Rethinking Feats

[SabreCat]

I've had the opportunity to create new paragon tier characters a few times recently, and found that feats are a surprisingly scarce resource. There are so many fantastically powerful, everybody-wants-'em feats in the post-Essentials world that the choices that actually help differentiate character concepts can be hard to squeeze in. Getting all your attack, defense, and damage boosts pretty much sucks up all your heroic tier picks, and it stings to pass them up. So I'm wondering... might it be worthwhile to make all the must-have feats part of the level progression somehow, and give more breathing room for character-defining feats in the usual "slots"? Characters would be more powerful overall, but it'd level the playing field in that non-optimizers wouldn't overlook crucial feats, and you're not penalized in the skirmish game by making RP decisions.

The way I see it...

Everyone Wants

• Expertise
• Focus
• +Fort/Ref/Will (Superior if possible)
• Resilient Focus
• Straightforward numeric upgrades to class features (Backstabber, Improved Armor of Faith)
• Superior weapon or implement (with rare exceptions, like dagger Rogues who want two enchantments usable at range)

These are the things I'd like to work into the level progression. Rather than spend a feat on Expertise, you get that automatically at level X. Rather than take Backstabber, your Sneak Attack dice would go up to d8s at some point in your career. You could choose when to take one thing over another, but not have to worry about being able to fit them all in.


Maybe Must-Have?

• Feats everyone wants but which have high prereqs (Crit range feats)
• Armor Specialization/Finesse/Agility
• Unarmored Agility for cloth wearers
• Upgrades to racial powers (Rigged Chance, Versatile Master)
• Action point upgrades (Dooming Action, Slaying Action)

I don't have the same strong sense with these of "everybody takes this" that I do with the big ones above, but they seem like things that might be worth making part of the progression. Should all strikers with rolled bonus damage get the ability to do it again on an action point (maybe at paragon tier when your APs get upgraded by your path)? Should everybody crit on 19-20 at Epic?


Could Use Incentivizing

• Skill Training
• Skill Focus
• Circumstantial non-combat bonuses (Expert Ritualist, Animal Empathy)

In my experience, these are the first things jettisoned in favor of combat effectiveness. Perhaps they could be put onto a separate feat track, so that choosing one of these doesn't have an opportunity cost against combat badassery? (Utility powers have the same issue, but that's a story for another day.)


Perfect Fit for Feat Picks As-Is

• Multiclass feats (though power swaps maybe ought to be retrains, feat-cost-free)
• Dragonmark feats
• Boosts to specific keywords or damage types (Psychic Lock, Lasting Frost)
• Fighting style feats (Two-Weapon Defense, True Arrow Style)
• Buy off penalties (Distant Shot, Blind-Fight)
• Circumstantial bonuses (Defensive Mobility, Improved Initiative)
• New capabilities or tricks (Skill Power, Channel Divinity feats)

Those are the sorts of feats I'd like to see people spend their RAW picks on. Fun, combat-oriented, distinctive. The more it lines up with the plain-English meaning of the word "feat," the better.


That's all a brainstorm. What do people think? Have others already done overhauls like this? Did I miss things in the must-have category? Any suggestions on implementation?

 

[hipnotode]

i think the type of feats you choose is more influenced by the type of DM/group you have, if you have alot of skillchalenges, then your more likely to take skill feats, if you rollplay more, youll take feats like group mindlink/linguist more. it all depends on how ou play the game. not every group is a slashfest.
i think if you want a group to aviod picking certain feats, vary your playstyle more, make the more rarly picked feats more apealing by making them more usefull in game.

 

[the-golem]

SabreCat, all your points have merit. I know with the Essentials versions, some of the "necessary" feats are included. (For example the Hunter (Ranger) and Crossbow Expertise, and the Knight (Fighter) gets Shield Finesse),

I know there have been maths threads that pretty much conclude that the expertise and such feats are almost mandatory to get the numbers to work out.


I'd just like to mention, that these types of feats aren't all everyone thinks about. For example, I've rolled a Earthsoul Genasi Warlord for my D&D meetup game (although i flavor it as a Bakluni character who's tribe made some pacts with Earth Ifrits or somesuch ). TO enforce this theme, I've taken 3 or so other feats that add flavor and such to my Earthsoul Racial Ability. Off the top of my head, adds +1d8 damage, 2squares of push, and either the +str feat, or the "removed from play" feat.

 

[Mengu]

I too would like to work the boring yet exceptionally good/near mandatory feats (as well as item bonuses to damage) into the system.

I'd just try to insert the features at certain levels. Something in the lines of:

Level 1: Superior weapon or implement.
Level 3: +1 feat bonus to *all* damage (increase to +2/+3 at level 11/21).
Level 5: +1 feat bonus to *all* attack rolls (increase to +2/+3 at level 11/21).
Level 7: Improved Defenses
Level 21: Crit on 19-20 with *all* attack rolls.

Also to address the basic attack issue at level 1, I would add the old version of melee training, and also make a "basic implement training" feat, and have the player pick which one they want. Basic implement training would essentially give a version of eldritch blast based on stat of choice, dealing 1d8+stat damage, instead of 1d10. I think every weapon user should be able to make a basic attack with their weapon, and every implement user should be able to make a basic attack with their implement. Seems like the first thing an adventurer would learn how to do.

I don't think the "maybe must have" list all that must have, though as DM, it is frustrating to see canned feat lists for certain characters, especially through heroic, but hopefully the elimination of some of the common themes would open up more options and bring more variety.

