Do you want variety or bonuses in your feats?

[I'm A Banana]

The problem is you're going to just shift that to other choices. Even if you remove 'feat tax' feats... the min maxer is still going to min-max regardless of the feat choices before him.

I don't really care of a minmaxer minmaxes. Like you said, they don't have to. If having a bigger...er...attack bonus is vitally important to them, let them pump it up and feel like MR. Tough Guy. No sweat off my back.

For the record, I'd also like the dramatist to dramatize, the chill guy to be chill, and the mischief-maker to make mischief. People should do what they have fun doing.

Problems enter more when the minmaxer has a +7 with Swords and a +4 with hammers, so they try to hawk their magic hammer to the first passerby.

Or when the "character player" has a +4 with everything while everyone else has a +7 with something, and so whiffs on ALL of their attacks instead of just their hammer attacks.

That's when people stop having fun, since your game is narrow and dull, or your constant misses are leading you to think that playing Torchlight has a lot less math...

Giving both players +5 with everything would help out immensely in both situations. And if the minmaxer can eke out a situational +7 and the character player occasionally has a pointless ability, it's less of a problem overall. In part because it is a rare event, rather than a constant state of affairs.

Kamikaze Midget then questions that with why he should have to and that he must be "doing it wrong" (since in his mind, the game should be able to work without having an active hand in it.)

Hey, Internet Psychic, your mind-reading device is broken.

I really just believe I shouldn't have to frickin' babysit my D&D game. "No, Jenny, don't choose that feat, your character is too narrowly focused. No, Auggie, don't pick that feat, it's useless. No, Thomas, don't put that mini in your mouth, you might choke."

I have enough responsibilities as a DM without protecting my players from the game they're playing. A good DM can solve all problems. A good game shouldn't need a good DM to solve its problems, though.

I'm really kind of mystified about the defensiveness over this. It's not like spinning feats off into two camps would hurt anyone, as far as I can see. Billy Big Bonus has his numbers to tweak, and Versatile Vanessa has her pool of possibilities to plumb. And Lazy DM KM can get on with the game, without having to remind anyone to brush their teeth and remember their jacket.

And yet this is not a problem in most campaigns, only those that have a mix of characters. And that is solveable through the DM enacting his duty to moderate the campaign, including player options.

IMXP, most groups are a mix of characters. Very few groups stake out one extreme position and draw a line in the sand separating them from every other position. This is especially true when the groups are new, and when players and DMs alike have the biggest chance of falling into the "I'll take Linguist, You'll take Improved Defenses, and those are entirely similar options because it costs the same resource to get them!" trap.

 

[DracoSuave]

Regardling the +7/+4 disparity... what is the DM doing?

This is hardly a new question, the answer has always been that. It's been that in every rpg ever made and it isn't the syste, tp b;a,e/

I mean, it's not right to accept the thesis that the DM has no responsibility in his game.

Worst, why are the players not comprimising or helping eahc other? This is a team game.

The problem is less pronounced than in previous editions because while you can fall behind someone optimized, it's not difficult to get a handful of feats to make youeffctive, if you're not effective. Contrast with previous editions where, and this is important, you make an incorrect choice at any point, and you could be boned forever.

Also, retraining.

But I'll be honest, when I hear people talking aboput how they need a plethora of specific feats to be effective, I cannot believe their argument because it is fallacious. If there's a problem, it doesn't exist to the degree that people in this thread would have you believe. It's a lot less than the disparities in 3rd edition or before that, or even in other games, and it's enough that it can be handled by a little party teamwork, and a helpful DM.

How did you solve similiar problems in other games? Do that here. This isn't exactly a problem requiring the rewrite of the system just to satisfy

 

[Ryujin]

IT'S - NOT - FIXABLE.

Not in 4E.

That's the point.

Virtually anything is fixable. It's called errata, and it's been done before. Rather extensively, at that.

