Does giving out more Feats affect the Fighter's power?

[victorysaber]

In my campaign, PCs get feats every two levels. Important NPCs get feats every two levels too.

Does this increase or decrease the Fighter's power level compared to other classes? One on hand he gets more feats in addition to his base number of feats. On the other hand, all other classes get 3 extra feats than normal, too.

How about a feat every level? Does this significantly affect the fighter's power too, since they get 13 extra feats?

 

[Storyteller01]

Probably, but the increased power to spellcasters will probably stand out more.

 

[Nyaricus]

Here's how I see it: If every class, by itself, is created equal, then stuff like the feats everyone gets should not affect the power level of a fighter, since those two things are mutually exclusive, IMO. So, everyone getting more feats in a game means everyone gets more powerful equally, and the fighter is not getting left behind in any way.

Just because a fighters strengths are in it's feats doesn't mean that giving out more feats makes a fighter less powerful overall.

FWIW, I also change fighters in the following way:
[sblock]For myself, I have given Fighters (renamed "Warriors" IMC) a Floating Bonus Feat, which allows them to, every day, change up one feat for another by going through a series of combat manuvers and concetrated traingin in the morning which lasts a hour (not cumulative). They must meet the prereqs for the feat and it must be drawn from the normal "Bonus Warrior Feats" list. It cannot be used for meeting the prereq of another feat, PrC, etc. You gain this at your 6th, 12th and 18th level of Warrior.[/sblock]

cheers,
--N

 

[Doomhawk]

I would say it makes fighters weaker relative to other classes. A fighter's big (only) advantage is that he can manage a lot of feat combinations that other classes just straight-up can't do, or at least not until very high levels. Giving everyone extra feats is a boost to the fighter, too, but mostly it just dilutes his power.
Consider this analogy: if every class got wizard spellcasting for free (and thus the wizard had double spells/day), would the wizard stay at its current level of relative power, or be weaker?

 

[Glyfair]

I would say it makes fighters weaker relative to other classes.

I agree. From a pure "power" point-of-view, there is an upper limit to the amount of power you can get from more feats (which is somewhat proportional to the number of feats you allow). Once you reach that level you just gain some more versatility.

One option for bring the fighter up a bit would be to disallow fighter bonus feats for those "extra" feats for non-fighters. It's not perfect (since non-fighters can just move their non-fighter feats to the extra feats), but helps a bit in giving the fighter his nice.

 

[Crothian]

I have found it helps fighters out. Fighters tend to take feats that they can use all the time like power attack. Wizards and clerics tend to take more that effect spellcasting or turning or other powers that have limited uses.

Of course with all the feats out there letting characters have more can mean they take more of the powerful ones. It really also depends on just what feats outy there a DM allows.

 

[Aust Diamondew]

Here's how I see it: If every class, by itself, is created equal, then stuff like the feats everyone gets should not affect the power level of a fighter, since those two things are mutually exclusive, IMO. So, everyone getting more feats in a game means everyone gets more powerful equally, and the fighter is not getting left behind in any way.

Just because a fighters strengths are in it's feats doesn't mean that giving out more feats makes a fighter less powerful overall.

Exactly.

In my campaign I give 2 feats at level 1, 2 at level 3 and 2 every 3 levels there after instead of 1. Now if we were just using PHB feats it might be an issue for fighters, they'd run out of stuff to pick (in there chosen focus), but since we have an extra feat list compiled from a few other books theres enough choice to keep focus on what you want to do (as opposed to increasing versatility).

A feat every other will not seriously change anything anyway. Thats only 3 more feats over 20 levels. And it won't even be till level nine that the PCs are a whole feat ahead of where they would be.

 

[Andre]

How about a feat every level? Does this significantly affect the fighter's power too, since they get 13 extra feats?

I'll second what others have said: it depends on how many options the fighter has to choose from. In my current group we give a feat every level/hit die, but we also added a number of basic feats that stack, so a fighter always has several good options when leveling, and the other classes can never get enough feats. By giving monsters and npc's extra feats, we also kept the pc's from being able to steamroll the opposition.

A few examples:
*We eliminated Weapon Focus, et. al. and replaced them with three feats - Melee Bonus, Ranged Bonus, Spell Bonus. Each gives the character a +1 bonus to hit for that type of attack.
*Eliminated Weapon Specialization, et. al. Replaced with Melee Damage, Ranged Damage, and Spell Damage (hit points only) which each add +1 damage.
*Eliminated Iron Will, Lightning Reflexes, Great Fortitude. Replaced with Will Save, Reflex Save, and Fort Save. Each gives a +1 bonus to the requisite save.
*Kicked Toughness up to 4 hit points.
*DR feat gives +1 DR/-. If a character has no natural DR, the feat gives DR 1/-.
*Dash adds 5' to ground Speed in light or no armor, and light load.
*Bypass DR allows an attacker to ignore a certain amount of the target's DR. This is a chain of feats that tops out at DR/Admantine (nothing bypasses DR/-). The amount bypassed is 2*the number of DR feats the character takes.

Characters can take these feats more than once (but no more than once per two levels or hit dice), and the effects stack. This allows a character to focus on one or two areas, but not everything. And the "cool" feats that allow special maneuvers or advantages are still popular. And giving some of these to the opposition allows a GM to easily boost a monster or npc, without increasing the difficulty of running it in combat.

 

[pawsplay]

Ir probably helps the fighter, since they can get really deep into feat chains.

 

[Squire James]

Fighters will maintain their power only if there are a lot of feats available for them to use. I've seen no problem with a feat-every-level system up to level 6 or so... it might start breaking down a little at high levels because Wizards simply run out of useful feat choices.