I didn't think that was the complaint. I thought the complaint was that it causes spotlight imbalance between team members (eg duelist and two-weapon types tend to be overshadowed by archers and great-weapon types).
My own view is that the debate around these feats shows the general flaw of the power attack mechanic. It is a purely mathematical trick that has no connection to the ingame fiction. The particular mathematical trick is the play on the fact that D&D uses both a to hit roll and a damage roll to determine the resolution of a declared attack.
Because it is a purely mathematical trick, it is prone to break down whenever the mathematics of the game falls outside the parameters that the designers had in mind in establishing the numerical trade-offs for the power-attack ability. And because huge swathes of D&D mechanics are all about tweaking those mathematics (ability score boosts, magic items, spells, etc) it turns out to be not that hard for that sort of break down to occur, particularly among players who pay attention to the maths. (That's not all of them, but it's not a negligible number, either, given that "paying attention to the maths" is a common trait among serious game players in general, a category that is over-represented among RPGers compared to humanity as a whole.)
It should be possible to define feats that serve the same function but aren't prone to mathematical breakdown. As I posted, it seems to me there are two main alternatives:
* If the point of the feat is a modest damage boost, change it to give one. That is what +1 to STR/DEX does. Another option is a flat +2 to damage.
* If the point of the feat is to give the player the thrill of occasional spike damage, redesign around that. The 1x/turn rationing is one approach, but perhaps not very thrilling because chosen by the player. Linking it to a particular natural attack roll (say, +5 to damage on an even attack roll that hits) might be better.
* If the feat is meant to involve a trade-off, make the trade-off something that does not operate in the same dimension of combat resolution as damage - eg to gain the damage bonus you have to take a -2 penalty to AC until the start of your next turn (the logic might be that a GWF is attacking more and defending less; a sharpshooter is taking more risks to aim the perfect shot).
The suggested solution that players should just not use their PC abilities strikes me as unsatisfactory. I think an RPG should be designed so that player use of their PC abilities makes for a fun experience, not so that that players have to second guess whether or not actually deploying the game elements will make for good play.