 

[I'm A Banana]

Regardling the +7/+4 disparity... what is the DM doing?...I mean, it's not right to accept the thesis that the DM has no responsibility in his game....Worst, why are the players not comprimising or helping eahc other? This is a team game.

The DM? He's trying to remember how much HP the orc had, where the Zombie minions are rising from, which secrets the Vizier has told the party and which he's keeping, who stole the cookies from the cookie jar, and exactly how that bloodied ability works on that solo he's got coming up later. Among other things.

Again, there's enough for a DM to worry about without having to protect the play from the game, and a DM shouldn't be required to fix things that the game is perfectly capable of getting right.

The players are in that camp by and large, too. D&D, in this version, is a reasonably complicated game, and not wanting to pay close attention to all the little fiddly moving parts is not the mark of a horrible person.

Also, retraining.

Sure, but you can't take back that fight where you missed with your daily by just a hair. Additionally, an entire party who takes Weapon Focus, Weapon Expertise, and Improved Defenses isn't exactly helping the person who likes the idea of learning rituals or extra languages, but also doesn't want to miss so much.

But I'll be honest, when I hear people talking aboput how they need a plethora of specific feats to be effective, I cannot believe their argument because it is fallacious.

Again:

I can give you a raise, or I can give you new responsibilities.

I can give you more water, or I can give you a dowsing rod.

It's not necessarily about being "effective," it's about risk aversion, buyers' remorse, and assured use of a resource rather than potential use of a resource. They still might not take every static bonus feat they can muster, but it shouldn't have to be a choice in a situation where we could give them both.

 

[DracoSuave]

The DM? He's trying to remember how much HP the orc had, where the Zombie minions are rising from, which secrets the Vizier has told the party and which he's keeping, who stole the cookies from the cookie jar, and exactly how that bloodied ability works on that solo he's got coming up later. Among other things.

None of these things are going on during character creation. The DM should be able to go 'You should probably get more of this option' as some helpful advice. The rest of this happens in play. If the DM is doing his part and getting in there, he doesn't have to think about how to make things even later.

Again, there's enough for a DM to worry about without having to protect the play from the game, and a DM shouldn't be required to fix things that the game is perfectly capable of getting right.

And what aspect of fourth edition has changed it such that this is correct, that no other rpg in the world ever made hasn't been able to do?

The players are in that camp by and large, too. D&D, in this version, is a reasonably complicated game, and not wanting to pay close attention to all the little fiddly moving parts is not the mark of a horrible person.

Not a matter of being a horrible person. It's a matter of applying an easy solution.

Sure, but you can't take back that fight where you missed with your daily by just a hair. Additionally, an entire party who takes Weapon Focus, Weapon Expertise, and Improved Defenses isn't exactly helping the person who likes the idea of learning rituals or extra languages, but also doesn't want to miss so much.

If missing one more daily per twenty uses ruins your gaming experience forever, you need priorities checked.

None of those three feats are essential or overpowering in heroic tier. The guy wants ritual caster, not having +1 to hit or damage isn't going to make him ineffective or even substandard.

1/6th of your feats is a huge cost? Really? Bah.

Again:

I can give you a raise, or I can give you new responsibilities.

I can give you more water, or I can give you a dowsing rod.

I can give you some water and a dowsing rod, or you can have two buckets of water or two dowsing rods that don't work. That's the ACTUAL comparison here.

It's not necessarily about being "effective," it's about risk aversion, buyers' remorse, and assured use of a resource rather than potential use of a resource.

In any game with limited resources, there's always a possibility of buyer's remorse. Again: retraining.

And I didn't bring up the idea of it being necessary for being 'effective.' But, that does seem to be repeated ad nauseum in this thread. Comments debunking it are obviously aimed at that thesis. Which is in this thread.

They still might not take every static bonus feat they can muster, but it shouldn't have to be a choice in a situation where we could give them both.

But you can have both, provided you don't overspecialize. Seeing as overspecializing isn't necessary, and the system does allow you to have both, again, I do not see the problem. There is a cost to it, of course.

