Unearthed Arcana Unearthed Arcana: Get Better At Skills With These Feats

ZERO chance I allow these in my games. They're breaking the skill system.

Some of the worry about this massively inflating passive checks to where it's impossible to fail is misplaced.

1. As Hussar and others have pointed out, the PHB clearly states that features that allow you to double your proficiency bonus don't stack. So in the case where a 13th level character (which is getting toward high level) spends a lot of resources to have a 20 in Wisdom (+5), a proficiency in perception (+5), the Observant Feat (+5), and the Perceptive feat (+5 but doesn't stack), they can have a 25 passive perception, not a 30.

2. That's a high score still, but they spent a lot of resources to get that, so more power to them. Let them find most all hidden doors and traps. They worked to earn that.

3. Some DC's in high-level dungeons should be set to 30. That is not DC creep, that's already in the core rules as a nearly impossible DC. Nearly impossible, but not impossible, meaning the character who spent all those resources in wisdom perception can achieve it. (They will be weak in other skills.) I find that some DMs get stuck in thinking that most all DC's should be 10, 15, or 20. Nope. Some DCs should be 25 or 30 when the characters reach 18th, 19th, and 20th levels. These DC's will be nearly impossible or impossible for most characters who aren't trained in the associated skills, but they will be very possible for characters who are well trained in those skills. That's actually a sign of the rules working, not breaking down.

The Human Target said:

Well, you have another big problem- proficiency in a skill isn't by itself a huge bonus, making being trained in a skill not really very impressive. Especially at lower levels.

These feats do solve that.

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I have not seen this as a problem people have been worried about. Have you? I think most people thing the gradual improvement of ability in proficient skills as one levels up is a good thing.

Right, because this is basically 18 different skill options baked into the same copy-pasted feat, I will be doing this a bit differently:

To start out with, I am not against giving out Expertise as a feat. In fact I highly embrace it. Expertise is not an exclusive ability, and I don't consider skills disruptive enough to restrict access to them. Also I like the idea of a fighter becoming a master blacksmith and that can't happen without multiclassing. (Technically it still can't, but this paves the way for such feats to exist later). Finally, due to static DCs, this allows for people who are really good at skills without having being talented via ability points, allowing for a much wider range of character options (like uncharismatic intimidators or dumb scholars), and that is always nice.

Making these half-feats is a bit dubious. I understand just Expertise in one skill isn't worth a feat, and feats are supposed to have a feature that is "always" useful, but there has to be some more interesting option to make that work.

Now, onward to each individual skill trick (Something I thought I would never see again after 3.X). I understand these are inherently weak, due to being the hyper-specific third option of the feat, but it is worth noting if these things are worth using a feat for, if they should be included in the normal use of the skill, or if they should be replaced with some other better idea.

Acrobat:
DC 15 bonus action to ignore difficult terrain. Considering using a skill defaults to an Action instead of a Bonus Action, this is possibly worth it, but it should be expanded a bit.

Animal Handler
Bonus action to command a friendly animal to do anything, but mostly used for guarding or making a move and attack action. I would consider this a good start to the feat, now if only they had expanded animal training rules.

Arcanist
Of all the abilities that grant spells, this is the most appropriate, both in what it grants and why it should be granted. I consider it worth a feat.

Brawny
Powerful Build? It's fun, sometimes, but not feat worthy.

Diplomat
At-Will non-magic Charm. That is feat worthy.

Empathic
Gaining advantage on checks against a target via empathy is rather fun, and full of story building goodness.

Historian
A bonus on help checks? That's an interesting start. A Mastermind Rogue could benefit from such an ability. I wonder how many other ways there are to help as a bonus action. Or maybe this is a Warlord Power playtest in disguise.

Investigator
Search becomes a bonus action. This is actually a really good use of action economy by itself.

Medic
Binding wounds lets you max out a single HD per target, once per long rest. This is bad. Where is the Surgery option to end effects? What DC is it to cure the common cold? Why is Medicine such as crappy skill that has no use outside of stabilizing people at 0hp and saying they are sick?

Menacing
At-Will Fear is something to be feared (heh) But this only lasts one round, and has to be used in place of an attack, making it marginally useful for classes other than Fighters. Maybe better as a Bonus Action.

Naturalist
The Druid's equivalent of Arcanist. It's a bit of a stretch for this to grant spells, and Detect poison and Disease would belong more with the Medic feat. Perhaps Speak With Animals would be better, or something to do with Cartography?

Perceptive
You can ignore disadvantage due to light obscurement, that's actually a rather big deal, and relatively rare as far as abilities go.

Performer
Distracting should be a normal function of Performance Checks. This needs a replacement.

Quick-Fingered
A poor-man's Fast Hands. Even more poor once you consider how limited it is compared to normal use of the skill. However, bonus action skill use is still a good start, given that you could take a small weapon or potion off of someone you are fighting with the normal skill.

Silver-Tongued
Unlike the Intimidation feat, trading in attack action is better for this option, as it grants you advantage on all other attacks you make. Additionally, it lets you disengage for no action.

Stealthy
Obligatory comment about how the Stealth Rules are a Mess, and I can't really advocate a feat that augments them until the core rules are more solid. However, I can say moving from cover to cover is something that should be part of the normal Stealth rules imo, then we can talk about making them better at it.

Survivalist
Alarm. Of All the spells you could have given them (and you really shouldn't have) Alarm isn't at the top of the list. Goodberry, Purify Food and Drink, Maybe? Just give them something that makes it harder to kill them, or even ignoring the effects of extreme weather, that would have been good start.

