JoeGKushner said:
And to quote myself again, "Players should work with me before making a character that they want to play if they're not going to be happy that their rogue isn't doing well in an undead campaign for example."
Can't help them out any more than that.
Yeah, that is a terrible attitude to take. I work with all my players on characters before entering my campaign, sometimes hours. And then they get in and sometimes the character just isnt' working like they wanted it to or soemthing changes in the campaign that alters the way they think about the character. It's like anything, until you actually have it in the field you don't know. I usually have a 1-2 session character make over in which characters can change and tweak aspects.
Bottom line is you got to think about your players enjoyment. Books come out every month and it might not be 7 months until a feat or prestige class that fit the player's concept is published. Or they might have picked a couple of feats becuse they didn't have access to the other material or didn't realize.
This may also depend on how long or fast your campaign runs. My campaign will last several years and level progression is slow (5 levels in 2 years). So a character is essentally stuck with a bad feat for a long time. If its something they never used before, theres no problem in what you didn't do can't hurt you. Something we've only seen a couple times isn't bad either. However, if a feat has been used (or it was a prerequisite to a feat that has been used) I won't allow it.
I think a better solution would be to structure my campaign in such a way that Profession(cook) and Use Rope become more useful. If a character took those skills, it's because he wanted them to be part of his character, and a well-structured campaign should respect that.
Besides, it's not like he can't just start taking a new skill the next time he levels. I played a rogue that didn't take any ranks in tumble until level three. Now I'm maxed out in it. Admittedly rouges have it easy as far as skill points are concerned, but picking up a new skill late in the game isn't the hassle everyone pretends it to be. Most skills are intentionally designed so that they're still useful even if you're not maxed out in them.
Feats, though, are another issue. Some feats are a trade-off, where a character sacrifices short-term power for long term gain, by taking a crappy feat that's a prerequisite for a powerful feat or a Prestige Class. Letting players circumvent those restrictions by switching out feats is probably a bad Idea. If somebody wants to change their feats for a PrC that's only just introduced, I'm more inclined to fudge the prerequisites than fudge their history.
If it's a simple matter of inexperience, It seems like it would be a better Idea to simply warn the character up front. If an inexperienced player Takes Toughness and Skill focus (Profession) for his half-orc Barbarian, I'll steer him towards Power Attack and Cleave instead.
Of course, If all else fails, I could always adapt psychic reformation, changing it from a Psionic power to a more general game mechanic.
I agree. I rarely let characters swap out skill points. I think i did it one time because the player was irking me and I ended up next session (and future ones) making that skill he swapped out of more prominent.
Most of the time when a character wants to change a feat they are not happy with their character. This can usually be fixed by talking it out with the player and trying to work something into the campaign where he can use the feat more. A lot of the time though, its not the power of the feat its the feat itself. I've had characters swap out traditional feats such as cleave and power attack because they were rarely used or needed and it didn't difine the character like (feat a) would.
But, I think I've nipped all that in the bud now. I've been using Buy the Numbers
http://www.rpgnow.com/product_info.php?products_id=2909&
Which seems to be the ideal solution to the problem. The problem is, in slow campaigns like mine, characters level once every few months, pick something that may be good then, and won't get the option to level again for a few more months. With this system, a character can buy skills, ability scores and feats with his XP whenever he wishes. I'm less inclined to switch out skills and feats under this system, because I believe it fixes the problem.
