Do you want variety or bonuses in your feats?

[DracoSuave]

How do you balance Arcane Mutterings with Stinking Cloud?

You put them in entirely different buckets, is what 4e design tells us.

Interesting, right?

Combat-heavy game is combat-heavy.

What does this have to do with people deciding what they want out of feats for themselves?

 

[Ourph]

I would be happy enough to see feats removed from the game completely. I would also be happy enough to see feats that give mathematical bonuses removed from the game completely. But the thing that would make me over-the-moon happy would be if they did away with the feats that add situational bonuses to things. Hate those.

 

[keterys]

What does this have to do with people deciding what they want out of feats for themselves?

That they aren't. You _can't_ balance Arcane Mutterings against Stinking Cloud any more than you can balance Linguist against Light Blade Expertise.

I was answering the question you posed, quite directly, using the logic that informed many of the decisions as they developed 4E. In fact, one of their early decisions _was_ that you could take whatever feats you want and it wouldn't make much difference between two characters, whether one did Linguist and Skill Focus Diplomacy, or another took something more combative.

And then they apparently changed their mind.

So, the system is flawed. Whether that flaw is ever addressed, well, that's a different question, but you shouldn't act like it's a healthy happy shiny land where everyone gets to pick the feats they want, and yay, choice.

 

[DracoSuave]

And then they apparently changed their mind.

So, the system is flawed.

That's the logical step you need to establish more. It does not matter that they changed their minds. Changing one's mind does not mean that what you changed from was good and what you changed to was bad.

Whether that flaw is ever addressed, well, that's a different question, but you shouldn't act like it's a healthy happy shiny land where everyone gets to pick the feats they want, and yay, choice.

I think a balance between feats you want and feats you need is a good thing. I agree there isn't enough 'interesting' feats but that doesn't make flat utilitarian feats inherently bad. You get 18 of them over your carreer, not every feat slot is necessarily going to performance,

And, games where players don't put every feat slot into performance work just fine. And games where they do work just fine.

The question that should be asked is not 'Is Feat A balanced with Feat B' because that, as I was trying to point out, is a rediculously impossible task. The question that should be asked is 'Is the feat system fair for players?'

It's not about one feat vs one feat. Feats don't have feelings and aren't playing the game. It's whether the system, in toto, works for players. And I'm not convinced it doesn't. And no amount of 'This feat is boring but good and this feat is interesting but not as good' is proof enough of that when the reality is most characters can take both.

-----------------------------

Do we really need three active threads on one singular topic?

 

[keterys]

Eh, we can agree to disagree then. Any system in which you have a choice of, say, +4 to a key defense, or +5 to damage much of the time, or learning a couple languages... the languages get the short shrift.

And they keep publishing more and more feats, so even the kinda nifty "I get to shift after forced movement" or "I can swap out a power for a slightly different power feats" start looking worse, and worse, and worse, under the overwhelming weight of other more effective options.

Or, maybe we should get rid of utility powers and let people take attack powers in those slots. That's basically the same argument you're making about feats, so would you make the argument that would be good for the system to _also_ change that, as they did with feats?

 

[DracoSuave]

Eh, we can agree to disagree then. Any system in which you have a choice of, say, +4 to a key defense, or +5 to damage much of the time, or learning a couple languages... the languages get the short shrift.

Or you hit level 6 and you have all three. Also, comparing an epic feat, the combination of two feats for paragon tier, and a heroic feat is fairly disingenuous.

By the time you have that +4 to a key defense, you have 12 other feats. There are not, for most builds, 12 feats that are huge bonuses to basic stuff. You got room for other feats in there.

And they keep publishing more and more feats, so even the kinda nifty "I get to shift after forced movement" or "I can swap out a power for a slightly different power feats" start looking worse, and worse, and worse, under the overwhelming weight of other more effective options.

And yet, that's the only solution to not having enough interesting feats to take.

Or, maybe we should get rid of utility powers and let people take attack powers in those slots. That's basically the same argument you're making about feats, so would you make the argument that would be good for the system to _also_ change that, as they did with feats?

Some utility powers are combat powers that boost damage, defenses, or otherwise interact with combat. Other utility powers do interesting things like summon a servant to answer questions or give you bonuses to certain skills--no different than feats.

But regardless, comparing utility powers to feats is downplaying the fundamental differences inherent in them. By the time you have your second utility power, you already have at least 4 feats. At level 12, you have 8 feats, and 3 class utility powers. At level 30, you have 18 feats, and 5 class utility powers. The simple ability to pick and choose options for feats is vast compared to the desert of choices that are utility powers in comparison.

If you look at a single feat to feat comparison, yes, you'll find they don't always match up. But that's not how the game works in practice.

If, instead, you look at six feats vs six feats, things tend to work out a lot better.

