D&D 5E Comparison/number-crunching time! -5/+10 feats: How much "too good" are they?

[Celtavian]

This is so easy to say. But the truth is that without feats, 5e is simply not crunchy enough.

I don't want to be "ready for the damage spike". Far better if the very few feats that contribute mostly to this were scaled back or changed or outright removed.

Feats are good. But some feats are not. I don't want to ban all feats because some aren't designed well.

So, no, that's not something I "need to know". I want and expect better from WotC.

It's not crunchy enough by design (at least one of my players agrees with you and he is super unhappy with the lack of splat books providing options, it's boring him.). That is why feats are optional. The game works well without feats. That means you're on your own balancing feats. You have to come up with a balance point that works at your table because WotC is not going to spend much time (if any) balancing an optional rule that if causing problems can be removed. I've given up on the idea that WotC plans to balance the game with feats in mind or officially change feats. This is like D&D on life support as near as I can tell. The D&D staff at WotC is keeping a game Hasbro doesn't care about in its Pen and Paper form alive. This is the most sparse version of D&D I can recall. It's saving me money, but at the same time it is pretty boring as far as purchase options. If you're not buying modules, you have nothing to spend your money on.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

I'd agree if and only if feats didn't cost your ability score increases. Because they do, they need to be as valuable as a +2 to your primary stat. It's nice to have a metric to put them against. It's tough to balance them all to that metric.

This doesn't necessarily follow. A feat only needs to be as valuable as +2 to your primary stat if you are primarily concerned with presenting an interesting decision at level 4, and the designers really should have learned by now that it's not cool to balance things at one level at the expense of other levels.

The choice is never whether or not you want to cap your primary stat. The current choice is whether you want to cap your primary stat first, or whether you have other priorities. The long-term decision always comes out to whether you want a primary 20 and some feats, or a primary 20 and slightly higher secondary stats. If a feat is worth +2 to your primary, then obviously the former set is just better than the latter.

A better balance point would be making a feat worth +2 to your secondary stats, such as Constitution (which all classes need in roughly equal amounts - wizards and rogues already have lower hit dice and AC, so they need a high Con to compensate). In fact, you can see this sort of logic if you look at the variant human option, which doesn't even pretend that you would give up your primary stat in exchange for a feat.

 

[Shiroiken]

A better balance point would be making a feat worth +2 to your secondary stats, such as Constitution (which all classes need in roughly equal amounts - wizards and rogues already have lower hit dice and AC, so they need a high Con to compensate). In fact, you can see this sort of logic if you look at the variant human option, which doesn't even pretend that you would give up your primary stat in exchange for a feat.

If that was the case, everyone would max their primary ability score before even considering feats. That puts Feats out of reach for many characters (assuming starting 16, non-human non-fighters won't see one until about level 12), and makes things unfun for most people. As it stands, I find the determination to get a feat or raise primary ability score to be a hard choice for my group, which means the Feats are working as intended (mostly working, anyway, as there are some terrible feats).

 

[The Crimson Binome]

If that was the case, everyone would max their primary ability score before even considering feats. That puts Feats out of reach for many characters (assuming starting 16, non-human non-fighters won't see one until about level 12), and makes things unfun for most people. As it stands, I find the determination to get a feat or raise primary ability score to be a hard choice for my group, which means the Feats are working as intended (mostly working, anyway, as there are some terrible feats).

Working as intended for low levels doesn't excuse working poorly for high levels. You could always give other races the human option, and let them sacrifice their bad stats for a feat. And you would still have the option, if you really thought a particular feat was worth it.

Alternatively, you could have feats reduce your maximum scores. If Great Weapon Master came with the penalty of reducing your maximum potential Strength to 18, that would solve a lot.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

So I realized that I was overlooking a thing in evaluating the math on the -5/+10 feats: I was overlooking the opportunity cost. Which is to say: If you didn't get that feat, what would you get instead? So the comparison isn't between using a -5/+10 feat and not using it. It should be, at least fairly often, better to use it than not to use it.

I think the right comparison is probably against taking +2 to your attack stat. So it should be compared against +1/+1, probably. Because the feat comes at the cost of an ASI. I suppose that becomes less true if/when you get the stat to 20, but if your stat isn't 20 yet, the -5/+10 feat is coming at the expense of increasing that stat.