 

[DEFCON 1]

Except you haven't really addressed the various responses folks have given to that claim.

For one thing, we're not talking about one single element, and either they fix it or ignore it. The Expertise issue is seperate from feat bloat is seperate from feat organization is seperate from having a delineation between combat and non-combat feats.

But here's the thing... you might not be talking about any specific elements, but *I* was. If you go back and check, I didn't make any real conversation here until Kzach posted that he would take every numerically advantageous feat regardless of which ones were available... and I then said maybe his problems aren't with the game itself, but his own attitude towards it. And at which time, *you* chimed in commenting you didn't like how I was pointing out what I perceived to be a flaw in his thinking. And things just spiraled from there because every time I reiterated what I saw to be the factual points as to why I thought his thinking was flawed, you wouldn't accept that I was doing so and kept trying to find excuses for him.

I don't care about feat bloat. I was never discussing feat bloat. Was I "off-topic" per se? Yeah, I guess I was. I was pointing out what I saw to be fingerpointing in the wrong direction. And it's only because you, others, and the original poster Kzach kept commenting back to me that I continued to post.

All the other stuff that other folks were talking about with regards to the actual poll... I never participated in that part. In fact, in many cases much of what you all are talking about, I happen to agree with. I'm also a believer that come 5E I'd love to see a combat-focuses feat/ skill-focused talent split, with characters earning both over time. I also believe that come 5E (provided WotC just tweaks the 4E game and doesn't make drastic changes to the game mechanics like they did when they created 4E) the underlying math will be adjusted/fixed. In fact, I'd imagine that it's already been done.

But like Draco keeps trying to do... if you make a logical fallacy or your beliefs might not actually have a basis in fact... other people will point it out. And if you come back trying to defend yourself (which you are more than allowed to do), you can't be surprised when the conversation continues.

 

[DEFCON 1]

Virtually anything is fixable. It's called errata, and it's been done before. Rather extensively, at that.

As a general point, absolutely. You are correct.

But now let's get specific. Do you honestly think that 4E as it stands now *WILL* get errata'd to "fix the underlying math" (including the removal of any and all "feat taxes" that are the band-aid to the problem)? Will it actually ever happen in 4E's lifetime? Because that's been the point of contention all along.

 

[Ryujin]

As a general point, absolutely. You are correct.

But now let's get specific. Do you honestly think that 4E as it stands now *WILL* get errata'd to "fix the underlying math" (including the removal of any and all "feat taxes" that are the band-aid to the problem)? Will it actually ever happen in 4E's lifetime? Because that's been the point of contention all along.

"Won't" and "can't" are two completely different animals.

I think that we've already seen some contrition, where at least the Expertise feats are concerned, as the new ones presented in Essentials have added more than just the math fix. A Warlock being able to obtain a shield bonus with a rod, for example, is a rather nice extra. Given that my Warlock was built to be a fair bit like a Hexblade, even before that class existed, I might well have taken a feat that did that, alone, as it fits my character concept quite well (Prince of Summer with a flaming sword, in one hand, and an ivory cane, in the other). Adding it to Expertise makes it a no brainer.

 

[DEFCON 1]

"Won't" and "can't" are two completely different animals.

Again, as a general point, absolutely. You are correct.

But in the case of fixing the 4E math and removing the feat taxes... the two right now are synonymous. And its my opinion that a person is just not look at the whole situation, game, and WotC as a company objectively if they don't believe it is. And I'd love to see what their reasons are for believing it will happen.

 

[MrMyth]

Regardling the +7/+4 disparity... what is the DM doing?

Glad you asked! In my case, I banned expertise feats and am using inherent item bonuses and making a few other house rules as well! With the aim of preventing players from only having one weapon they are good at, and not bothering with anything else, as well as helping to minimize the potential 'gap' that was discussed before.

But, again, it sure would be nice if that burden wasn't on me.

I mean, it's not right to accept the thesis that the DM has no responsibility in his game.

Worst, why are the players not comprimising or helping each other? This is a team game.

