D&D 5E Adding Feats to the Existing Backgrounds

[TerraDave]

The Squire of Solamnia feat gives weapon and armor proficiencies, and the Mage of High Sorcery feat gives spells, so we have to assume any background feat should be on a similar power level to those.

Right, these are junior feats. They are not Lucky or Sharpshooter.

They are also prerequisites. They are a way of linking background to potential, better feats, in a way that is quite strong.

Also, we don't know what's going to happen with feats in the PHB. As things stand now, no, don't bother. Keep feats at a minimal option. If they fix feats, well, anything is possible.

 

[TerraDave]

FWIW, every group I know of plays this way already... so I could easily see WotC following the lead.

FWIW I know of no group that plays this way.

 

[cbwjm]

I keep on saying I'm just going to grant a feat at 1st level and then I keep forgetting to do it.

If I was going to grant a feat with a background, I'd probably let the player choose a thematic feat related to their background. Sage might get keen mind or magic initiate, almost any background could get skilled or the skill expert feat. Soldier might be the best for various combat feats, etc.

 

[DND_Reborn]

FWIW I know of no group that plays this way.

That's good to know, because I see it all the time...

Now, my personal favorite is allowing players to drop racial ASIs for a feat and that is currently how I run my mod-game; and yes, this means variant human can get two feats instead of two ASI +1s and a feat. For the other races, losing a +2 and +1 for a feat makes it a trade off you have to really want.

I should emphasize rolling scores in my mod-game limits you to 15's, so you can just roll really high and choose to forego the racial ASIs for a feat because you got lucky.

 

[JEB]

I could also see some of the previously cultural race traits becoming backgrounds.

That exactly why they're in backgrounds though. The idea is that they're learned from experience instead of being inherited.

Very good analysis. Spot on, I think.

In previous discussions on the changes to D&D races, the idea of enhancing backgrounds to replace the removed cultural traits had been raised. Seems like this could be Wizards' attempt to do that.

 

[Blue]

It came up in the Dragonlance UA thread that it seems likely backgrounds will be granting a feat moving forward. If so, presumably the 2024 revision will update the core backgrounds to match this standard. So, of the currently existing feats, which, if any, do you think might get added to which of the currently existing backgrounds?

The UA did not add feats. It replaced background features with custom feats so that others can take aspects fo those backgrounds during play as well. So all of the features can become feats, and then the backgrounds add them.

So no existing feats would be moved into play for backgrounds.

 

[Jacob Lewis]

Are feats still optional? Or have backgrounds become optional? Can you take ability scorce increase instead?

 

[CleverNickName]

Eh, I don't have a problem with your Background giving you a feat. I have a house-rule that lets players start with a feat at 1st level regardless, and it hasn't broken the game. (But only one feat. If they're already getting to start with a feat because of their ancestry or whatever, they don't get to start with another one.)

Linking that feat to the player's choice of Background makes a lot of sense to me. That said, I'd prefer they keep this an optional rule, and they never put it in the Player's Handbook, and they state at least six times in six different places that it is optional and subject to DM approval, which I wish they would have done all along with Feats (and with Multiclassing, now that I think about it.)

...whew. Sorry, got a bit worked up there. Just make it clear that they're optional, and that they might not be suitable for every setting. That'll do it for me.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

The UA did not add feats. It replaced background features with custom feats so that others can take aspects fo those backgrounds during play as well. So all of the features can become feats, and then the backgrounds add them.

So no existing feats would be moved into play for backgrounds.

That is interesting. You could still use existing feats or new feats duplicating features

Are feats still optional? Or have backgrounds become optional? Can you take ability scorce increase instead?

I see no reason why backgrounds would not be built in and feats still be optional. as such you can have the one feat that is your background, but not able to take more... or you can take the optional rules and be able to take feats as you level.

 

[Blue]

That is interesting. You could still use existing feats or new feats duplicating features


I see no reason why backgrounds would not be built in and feats still be optional. as such you can have the one feat that is your background, but not able to take more... or you can take the optional rules and be able to take feats as you level.

Sure, we can go outside the scope of what the UA did and make up our own rules. But we could do that anyhow.

I was talking about mimicking what the UA did, which was strictly move features to a feat, and then grant that feat.