I still think the feats are pretty good, but it occurred to me that all the modeling I saw was assuming that the alternative was just "don't have that feat", rather than "have something else instead".

Comparing against ASIs is still an analytically-weak approach. Since the claim is that Sharpshooter/GWM/Crossbow Expert are outliers for feats, it only makes sense to compare them against other feats, like Mounted Combatant, Lucky, Healer, Inspiring Leader, Heavy Armor Master, Polearm Master, Defensive Duelist, etc.

A feat is a statement about what you want to be your niche. It had better be better for that niche than a bland generic ASI is.

This analysis from last month found that, contrary to some peoples' intuition, Crossbow Expert + Sharpshooter is not the optimal build for fighting in a cage match, despite its high DPR. Defensive Duelist proved to be superior for killing (simplified, spell-less) Slaads and Earth Elementals. Heavy Armor Master is also excellent in a variety of situations.

The real advantage of Sharpshooter is that it has a much wider niche than the average feat (applies to almost any combat, so it impacts almost a full third of the game); but it doesn't dominate other feats within their niche (many of which are also combat-oriented). It is not easy to determine which feat is the "best"; all that can be said with confidence is that there are a number of very attractive feats competing with each other.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

Comparing against ASIs is still an analytically-weak approach. Since the claim is that Sharpshooter/GWM/Crossbow Expert are outliers for feats, it only makes sense to compare them against other feats, like Mounted Combatant, Lucky, Healer, Inspiring Leader, Heavy Armor Master, Polearm Master, Defensive Duelist, etc.

You still need a reference point in order to determine whether the best feats should be weaker or the worst feats need to be better.

Given that +2 to a stat is the trade-off that the game actually gives you, it makes sense to use that as reference, but it doesn't help at all that +2 to a stat has a wildly different value depending on which stat it is and whether or not it's your primary.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

You still need a reference point in order to determine whether the best feats should be weaker or the worst feats need to be better.

Given that +2 to a stat is the trade-off that the game actually gives you, it makes sense to use that as reference, but it doesn't help at all that +2 to a stat has a wildly different value depending on which stat it is and whether or not it's your primary.

I'd say you've just disproved your own argument there. It doesn't make sense to use ASIs as a referent, because doing so just introduces new analytical problems.

I'm not even persuaded that you "need" a baseline referent in the first place, because rendering normative judgments about what "needs" to happen is not the function of the analysis. All you need to do is illustrate to DMs what the relative utilities are; they will then customize their games to taste with their eyes wide open. Description, not prescription. If you try to invent a baseline based on your own tastes, all that's going to happen is that you'll narrow your own audience to people who share similar tastes.

But hey, if you want to do a whole lot of extra work for nothing, go ahead and invent that baseline & evangelize those norms! I'm certainly not going to normatively declare that you shouldn't.

 

[Ashkelon]

I think things would be much more interesting if most feats gave +1 to an ability score + some other effect and when you get an ASI your choice is between +1 to two scores and a feat.

This would ensure that players would eventually get a 20 in their primary attribute, but also encourage picking feats first instead of attempting to get to a 20 in your primary ability first.

 

[Ovarwa]

You still need a reference point in order to determine whether the best feats should be weaker or the worst feats need to be better. Given that +2 to a stat is the trade-off that the game actually gives you, it makes sense to use that as reference, but it doesn't help at all that +2 to a stat has a wildly different value depending on which stat it is and whether or not it's your primary.

By similar reasoning, Sharpshooter has a wildly different value depending on whether it is taken by a paladin with Dex 8 or a Dex-based Ranger.... (In other words, I think it is pretty obvious that we're talking about choosing Dex+2 for a character who actually uses Dexterity versus taking Sharpshooter for a character who actually wants to use some kind of bow.)

 

[Rhenny]

By similar reasoning, Sharpshooter has a wildly different value depending on whether it is taken by a paladin with Dex 8 or a Dex-based Ranger.... (In other words, I think it is pretty obvious that we're talking about choosing Dex+2 for a character who actually uses Dexterity versus taking Sharpshooter for a character who actually wants to use some kind of bow.)

Also, a feat like defensive duelist becomes more powerful at higher levels so taking it at lower levels is less valuable. At lower levels the choice to take that feat would be more for flavor, with the promise that later it will be more valuable when proficiency bonus is +4, +5 or +6.