rushlight said:
I'll use the (apparent) standard of "Is it too powerful?" - Is there ever a situation where, say a Bard (who I have in my game and is wanting the Arcane Strike feat) would opt to not use this feat? I can't imagine an instance where he wouldn't be converting every 4th and 5th level bard spell (of which there aren't any real "attack" spells short of Shadow Evocation) for attack bonuses and extra damage. Especially since his DCs will be lower than an average mage of similar level.
That's funny, I have no problem imagining many instances where the bard wouldn't convert spells to attack bonusses.
1. It doesn't look like a deadly fight and he expects more fights later. Bards don't have an awful lot of spell slots; they might well want to keep magic available for later. Obviously this is more of an issue if you're playing Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil than if you're playing Return to the Drawing Room of Mathilda Kaufman but all limited use abilities have a tendency to become unbalanced when the party expects to be able to unload everything they've got if there ever should be a combat encounter.
2. For the melee focussed bard, Dimension Door, Freedom of Movement, Greater Invisibility, Cure Critical Wounds, (all Brd 4), Greater Dispel Magic, Greater Heroism, and Summon Monster V are all rather useful spells. So are Eyebite, Hero's Feast, Greater Shout, and Otto's Irresistable Dance at 6th level. It's not hard to imagine a situation where one of the above spells would be far more useful than +4 to hit and +4d4 damage.
3. For the battle (but not melee-focussed) bard, there is also
4: Shout, Hold Monster, Dominate Person, 5: Mind Fog, Shadow Evocation, Song of Discord, Mass Suggestion, and 6: Find the Path (OK, it's not combat but it's still very very useful), Mass Cure Moderate Wounds, and Project Image. It's not hard to imagine a situation where I'd rather have one of those spells than a bonus to hit and damage.
So what I'm considering is this: Make the feat a Standard action to activate, and last 1d4+1 rounds before it needs to be re-activated. You'd still need to burn a spell each round (and while active that would be a free action). You could of course re-activate it after it wears off, and repeat. With it taking a standard action though, there would be circumstances where you would have to decide if you should use it or not.
Anyone think this is going too far? Not far enough?
I wouldn't touch that feat with a 10 foot pole. Standard actions are far too valuable to waste activating a feat that I might or might not find advantageous to use sometime next round (potentially, it could be over in 2 rounds--leaving only one round of use). Heck, right now, my fighter/wizard/Eldritch Knight (1/10/1)--the kind of melee focussed arcanist that the feat is ideal for--would hesitate before using the feat. +5 to hit and +5d4 to damage can be quite useful. On the other hand, a quickened ray or enfeeblement or a feeblemind is also quite useful. If he does the one, he won't have the other available. He would take the feat without a second thought (so long Still Spell, I'll just live with spell failure or without armor). However, he wouldn't always use it.
On the other hand, he'd never use your version of the feat. The standard action activation really kills it for him. (Most of his battles are halfway over by the end of the first round).