Not to mention, feats like weapon focus, expertise, don't have such a huge impact on the game that you can't put off taking them in favor of feats that define your character. There are many players who take a more utilitarian feat at level 1, just because expertise and weapon focus just don't make that much of a difference until much, much, much, much later when the bonuses scale better. By that point, you have feats to burn.

Again, a feat by feat comparison is pointless.

 

[keterys]

Or you hit level 6 and you have all three. Also, comparing an epic feat, the combination of two feats for paragon tier, and a heroic feat is fairly disingenuous.

Headman's Chop and Linguist are both heroic, as are Backstabber and Light Blade Expertise. And the defense booster feats I was thinking of, for that matter.

At any rate... so I'm clear. Have you taken Linguist on any PC? Have you seen it taken by others and considered it a good use of a feat? I've got a changeling who I'd very cheerfully get more languages for who I haven't found a spot to take it yet, and I doubt I ever will... (though I might try to get more languages another way)

 

[DracoSuave]

Headman's Chop and Linguist are both heroic, as are Backstabber and Light Blade Expertise. And the defense booster feats I was thinking of, for that matter.

At any rate... so I'm clear. Have you taken Linguist on any PC? Have you seen it taken by others and considered it a good use of a feat? I've got a changeling who I'd very cheerfully get more languages for who I haven't found a spot to take it yet, and I doubt I ever will... (though I might try to get more languages another way)

Backstabber doesn't provide +5 damage in heroic. Neither does Light Blade Expertise. Neither does any of those defense feats provide +4 in heroic. Again, those bonuses are epic level. So, are you saying you can't find room for a feat you'd like amidst 12 other feat slots? Really? Really!?! You have 12 other, feats you simply MUST have?

Games I play in tend to feature combat more, so there's no need for Linguist.

Games I run tend to feature politics and negotiation more, so there's a real need for Linguist.

It's a situational feat, but when that situation occurs, it's damn near indispensable.

I know I know, game options based on the campaign being run?!? Inconceivable!

 

[SabreCat]

I voted #2, interpreting the first option as having to do with feats that are purely (at least effectively so) mathematical in nature, such as Expertise and Focus. I think those harm the game.

I'm also in the camp that would love to see bucketing between combat and non-combat options. Put skill-boosting utility powers in a different pool from the defense-and-movement utility powers. Put Linguist in a different pool of feats from Nimble Blade. That way nobody has to sacrifice effectiveness in one major arena of gameplay to boost themselves in the other*. It'd be a huge overhaul, but I would shed tears of joy to see it.

*There's an argument that this is a meaningful choice and taking it away by designing separate tracks is a bad thing. I find that the unpredictability of the combat/noncombat divide in any given game, and my desire for all players to be able to contribute about equally in the different spheres of gameplay, trump that for me. But YMMV.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

Do we really need three active threads on one singular topic?

Yes, we really do. Because for a host of reasons, people talking about this are coming from different perspectives as to what is important--sometimes multiple, incompatible perspectives from the same person in the same post.

There is the business perspectitve. E.g. WotC wants something to fill up books. This is fine if you want to talk practical stuff, though even then not entirely determinative. It is not fine if you want to talk good design, even if you acknowledge that good design will eventually have to be compromised for practical reasons. Compromises eventually made for competing design elements or other concerns are not the same thing as "compromises" conceded up front, thus forestalling whole avenues of exploration.

There is the scope issue. What do feats cover, how well do they do it, and how do you divide that scope up among the feats? You can't talk intelligently about that unless you are willing to put some kind of limits, however theoretical and tentative, on what feats can do. This is related to but different from balance issues. It does not help that people keep thinking that scope is only about balance. Scope affects balance, but it also affects handling time, ease of understanding the game, and other such decisions--not to mention frequently having a direct effect on flavor. See the 3E/3.5/4E skills.

There is the balance issue. Separate how much balance people want, versus what the tradeoffs are, versus unforced errors. Your whole complaint about people just doing whatever they want in different games assumes that the tradeoffs are king (i.e. to be avoided whenever possible) and that unforced errors don't exist. (I'll grant you that the uber char op position is to extreme the other way. I'm more sympathethic to your perspective than theirs. But you try to take too much ground here. There is a room for balance in good design, even when it isn't king.)

There is the mechanical issue of what area feats do cover, why, and how strict you want to be about it. By definition, feats are for things you have or you don't. Some aspects blur part of this mechanical design, some even on purpose.

And I'm probably leaving some stuff out. I'm certainly leaving out any misplaced angst about people trying to change the game into something X doesn't like. I say misplaced, because we have some minor ability to move things (cumulatively, over the life of the edition), but the simple fact of the matter is that much of this dicussion will never lead to anything more intrusive than a popular house rule, at best. Most of it will simply lead to nothing whatsoever. When the 5E (or next iteration of 4E) design team is thinking how to handle stuff, their design goals will drive it. Period.