D&D 5E Metamagic as Feat

[Tales and Chronicles]

Hey guys,

I did it: I just made the jump and removed three classes at my table (they were not really played anyway). Monks, Sorcerer and Warlocks are now out. Wild, Draconic, Storm, Shadow and Clockwork origins, and Fey, Fiend, Undying, Great Old Ones, Celestial patrons are now Wizard traditions (all of'em have 4 archetypes features, so it maps nicely with the wizard's).

Now, since metamagic are no longer a sorcerer's thing and knowing that spellcaster do not have a lot of useful feats, I'd like to make metamagics available to all casting class. How would you do that?

Extended Spell (replicate the same for all metamagic option)
Prerequesite: Spellcasting
You have magical training that allows you to perform special enhancement for your spellcasting. You gain the following benefit:
When you cast a spell that has a duration of 1 minute or longer, you can double its duration, to a maximum duration of 24 hours.
You can not do so again until after you have taken a short or long rest.

Would you give a ability score increase with that?

 

[DND_Reborn]

Probably. Extended Spell was never one of the better metamagics IMO.

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

Probably. Extended Spell was never one of the better metamagics IMO.

But would you also give the other metamagic feats a stat increase? Martial Adept just gives you 1 superiority die, without any stat boost, so I'm kinda comparing my new feats to that one.

 

[DND_Reborn]

But would you also give the other metamagic feats a stat increase? Martial Adept just gives you 1 superiority die, without any stat boost, so I'm kinda comparing my new feats to that one.

LOL well, you picked a good one because I think Martial Adept is a pretty useless feat and no one IME has ever taken it. Of course, I've never seen anyone play a BM either... so there you go.

Given a metamagic feat is limited to one use, I would award all of them a boost. However, more powerful ones, just as Twinned Spell would be once per long rest (not short).

I wouldn't see any issue giving Martial Adept a +1 STR or DEX, either. shrug

 

[Samloyal23]

What motivated this leap?

 

[DEFCON 1]

Since you're requiring a feat to gain metamagic, I also think you're going to find very few takers if you only go with what you suggested in your first post. Most metamagic is so situational that it's not worth spending a feat on, not when you can gain ASIs instead.

To truly make metamagic something kind of worth taking, I personally think you need to really make it enticing. So I would say that taking the feat gives you both the Font of Magic ability and the baseline Metamagic ability. Thus when you take this feat:

METAMAGIC INITIATE

• You gain 2 sorcery points. You regain all spent sorcery points when you finish a Long Rest.
• As a Bonus action on your turn you can expend one spell slot and gain a number of sorcery points equal to the slot's level.
• You gain two of Metamagic options of your choice. You can use only one Metamagic option on a spell when you cast it, unless otherwise noted.

This gives a player two metamagic selections so they have a bit of variety. They also get two sorcery points, so for most of the standard metamagics that cost 1 point each they can use each one once or the same one twice per long rest. And because the more powerful metamagics require 2 or more sorcery points, I threw in the ability to change over your spell slots into more points so that you could use them. This can be done either in the middle of combat, or a caster could gain a bunch more points at the start of the day by burning spell slots for them out of combat.

Obviously I haven't playtested any of this to see if there are spells on the other casting class lists that might become too overpowered by adding metamagic to them... but at least this would give enough "stuff" for the feat slot that might make taking the feat worthwhile.

 

[Krachek]

A wizard bored of seeing its key spell counterspell by npc may find that pretty useful.

 

[Blue]

I have to admit, even with an ability score bonus I would probably never take a feat that is only usable once per short rest. Feats are my chance to customize a character.

I'd rather see it meaningful - make the feat such that it impacts how the character is played. That's a real customization option. That will probably make it too powerful to add in an ability score bonus.

Extend is one of the more situational metamagics in terms of effectiveness. For example, Quickened or Twined I'd be more restricive about. But with Extend I would go all out:

Option 1: Everything is extended!
When you cast a non-Concentration spell with a non instantaneous or permanent duration, the duration is +100% to a maximum of 24 hours. You can increase it more or apply it to Concentration spells by casting using a slot of higher level, gaining +100% of the original duration per 1 level upcast, but still capped at 24 hours.

Option 2: Long extensions
When you cast a spell with a non instantaneous or permanent duration, you may increase the units to the next largest. You may do this a number of times per long rest equal to your casting ability score (minimum 1). Spell slots used to cast these spells may not be regained by any means until the spell ends.

