Proposal: Replace expertise related bonus with a feat bonus

Otakkun · Oct 12, 2010

Well, as things are today we have:

- Everyone gets a single expertise-family feat at level 5 for free.
- No one can take an expertise feat before level 5.

The way this house rule is made we're going to keep discussing it every time WotC changes or adds a new rule/feat concerning expertise bonuses. Besides, we still (as written) get problems with those with multiple sources of attacks (implement, weapon, racial, etc).

I'll propose the following instead of what we already have:

"At levels 5, 15 & 25 L4W characters get a free +1/+2/+3 feat bonus to hit with all their attacks."

This way people are free to pick whatever feats they want, since they'll never stack. Seems like less bookkeeping for me.

renau1g · Oct 12, 2010

Otakkun said:
I'll propose the following instead of what we already have:

"At levels 5, 15 & 25 L4W characters get a free +1/+2/+3 feat bonus to hit with all their attacks."

This way people are free to pick whatever feats they want, since they'll never stack. Seems like less bookkeeping for me.

edited

Dekana · Oct 12, 2010

Part of the reason for the "no expertise before level 5" restriction was to encourage diversity among the characters. If this passes as is, I'll make my characters like this every time:

Level 1: Versatile Expertise
Level 2: ...
Level 4: ...
Level 5: Retrain Versatile expertise to something else.

I suspect I won't be alone either.

stonegod · Oct 12, 2010

I wouldn't. Ever. *shrug*

hafrogman · Oct 12, 2010

There's the retraining issue. [a middling issue]
There's the increase to non-implement, non weapon powers (some of the newer ones, as Renau1g pointed out, were printed assuming no expertise bonus) [a minor issue]
There's the essentials expertise feats that combine the math bonus with a small other bonus that might not be worth a feat by itself [a middling issue]
For me at least, there's the fact that the CB can be customized to add a free feat, but not a random bonus. [a minor issue]

So mostly small bean stuff. Not super important. But I see no actual upside to the change. It's being proposed to possibly correct future issues that may or may not exist after future unknown revisions by WotC. Is there any reason to make this change now instead of waiting until there is an actual problem to address?

Always seeking a more elegant solution can lead to the danger of getting trapped trying to endlessly revise and perfect an ultimately imperfect system. In general, I'd favor not making changes unless they're neccessary, keeping the game as easily understandable and accessible as possible.

TwoHeadsBarking · Oct 12, 2010

Ha, this is almost exactly what we had before. And then some people started raising what I'm sure were excellent reasons for why we should switch it to a free feat. I don't remember any of said reasons as being particularly convincing though.

We could also throw in a ban of the expertise feats as well, but I don't really care what other people use their feats for. Leaning towards yes.

renau1g · Oct 12, 2010

TwoHeadsBarking said:
Ha, this is almost exactly what we had before.

Yeah that's why I like it

There was an issue with 1 paragon path that requires expertise-type feat for entry into it. Ninefold Master was the PP

TwoHeadsBarking said:
We could also throw in a ban of the expertise feats as well, but I don't really care what other people use their feats for. Leaning towards yes.

Personally I used to be more against them, but really, people should be able to choose what they want I s'pose, we're all big boys and girls