can’t attack a target beyond the weapon’s long range.

Reach. This weapon adds a number of feet to your reach when you attack with it, as listed by the number in the table.

Two-Handed. This weapon requires two hands to use, meaning that you do not have any free hands while this weapon is drawn.

Versatile. This weapon can be used with one or two hands. A damage value in parentheses appears with the property—the damage when the weapon is used with two hands to make a melee attack.

Special. Due to the special nature of this weapon, you have disadvantage to hit targets that are within 5 feet of you.

Thrown. If a weapon has the thrown property, you can throw the weapon to make a ranged attack, and you can draw the weapon as part of the attack. You use the same ability modifier for the attack and damage roll of the weapon that you would use for a melee attack with the weapon. The range of the thrown weapon is listed by two numbers. The first is the weapons normal range in feet, and the second indicates the weapon's long range in feet. When attacking a target beyond normal range, you have disadvantage on the attack roll. You can’t attack a target beyond the weapon’s long range.

Firearm. A weapon with the firearm property is loud when you make an attack with it.

Reload. The weapon can be fired a number of times equal to its Reload score before you must spend an action to reload. If you have the extra attack feature, you can replace one of your attacks to reload. You must have one free hand to reload a firearm.

Misfire. Whenever you make an attack roll with a weapon that has a misfire score and the number rolled on the die is equal to or lower than the weapon’s misfire score, the weapon misfires. The attack misses, and the weapon cannot be used again until you spend an action to try and repair it. To repair your firearm, you must make a successful Tinker’s Tools check (DC equal to 8 + the weapon's misfire score). If your check fails, the weapon is broken and must be mended out of combat at a quarter of the cost of the firearm.

Weapon Abilities

Concuss. As a bonus action, you can whack a creature over the head with the weapon. That creature cannot make attacks of opportunity until the end of your current turn.

Cleave. When you hit an attack on a creature, you can use a bonus action to make the attack hit another creature within your reach, using the same attack roll. The second target only takes damage from the weapon damage die of the attack, and nothing can increase this damage.

Graze. When you miss an attack with a weapon that has the Graze ability, you can use your reaction to deal damage equal to the ability modifier used to make the attack. This damage cannot be increased in any way.

Push. You can use your weapon to shove a creature. As a bonus action, you can shove a medium or smaller creature 5 feet straight away from you.

Bounce. When you throw a weapon with the Bounce ability, you can activate this feature to have it return to your hand for all of your attacks until the end of your next turn.

Pierce. If there is a second creature directly behind the creature you are attacking that is also within the weapons reach or normal range, you can use your bonus action to make the attack hit the second creature as well, using the same attack and damage roll.

Quick. This weapon is extremely light, and can be swung insanely fast. When you use this weapon in your offhand with two weapon fighting, you don't need to use your bonus action to make the offhand attack. You can still only make one offhand attack per turn.

Disorient. When you hit a creature with an attack, you can spend your bonus action to disorient them. The next attack roll the target makes before the start of your next turn has disadvantage.

Topple. You can attempt to sweep a target off its feet. As a bonus action, you make an athletics check versus the targets athletics or acrobatics check (their choice). On a failure, they have the prone condition.

Vex. If you hit a creature with this weapon and deal damage to them, you can use your reaction to give yourself advantage on your next attack roll against that creature until the end of your next turn.

Improvised Weapons

Sometimes characters don’t have their weapons and have to attack with whatever is close at hand. An improvised weapon includes any object you can wield in one or two hands, such as broken glass, a table leg, a frying pan, a wagon wheel, or a dead goblin. In many cases, an improvised weapon is similar to an actual weapon and can be treated as such. For example, a table leg is akin to a club. At the DM’s option, a character proficient with a weapon can use a similar object as if it were that weapon and use his or her proficiency bonus. An object that bears no resemblance to a weapon deals 1d4 damage (the DM assigns a damage type appropriate to the object). If a character uses a ranged weapon to make a melee attack, or throws a melee weapon that does not have the thrown property, it also deals 1d4 damage. An improvised thrown weapon has a normal range of 20 feet and a long range of 60 feet.