Theologian
So you get Cleric spells by studying religion (and not even worshiping or making at least a pact) now? How do the gods even stay in power with the myriad of things that are encroaching on their turf? At least the spells are appropriate.

Kobold Stew said:

I have not seen this as a problem people have been worried about. Have you? I think most people thing the gradual improvement of ability in proficient skills as one levels up is a good thing.

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It is, and still is. I don't see that these rules break that, since the doubling of proficiency bonuses don't stack. This literally changes nothing that wasn't already possible with a rogue or bard's ability to double skill proficiency.

Blue said:

But when it's something like finding traps, the DM isn't going to want to let someone auto-succeed. Which means everyone without expertise is hosed.

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I don't see why not. Let him find all the traps. What does it hurt?

On fact, add more traps, so he can feel even better about finding them.

I like the ability to reach a +17 skill bonus at high levels. For one thing, you can't reach this in all skills, only skills you have expertise in. But this shows the beauty of bounded accuracy.

Imagine a Level 1 character walking up to the castle wall of Castle Waterdeep. They ask if they can climb it. The DM says, "Well, it's a sheer wall and has almost no handholds. It's nearly impossible to climb." And let's say the DC is set at 30. So it would, in fact, be impossible for the level 1 character to climb. But this character goes on numerous adventures, gains experience, and learns to climb all manner of things. He spends a lot of time learning to become an expert climber.

Now, years later, and at level 17, he looks at that same wall. The same exact wall with the same DC as when he was Level 1 (there is no treadmill trickery here), and he starts to climb it. With a +17 bonus to his strength athletics skill to climb, he just needs to roll a 13 or higher to climb it. What was once impossible is now possible for the very powerful and skilled adventurer.

In previous editions, if you asked, "What's the DC of climbing Castle Waterdeep's wall," or, "What's the DC of breaking that famous door, or picking the lock of that famous chest," the answer would be, "It depends. What level are you?" That always struck the wrong chord with me. Now the answer can be definitive. We can have whole conversations about what a DC for a famous wall or door or lock should be. And it is not dependent on the situation or the person performing the skill, and that's how it should be.

Like I said before, this is a sign of the rules working as intended.

And we can do away with the ridiculous situation in earlier editions of a character at level 5 walking up to an iron door and asking to break it down and the DM saying, "Well's it's very hard to break down, so the DC is 20," then the same character, now at level 15, walking up to the same door and the DM saying, "Well, it's still hard to break down, so the DC is 35." Now, with bounded accuracy, the DC for a very hard door is 25, and will always be 25. The door doesn't change. The PC changes.

These feats aren't perfect (I'm looking at you, Performer Feat), but I like the general idea of them, and they don't break the system.

The Human Target said:

They all share a +1 Ability Score and proficiency/double proficiency. These are solid but boring numerical bonuses that really limit what the rest of the feat can do.

Acrobat- If your DM uses difficult terrain I think this is useful. But really pretty dull.

Animal Handler- Okay. Though I'm kind of against skill action stuff that doesn't require a roll.

Arcanist- Basically a feat for a little flavor.

Brawny- Really boring. I guess there is a certain play style that would go nuts for increased carrying capacity. But why waste the Athletics feat on it?

Diplomat- Good but one of those things that might fall into the normal use of the skill.

Empathic- Good idea, bad execution. One round of advantage is such a blunt and boring instrument. Advantage is overused.

Historian- A feat that makes you wonder why History is even a skill.

Investigator- Making stuff a bonus action is good. But a lot of the time when you are making a Search action, you aren't worrying about the action economy at all.

Medic- Alright. But if this is what the feat does, what does the skill normally get you? Why are skills even in the game if they are so ill defined?

Menacing- Weird that it uses an attack action. Do you have to draw your weapon and actually swing at them to use this ability? Frightening is pretty powerful though, but humanoid really limits it.

Naturalist- Hate it. Want to be good at a skill? Here is some MAGIC.

Perceptive- I mean, this is really dependent on your DM even remembering that rule.

Performer- I really like this one. It probably should just be a use of the limited function Performance skill though.

Quick-Fingered- Now making Sleight of Hand a bonus action is really nice.

Silver-Tongued- Not to say this is bad, but making the Deception skill's ability combat only kind of stinks.

Stealthy- Kind of vaguely worded but I like the intent.

Survivalist- I always forget this is a separate skill from Nature. Also, MAGIC.

Theologian- MAGIC.

I'm totally on board for the idea of these feats, but the execution is very blah.

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I think, by hand-waiving the "double proficiency" portion, you're missing the key on some of these feats. For example, that's the key to the Brawny feat. It's for grapplers, so they don't have to multiclass to get that double proficiency. That's very meaningful for them - much more meaningful than the capacity bonus. However the capacity bonus also helps with things like using improvised weapons, and the tavern brawler feat.

I have been thinking about these and my opinion is they are ok. I think people are over reacting. I dont think players will choose these feats right away first off. They tend to grab either stat increases or one of the top tier combat feats. Honestly I think more players will grab these at later levels to shore up their weaker skills than to auto succeed at one skill. But that really depends on how your players style I guess.

Mistwell said:

For example, that's the key to the Brawny feat. It's for grapplers, so they don't have to multiclass to get that double proficiency. That's very meaningful for them - much more meaningful than the capacity bonus. However the capacity bonus also helps with things like using improvised weapons, and the tavern brawler feat.

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Maybe they should have something that directly benefits grappling then? Like counting as a size larger when it is beneficial?

That would be a handy way to give gnomes greatswords at least.