D&D 5E Does Your DM Let Everyone Start With A Feat?

[DEFCON 1]

I re-wrote pretty much all the feats a long time ago, rebalancing them to my satisfaction and splitting them into "standard combat" and "non-combat/rare combat" groups. For most of my campaigns I usually give the players one of the non-combat/rare combat feats for free that most closely matches the character concept they give me. (In other words, they don't choose a feat to get, they decide who their character is and what they are and they then get given one of the feats that works well with their concept-- sometimes inspiring me to create new feats if their concept compels it.)

However, this might not be needed much anymore, as the current Theros game I'm running gave out Supernatural Gifts (which took the place of a starting feat), and based upon the recent UAs, the 2024 books might very well create and give out feats directly related to Backgrounds-- which pretty much are like what I've been doing all along.

The irony of doing things this way is that a number of the players know how overpowering a feat like Lucky can be and might ordinarily take it if they had free choice to select whatever they wanted... but when tasked with coming up with a character concept and background/history that justified starting with the Lucky feat, none of them ever do. Almost like being a "lucky" character isn't actually that interesting or compelling a character concept that someone wants to play... they just want the mechanic of free re-rolls to more likely succeed on actions involving the concept they would rather have, LOL.

 

[ART!]

I played a human luck domain cleric who also started with the Lucky feat, and it was great. His ability scores were pretty low starting out, and that's how I wanted it. My concept for the character was to build someone who wasn't about fighting and killing and got by on just being a chill dude and having his god smile upon him. "Praying" for his spells every day involved literally wandering aimlessly in the woods and trusting his luck. Sometimes I would roll to see what spells he got that day.

To answer the thread title's question, I have never played in a 5E game where the DM let everyone have a feat at first level. I daresay it hasn't even crossed anyone's mind.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Only caveat: We need more good feats.

Well yeah.

As it is, 5e has somewhere around 80 official feats.

That would be a pathetic number for launch, IMO, not a ten year old edition on its way to the traditional revision.

 

[DEFCON 1]

Well yeah.

That would be a pathetic number for launch, IMO, not a ten year old edition on its way to the traditional revision.

Unless you looked at every single feature a class receives as essentially a feat (which I do). To me there is no difference between a feat and a class feature, except the class features are given to a character for free as part of being that class. But I never see any issue with swapping out class features with "official feats" if it makes sense for a particular character (granted, I've also re-written a whole bunch for balance reasons), and more often than not will poke players towards just doing "feature swaps" with other classes to get the feature they want, rather than taking a 1-level multiclass dip to get it.

Heck... this is exactly what so many feats are nowadays anyway, class features that other classes can take. Other class wants spellcasting? There's a feat for that. Other class wants a Fighting Style? There's a feat for that. Metamagic? There's a feat for that. Combat Maneuver? Feat. At this point they could just turn every single Level 1 class feature into a feat and then let players select like three that they want to start the game with if they wanted. Keep Classes as like the "starting basic packages" available to players that want a standardized pre-chosen selection... but then anyone else can mix-and-match to their heart's content.

 

[iserith]

These days I replace the pretty terrible (and in my experience, forgettable) inspiration mechanic with a free Lucky feat* for everyone at first level. This solves three problems for me.

First, not having to grade my players’ role-playing as is expected by the inspiration rules. As a DM, that nonsense is not my job! I have more important things to focus on while I’m at the table!

Second, I’ve found that Lucky tends to be a bit of a feat-tax. At least for the optimizers. Giving it out for free makes that a non-issue.

Third, I don’t balance encounters. The Lucky feat makes survivability much easier for the PCs in low tiers (when that’s more of an issue) but never becomes useless even at high tiers.


* I do prefer a houseruled version that refreshes per session instead of in-game days for ease of book-keeping. With possibly other variations dependent on the intended feel of the campaign.

I also don't balance encounters (usually), but do the opposite otherwise:

Lucky feat is not allowed and I use this method for Inspiration: The Case for Inspiration.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Unless you looked at every single feature a class receives as essentially a feat (which I do).

I do not.

Believe me, I wish the game was designed that way, but 1) feats are about customizability while features are about enforcing the archetype, and 2) the disparity between the weakest and strongest features is way different from the weakest and strongest feats.

 

[Maxperson]

I answered for myself since I DM most of the time. A bonus feat at first level is allowed, two for alt humans. When others in the group have DM'd we haven't started with one.

 

[DND_Reborn]

Regarding replacing Inspiration with the Lucky feat:

I think that is a fine idea, as well.

FWIW our Inspiration has become an automatic feature of leveling.

• At 1st level, you have one inspiration point (used to reroll any roll YOU make).
• When you gain a new level, your number of inspiration points increases to your new level.
• Once an inspiration point is spent, it is lost until you gain a new level.

That's it. Keeps it pretty simple and we don't have to worry about "awarding" them.

 

[payn]

See, this is what I'm worried about.

I might avoid this by forcing the players to choose this first-level "bonus feat" from a short list of options. Feats that I have carefully selected for build options and storytelling potential. I'm thinking stuff like Light Armor Master, Ritual Magic, Skilled...the feats that are nobody's first choice, and probably aren't worth a +2 ASI, but would still pretty good to have for certain builds, or to fill in gaps. It's free, after all, so there'd be nothing to complain about.

If I let them pick any feat at 1st level, it would be the only feat they would ever get...and I don't think that would be very popular with my players.

If I was going to do it, I might create a list of specific campaign feats. Things that make flavor and or setting sense for the game the players are about to play. Sounds like a real fun exercise and good way to avoid the "everybody pick one of three best feats" problem.

 

[Umbran]

None of the GMs I've played with recently have allowed a starting feat if such wasn't part of the race description (for variant human). I also am not allowing them in the game I'm running.