For incentivizing skill focus, I think you need a new set of skill focus feats, that are +2 instead of the +3, and do one other small thing related to the skill. Examples:

Acrobatics: once per encounter make a save to not be knocked prone
Arcana: gain resist fire 3/5/8.
Endurance: once per encounter make a save to not be pushed/pulled/slid
Perception: gain low-light vision
Stealth: at the beginning of encounter if you have cover or concealment make a stealth check.

You're basically creating two for one feats people might not otherwise pick up individually, but becomes more enticing when you combine them. The system needs more of these in general.

I like your list of perfect fit for feat picks. Those are the kinds of feats I would like to see more of as well.

Of course you can always ignore conventional wisdom and play what you want instead of playing what you feel you have to, to be effective. I have a level 10 warlord (soon to be Commando Captain) with a somewhat unconventional set of feats. I went with

1. Scale Armor Proficiency
2. Warrior of the Wild (Perception)
4. Skill training (Stealth)
6. Inspiring Breath
8. Skill power (Guided Shot)
10. Heavy armor agility

Next level I will retrain heavy armor agility for scale specialization, and pick up Combat Commander. Even my items from my elven cloak, to agile scale, to catstep boots, to dynamic belt, and wolfen longsword, support my commando leader concept. I don't have the optimization feats like bastard sword, improved defenses, superior will, improved inspiring word, etc. But none of those feats would add to my concept. Scale armor (which negates the skill check penalties) is really the only feat that helps optimization and the concept. I was also very tempted to pick up Dragonborn Senses to help me with setting up ambushes at night, but couldn't bring myself to do it.

In any case, I would certainly like to see more incentives to follow a concept and feel good about your choices, than to feel you must pick the feats that give you more pluses. A rogue with expertise, backstabber, weapon focus, nimble blade, improved defenses, etc. is doing their job well, but the feats haven't really contributed to making the character any more interesting. He hits and does damage, just like he could at level 1. A daring rogue swashbuckler with bard MC for diplomacy and majestic word, skill power agile recovery, mark of passage, rash sneak attack, and maybe durable, just sounds infinitely more interesting and well rounded to me.

 

[hipnotode]

id like to point out that (if min-maxing) any leader job other than shaman's first two feats will probably be "spitit talker" and "mending spirit", just because then they get another per encounter heal, rasing them to 3 at level 2 (level 1 if human), and 4 at level 16.

ive also been thinking about this thread since my last post, and have come to the conclusion that i think the level 2 feat should be moved down to level 1. this is because the feat you take at level one is posibly the most important feat you can take from a fluff perspective, it defines your character more as it is another ability that you can say that your character has had since birth/some pivital event ect, while every other feat after that you have learned during your campain, they dont help shape your characters past.

 

[SabreCat]

i think the type of feats you choose is more influenced by the type of DM/group you have, if you have alot of skillchalenges, then your more likely to take skill feats, if you rollplay more, youll take feats like group mindlink/linguist more.

That's a fair point. I definitely feel the pinch in feat selection much more in "boardgame-plus" style games than in ones where you have frequent battlemat-free sessions.

Still, there are two reasons it's worthwhile to do some revision like I'm pondering, regardless of play style:

- When you pick a few flavor feats, you have that many fewer feats to spend on core combat effectiveness, and the must-haves become moreso rather than less. I'd like to remove that tension.

- I find scenes to be most fun when everyone can contribute. People get spotlight moments for their specialties, but I don't like seeing a character get pummeled in combat because they didn't pick up Superior NADs, or failing out of one skill challenge after another because they did. That sort of thing can happen regardless of the balance of combat/skills in a campaign, by virtue of the fact that usually there's going to be at least some of both.

4e aimed as a design goal to make everybody combat-capable; I find that the existence of Expertise/Superior Defenses/etc. establishes a new baseline for "combat-capable" that I'd like to make it easy to achieve. Picking some skill feats shouldn't undercut that.

 

[hipnotode]

4e aimed as a design goal to make everybody combat-capable; I find that the existence of Expertise/Superior Defenses/etc. establishes a new baseline for "combat-capable" that I'd like to make it easy to achieve. Picking some skill feats shouldn't undercut that.

maybe the way to go would be to go the other way, to remove such feats, or maybe just strongly encourage against them, saving them more for letting chars with lower main scores etc. catch up than them setting a base.
or maybe encourage PC's to only pick feats from the list associated with there job. the wizard doesn't necessarily need huge defenses if hes standing behind a decent paladin for example.

 

[SabreCat]

maybe the way to go would be to go the other way, to remove such feats, or maybe just strongly encourage against them, saving them more for letting chars with lower main scores etc. catch up than them setting a base.

That's a way to go about it. I find things to be much more fun (on both sides of the screen) when I hand out extra goodies rather than say "no, you can't have that" to a bunch of things, though.

 

[hipnotode]

yeah, im usualy of the philosiphy of pimp-not-gimp, but im just starting to think, if these feats are just taken by everyone, and thus just rasing the bar, i dont really see the point in them being there in the first place.

 

[SabreCat]

yeah, im usualy of the philosiphy of pimp-not-gimp, but im just starting to think, if these feats are just taken by everyone, and thus just rasing the bar, i dont really see the point in them being there in the first place.

Some of them (Expertise, Improved Defenses) help make the game's math work out better. The discussion of this has been hammered into the ground, and generally speaking people have come down as convinced or not of this fact and stuck to their positions from there. I'm in the camp that believes the feats are a patch for an actual defect in the game design, so if I disallowed them, I'd be fixing the math some other way anyway.

Others (Focus, superior weaponry) beat down monsters' HP faster and thus make for speedier combats, so I'd rather not strip them out either.

A case could be made for banning the uncommonly awesome feats that don't fix a math problem, e.g. Resilient Focus, though.