You keep putting things into such extremes. I've said, repeatedly, that no game is perfect - the DM will always have some need to oversee and adjust things. That doesn't change the fact that the less they have to do so, the more they can focus on, say, story and entertainment and fun.

As a DM, coming up with house rules to balance the party and prevent various undesired outcomes (like fancy new magic hammers getting discarded as trash) is not the fun part of the game. It's homework, aimed at getting the game to run in a fashion I think everyone will enjoy.

I'm willing to do it - but that doesn't mean I wouldn't rather the system handled such things on its own. And 4E does, in many ways! It has made many advancements and addressed many problems. This is simply one that I feel has developed, and would be nice for it to be addressed as well.

As far as the talk of players, that's a tricky issue. It generally isn't fun for a player to be told, "Hey, you should intentionally cripple yourself for the good of the group". They can do so, sure. But the problem remains with the system that demands such a concession, not the player who is frustrated by it.

But I'll be honest, when I hear people talking about how they need a plethora of specific feats to be effective, I cannot believe their argument because it is fallacious.

If half the party are super-optimized, and half are not, who is at fault? The optimizers? The other players? The DM?

Or the system that allowed that scenario to occur?

You keep putting things in extremes - that this is the only argument being offered, and since you find it incorrect, everything else in the discussion can be easily dismissed.

I agree that you don't need certain feats to be effective. But by higher levels, if the DM is balancing the game towards characters with Expertise and Superior defense feats, a character without those will be at significant disadvantages.

Again, it comes down to the gap. At launch, honestly, the feats were relatively balanced. You couldn't jump ahead of other characters by leaps and bounds. You could still optimized, but being optimized didn't put you out of another character's league.

Over the course of the edition, power creep developed. The Expertise feats were really what emphasized it, and whatever you might feel about them, you cannot deny that they are game mechanically unbalanced with other feats. They are simply more mechanically potent, by a significant degree, than even other useful combat feats.

The current discussion - over what sort of feats to have, or over the potential to have multiple categories of feats, or whatever other solutions are proposed - is looking at ways both that might fix the problem for DMs in the current environment, or could prevent such issues in future environments. You can't deny that the potency of feats has changed over the course of the edition and that the 'gap' between optimized and non-optimized has widened.

You might not feel it is a problem, sure, or that a good DM can address it anyway. But you can't deny that the change has happened.

If there's a problem, it doesn't exist to the degree that people in this thread would have you believe.

I don't think you get to declare that. You can say it isn't a problem in your game, sure, or in your experiences. But simply blanket declaring that those who have run into the problem are somehow wrong? Sorry, but I don't think you have the authority to dismiss them like that.

You seem to have this odd impression of the folks in the thread. That they are out to convert folks to a cause or trying to convince people of a problem that you don't think exists. That's not what is going on. They are discussing a problem that they have encountered, and discussing ways to address it. It's you who keeps coming in here and insisting that they are incorrect about it being a problem, and that if it is a problem, its due to their own failings.

Which, again... unhelpful. Not especially constructive. Etc.

It's a lot less than the disparities in 3rd edition or before that, or even in other games, and it's enough that it can be handled by a little party teamwork, and a helpful DM.

How did you solve similiar problems in other games? Do that here. This isn't exactly a problem requiring the rewrite of the system just to satisfy

I keep repeating myself here, and you keep not acknowledging it. I get that you can handle this. But insisting that an issue shouldn't be addressed, simply because a DM can fix it, doesn't satisfy me. Especially because a "fundamental rewrite of the system" is only one of the possible topics on the table!

Look, you mention that they have come farther than in other editions or other games. But by your logic, they should never have done so. By your logic, you should be playing those other games, and just using "a little party teamwork" and "a helpful DM" to handle any disparities.

Did you enjoy doing so, in the past? Given that you aren't playing those games or editions - or so I assume - you must feel that 4E addressing the issue was a good thing.

So why do you feel that continuing to work on the problem, continuing to even discuss it, is somehow problematic?