D&D 4E Most useless 4e Feat?

[renau1g]

My fighter uses Power Attack almost all the time. Two-handed you get +3 extra damage. She uses a bastard sword and is a Two-Hand specialist so the Proficiency and Fighter bonus cancels out the -2.

Well, it doesn't cancel it out, it just mitigates it somewhat. You are still at a -2 penalty vs not using it. So you're giving up approx. 10% hit rate for an x% bump in damage. At lower levels the +3 damage is decent, but it doesn't scale well (if it's only +3 all the way through)

 

[Kurtomatic]

Power Attack can be fried awesome on a stick for avengers. No doubt that there are universally useless feats out there, but just because your characters can't use a feat, doesn't mean there isn't a build out there that can leverage it.

 

[yesnomu]

Well, it doesn't cancel it out, it just mitigates it somewhat. You are still at a -2 penalty vs not using it. So you're giving up approx. 10% hit rate for an x% bump in damage. At lower levels the +3 damage is decent, but it doesn't scale well (if it's only +3 all the way through)

Scales to +4/+6 at Paragon and +6/+9 at Epic. Not too bad, though you do have to make sure it's worth it (leader buffs and the like help).

Alchemical Opportunist is one I always take on the Character Builder at level 10--because it's so situational that there's never any doubt about which feats get traded out when I hit 11.

Evasion and Mettle are probably also not ever worth it, due to the paucity of monsters with miss damage.

 

[DracoSuave]

Well, it doesn't cancel it out, it just mitigates it somewhat. You are still at a -2 penalty vs not using it. So you're giving up approx. 10% hit rate for an x% bump in damage. At lower levels the +3 damage is decent, but it doesn't scale well (if it's only +3 all the way through)

It actually depends on your existing chance to hit. The hit rate change is 2 outcomes, but it is not a 10% difference in due to hits. It's actually closer to about 20%. However, this might be mitigated by the amount of damage done across the outcomes you have remaining.

The math on this becomes pretty simple:

P is the number of outcomes that lead to a successful hit before power attacking, x is the average amount of damage dealt with a successful hit, and d is the amount of damage power attack gives you as a bonus.

This gives you the formula (P-2)(d) > 2x, or P-2 > 2x/d.

Then, P can be calculated as 21 - R, where R is the number you normally need to roll to hit, which in turn can be calculated as D - A, where D is the defense and A is the attack bonus.

21 - (D - A) - 2 > 2x/d

19 + A - D > 2x/d

19 + A - 2x/d > D

Thusly, you can easily calculate at what Defense do you start to see profit from Power Attack. Then you can use that to make an informed decision about whether or not you want to take the feat.

Take a level 8 fighter, using brash strike, with an +2 execution axe, 20 Str, 18 Con, and Expertise, but not weapon focus.

His attack bonus with this power is 4+5+2+2+1 for a total of +14. His damage is (1d10+2)+5+4+2=av. 18.5.

19 + 14 - 2(18.5)/3 > D
33 - 37/3 > D
33 - 12.33 > D
20.67 > D.

Most equal level monsters have a defense of 22, with some 20s and a few 24s. It's on par about, so it's not really a worthwhile feat to take.

However, on a polearm fighter, used with attacks of opportunity, it's a much different story. Instead of 18 Con, go 18 Wisdom. Take a glaive, and use HBO so you can reaping strike with those AOs. Go level 11... and make the weapon + 3. The attack bonus in this case is 5+5+3+1+4=18, and the average damage (which doesn't count strength bonus because with reaping strike hits or misses both apply it) becomes 2d4+3, or 8.

19 + 18 - 2(8)/3 > D
37 - 16/3 > D
37 - 5.33 > D
31.67 > D

Looking at average AC at this level, high AC would be 27, low would be 23.

For -this- build, Power Attack would be an exceedingly beneficial feet. Even if you took Weapon focus, that would only change the formula to 30 > D which would -still- mean Power Attack is working for you.

 

[RigaMortus2]

Linguist has a use if you're in a campaign with a lot of cross-cultural roleplay, and where languages actually matter.

Most useless one would be Focused Expertise.

Focused Expertise has a use in you're in a campaign where the DM does not allow Versatile Expertise. (oh yeah, I went there)

 

[noodle fish mice]

My Eberron character was a 13-year-old child prodigy wizard whose whole character concept was that he was a knowledge-devouring nerd.

He took Linguist TWICE.

 

[Wepwawet]

My Eberron character was a 13-year-old child prodigy wizard whose whole character concept was that he was a knowledge-devouring nerd.

He took Linguist TWICE.

Yeah, that's awesome, but it doesn't make Linguist any more useful...

 

[garyh]

Here's an example of bad feat design from today's warden Class Acts.

Unseelie Blight
Prerequisite: Drow, warden
Benefit: When you hit an enemy with a warden encounter attack power, the target cannot benefit from any concealment until the end of your next turn.

First off, how many drow (dex/cha race) wardens (str and con/wis class) have EVER been made in 4e? There's no stat or flavor synergy at all, and this feat certainly isn't enough to overcome that. Denying concealment when you hit with an encounter power? How many times a fight is THAT going to matter?

The only good thing about is that, due to the pre-req's, no one will EVER have to worry about this cluttering up the screen in the Character Builder.

 

[DracoSuave]

Yeah, that's awesome, but it doesn't make Linguist any more useful...

It doesn't make it less useful.

If all your doing in your game is kicking down doors and stealing treasures from monsters, then yeah, Linguist is useless. But if Diplomacy, Intimidation, Bluff, social skill challenges, reading clues from ancient things, and communication are things that might go on in your game, then Linguist is far from useless.

Are you going to other planes? Linguist is not useless.

Are you reading tomes to discover the whereabouts of doors to kick and treasures to take? Linguist is not useless.

Linguist doesn't max out your damage/healing meters, no. But it DOES allow avenues and story telling opportunities to arise where they didn't already before. Even in a tactical sense, if you can understand the communication between monsters, you can actually use that to your advantage.

But hey... it's totally useless cause it doesn't give you +1 damage with twin strike. Cause that's more important than moving the story along.

 

[Prestidigitalis]

I would nominate one-two punch feats like the Swordmage's Combat Casting [ When you use a melee swordmage attack power and hit an enemy, your ranged and area swordmage attack powers don’t provoke opportunity attacks until the end of your next turn. ] and Closing Advantage [ When you use a ranged or area swordmage attack power and hit an enemy, you gain a +1 bonus to attack rolls and damage rolls with melee swordmage attack powers until the end of your next turn.]

They are both too situational and don't take into account actual Swordmage power usage. Swordmages have few ranged and area attacks in the first place, and every Swordmage I've seen spams Swordburst, which gets no benefit from either feat.