Round -> Minute -> 10 Minute -> Hour -> 8 Hour -> Day/24 Hour -> Week (maximum extension)


YES, these can be used very effectively. That's the value of a feat - they can make a big change.

 

[Samloyal23]

I miss feat chains... I know some people like the way feats work in 5E, but given how few feats there are in the PH it just seems like the vast variety of options from 3E has been chucked out the window. Metamagic and item creation feats made things way simpler for spellcasters...

 

[DEFCON 1]

I think part of the problem with 5E feats are that most of them just don't give you enough "stuff" for their purchase to make it feel like its worth taking. Not when you only get to make 1 or possibly 2 total selections since most games don't end up reaching 12th level anyway. And then on top of that, one of those two selections usually ends up being an ASI.

Case in point, the Grappler and the Tavern Brawler feats... both of them enhance what those different aspects do (grappling and improvised/unarmed combat)... but neither of those things are done enough in the game to make it feel like you're actually getting something worthwhile for taking the feat. When I re-did a lot of the feats for my game, I just thought "Are either grappling and unarmed/improvised weapon combat so overpowered that it would kill me to give someone both feats?" And the answer was 'No'. If someone in my game wanted to be that kind of person who forsook their weapons (and all the class features they had to enhance them) in order to grapple and brawl... then just them go wild with it. So I combined the feats together and made:

BRAWLER

• You are proficient with improvised weapons and unarmed strikes.
• Your unarmed strikes and improvised weapon attacks use a d4 for damage.
• When you hit a creature with an unarmed strike or improvised weapon on your turn, you can use a Bonus action to make an unarmed strike or attempt to grapple the target.
• Whenever you make a STR (Athletics) check to grapple a creature or escape a grapple, you are considered proficient in the Athletics skill and add double your proficiency bonus to the check.
• You have Advantage on attack rolls against a creature you are grappling.
• You can use your Action to try to pin a creature grappled by you-- make another grapple check and if successful both you and your target are Restrained until the grapple ends.

Now neverminding the fact I'm sure there are optimizer players out there who will see this and immediately formulate sixty-five different ways to break the game using my feat above... for my normal players in my normal game, it actually gave the person a whole heap of stuff for taking the feat. All kinds of cool, small stuff they could do. And that's what I wanted-- a feat that boosts many small but similar isolated parts of the game to really make it feel like this person is that kind of person. This person is a brawler... because they get to do a whole ton of brawling stuff and get brawling bonuses that others don't get.

On a similar note, I found the Athlete and Mobile feats to both have some nice ideas... but not nearly enough to feel like it'd be worthwhile to forsake an ASI or combat feat for them. So I combined and edited both of them as well to really give you a highly-mobile character if you took it:

FREERUNNER

• Your speed increases by 10 feet.
• You may use a Bonus action on your turn to take the Dash action.
• Difficult terrain doesn't cost you extra movement.
• When you are prone, standing up uses only 5 feet of your movement.
• Climbing doesn't halve your speed.
• You can make a running long or high jump after moving only 5 feet rather than 10.
• When falling, you may reduce the distance fallen by 20' for the purposes of calculating damage.

This is something that an athletic-focused character would actually enjoy taking, and would definitely make this character feel different than the other PCs. They get a lot of really good meat that might only occur in isolated circumstances, but will be exceedingly useful when it does.

And then for the smarter group of PCs out there... I combined two of the lamer feats together, Linguist and Keen Mind, plus added in a bit from Observant to give the character a lot of stuff to get for spending a feat slot:

LINGUIST

• You may learn three languages of your choice.
• You can ably create written cyphers, and whenever you make an INT check to decipher a code or puzzle you are considered proficient in the applicable skill and add double your proficiency bonus to the check.
• You can communicate simple instructions non-verbally to allies that can see you and share your same language.
• You can read the lips of creatures you can see and whose language you understand.
• You can accurately recall anything you have seen or heard within the past month.

I can understand why they decided to lessen the power of the feats... because they didn't want things at the very beginning of the game's life to go really far off the reservation because they didn't know yet what was going to be truly important. So doing things like a couple small abilities plus a half-ASI was probably a little safer. But now all these years in... we know that if you are taking a feat its because you want to make your character stand out from the others in the group... and a half-ASI doesn't lend itself to that. That's just the same as anyone could and would take. So instead, I just let my players go all-in on the specialty stuff they wanted to do. And for the most part it worked out.