New playtest and feats...did I miss something?

[cynicaloptimist]

The high eleven roguish necromancic assassin, gliding around a ballroom, consuming the spirit of a just felled victim to gain advantage for his next sneak attack, perpetuating the cycle until the floor is littered with soulless corpses.

Or a high elven fighter swashbuckler sage, who intersperses his sword jabs with offhand magic missiles.

 

[Connorsrpg]

So, has there been any word that Feats 'have levels' or are PCs free to chose ANY feat including taking the feats from their specialty in reverse order?

 

[PinkRose]

Wow. I got quoted a bunch.
What I meant was keeping pre-req. is a good thing, because, to me, it adds flavor. A Dwarf Fighter with no spell casting shouldn't be a necromancer, in my opinion. An Elf fighter (who meets the pre-req.) sounds fine, to me.
When I said Fighter, I meant, non-spellcaster. I apologize.
This weekend at GenCon, I created a Human Cleric of the God of Sun, with a Sage background and Necromancer Specialty.
Nothing wrong with it.
Of course, all pre-reqs are optional with a good backstory and an allowing DM.

 

[Kobold Stew]

The high eleven roguish necromancic assassin, gliding around a ballroom, consuming the spirit of a just felled victim to gain advantage for his next sneak attack, perpetuating the cycle until the floor is littered with soulless corpses.

I am firmly in the camp that this is a feature not a bug.

Indeed! This is one of the things I was excited about when I first read the package (here).

(Though you won't be able to make great use of Aura of Souls, who doesn't want an undead minion from time to time?)

 

[Grimmjow]

i feel like the specialties are just there to guide you along a road that you CAN take. If you want to be a better archer, take these feats. If you want more HP, he's this one. Wanna tank, here you go.

The reason they said you can pick one is because you dont have to stay within the speciality. If you want to take defender at level one and toughness at level 3, you can do that. Specialties are simply a guideline to make "this" kind of a character

 

[ComradeGnull]

So, has there been any word that Feats 'have levels' or are PCs free to chose ANY feat including taking the feats from their specialty in reverse order?

I wouldn't draw too many conclusions about what individual Feat selection will look like based on the Specialties- the Specialties are meant as an all-or-nothing package with an associated progression, and reverse-engineering individual feats from them involves making some big assumptions.

Personally, I suspect that you will eventually see:
* Level 3 Feats have a minimum level of three to select or use them
* Level 1 Feats are pre-requisites to Level 3 feats in the same specialty

So if you want to be a Magic-User and a Necromancer with a familiar and a skeletal servant, you will need to spend four Feats on it, always selecting Aura of Souls before Undead Servant and selecting Arcane Dabbler before Familiar. You won't be able to get an Undead minion or a familiar before level three, and it will probably be level 6-7+ before you get all four.

 

[Connorsrpg]

Thanks. I am aware of what they are trying to do with Specialties and I like them.

BUT still want an answer regarding the choice of feats. ARE levels going to be prereqs? Can you take the feats out of order?

To me I would say yes - is Two-Weapon Defense any better than Two-Weapon Fighting for eg? I think not and as a DM would allow a player to take them in in reverse order if they so wished.

OR, have we heard anywhere Feats are going to get level reqs? I hope not.

 

[Li Shenron]

Also, feats have pre-requisits. So what happens if you take a spec, but dont meet one of the pre-reqs for a feat?

Prerequisites are cool and make the feat system consistent, but the truth is, they are not all absolutely necessary. If you removed all prerequisites to all feats currently in the playtest, most of these feats would still work, while only a few of them won't.

Take for instance the Necromancer theme: Aura of Souls and Animate Servant both requires to be a spellcaster, but only the first one then actually use your spellcasting ability and would make no sense mechanically if you couldn't cast spells.

Instead the second ability requires spellcasting but doesn't use it, so what happens if you ignore the requisite for Animate Servant? That you can have a Rogue or a Fighter with a skeleton minion.

OTOH, you can have a Rogue or a Fighter with a skeleton minion.

That could be unacceptable in some campaign and totally awesome in another.