New hybrid rules: hybrid talent feat just once?

invokethehojo · May 29, 2009

I was just reading the design article on the new hybrid rules, which I'm going to test tonight, and I saw something

The new hybrid rules now allow you to gain additional powers from either of your classes in place of a paragon path. It also grants your character a bonus Hybrid Talent feat, even if you’ve already taken it once. So far, this is the only method for a character to gain more than one hybrid talent option, so it wouldn’t surprise me to see plenty of folks giving it a shot.

I reread the rules and I don't see anywhere a place where it says you can only take the hybrid talent feat once... am I missing something?

Majushi · May 29, 2009

feats that are allowable to be taken multiple times always specifically indicate that this is the case.

If the Hybrid Talent feat doesn't say that it can be taken multiple times it can't.

That's not to say that it won't be the case in the future...

twilsemail · May 29, 2009

invokethehojo said:
I was just reading the design article on the new hybrid rules, which I'm going to test tonight, and I saw something

The new hybrid rules now allow you to gain additional powers from either of your classes in place of a paragon path. It also grants your character a bonus Hybrid Talent feat, even if you’ve already taken it once. So far, this is the only method for a character to gain more than one hybrid talent option, so it wouldn’t surprise me to see plenty of folks giving it a shot.

I reread the rules and I don't see anywhere a place where it says you can only take the hybrid talent feat once... am I missing something?

PHB page 192 said:
Generally, you can’t take the same feat more than once, and most of the time you wouldn’t want to. A few feats, however, specify that you can take the same feat multiple times.

Hope that helps.

Siberys · May 29, 2009

I'll be HRing the standard "Special" line into that feat. I understand the limit's there for balance reasons, but... Especially considering the armor hybrid talents, it seems like such an option should exist.

Also, I'll be adding a feat that lets you upgrade a hybrid class feature to a full feature. Consider the Rogue's SA, or the Fighter's Challenge - there should be a way to get those to work on non-in-class powers.

mneme · May 29, 2009

Syberys -- fair enough, but I think they're trying to make the doubling up of class features a "paragon hybrid" thing, and I'd expect extra-strong/broken hybrids with your house rules. As it is, a hybrid Swordmage/Avenger can get a stupidly high AC at 11th level (specifically.... 10+5+5+3+3+2+(magic)3 = 31. For every fight.

Similarly, the reason that the striker bonuses (specifically and directly) don't work with non-class powers is, I'm quite sure, because they're -full- versions of the bonuses otherwise, not (like multiclass feats) crippled versions of same. Which means that if they didn't do that, you could -stack- striker bonuses, and make a ranger/avenger (for instance) that was more or less impossible for a non-hybrid to compete against on DPR.

LightPhoenix · May 29, 2009

The Design & Development article accompanying this month's Hybrid rules specifically calls out that you can only take the Hybrid Talent feat once.

Siberys · May 29, 2009

Yeah, I will have to look into balance. Like I said - I understand the balance reasons, but it's an option I want open. I'll be looking into making it balanced. I might have to break it into several feats...

As for striker damage? Multiclassing DOES gets a full version, except it's only usable once per encounter. I think a feat cost would be acceptable to upgrade from "only in-class" to full. I mean, it'd take 6-9 feats for a hybrid character to get full features of both classes. That's a significant chunk right there.

Of course, this is coming from the guy who entirely redesigned multiclassing for his games. I'm more or less trying to keep hybrid consistent with my house rules (in that, if you invest enough in it, you'll essentially be a full member of two classes. It takes a lot of your character resources, but it can be done).

Herschel · May 29, 2009

mneme said:
Syberys -- fair enough, but I think they're trying to make the doubling up of class features a "paragon hybrid" thing, and I'd expect extra-strong/broken hybrids with your house rules. As it is, a hybrid Swordmage/Avenger can get a stupidly high AC at 11th level (specifically.... 10+5+5+3+3+2+(magic)3 = 31. For every fight.

You might want to take a look at your feat allocation again. 10 (base) +5 (Int) + 3 (Armor of Faith) + 2 (Leather) +1 (Hide) +1 (Improved Armor of Faith) +2 (magic armor) at heroic and at Paragon taking Swordmage Warding and swapping your other feat for Improved Swordmage warding leaves you with very little utility or offensive capability. In this scenario, you sacrifice everything else to be hard to hit. And your non-AC defenses aren't all that great either without buffs.

Tripgnosis · May 29, 2009

once per class?

I like the idea o taking the feat more than once. The revised hybrid rules limit what you can gain with the feat, but I still see you're points about it still being too unbalanced. Maybe just once for each of the two classes that you're a hybrid of? Maybe twice per tier??

doggywoggy · Jun 7, 2009

Once per tier

and no Paragon Hybrid whatsoever gets my vote.

It would be great to be able to swap-out Chain, Scale, and Plate, for Paladin Armor Prof and Plate Spec by Epic, while having two weapon style (heroic Hybrid Talent) and say, Lay on Hands and a Paragon path for paragon levels. I'm talking about a twf pally/ranger hybrid. Or at least, make it so the armor is 1 better than your worst class, so you don't have to take as many feats. I have no use for Light and Heavy Shield feats if I'm dual-wielding, do I. I'd much rather specialize in Scale anyway...so this is a net gain (avoiding class powers you don't want and saving feats in the process) for my character concept.

Or one per class is OK too (though only 1 in Heroic). Remove Paragon Hybrid completely and let people have their choice of PP. Is the loss of a Paragon path worth it for one more class feature? maybe it is...I haven't looked at all the options.

The next couple months should be interesting in terms of character choices.

Will Divine Power have any Hybrid class options? Given that PH3 won't be out for a while...