Mistwell
Crusty Old Meatwad (he/him)
The new UA playtesting the upcoming D&D revisions for 2024 introduce 1st level feats, which are intended per the designers to:
1) Make it easy on beginners to pick a feat without being overwhelmed by the number of choices.
As stated by Crawford, “Feat selection should not be overwhelming, and one way to do that is to break feats up into smaller groups, like with levels. If something tells you to go pick a first level feat, then that tells you right away I can ignore all the feats on this book that are 4th level, or 20th level, or any other level of feats. Instead you can focus on just the 1st level feats.”
However,
2) Feat Chains increase the incentive to be overwhelmed by the number of choices. Where one more powerful feat requires that you already have a prior lesser fear, you will have an incentive to know all the higher level feat prerequisite lower level feats out of fear you will lock out options you might way at higher levels with your choice. You essentially need to plan out much of your adventuring career from character creation if higher level feats have prerequisites impacted by your 1st level feat.
Finally,
3) A solution to this dilemma of allowing you to swap out your 1st level feat at higher levels is incompatible with the notion that your 1st level feat is part of your culture, which is represented by your background. Here Crawford emphasizes repeatedly that the 1st level feat choice is something you've been doing for years, and is tied to who you were before you took up adventuring. This feat, more than any other feat in your adventuring career, is tied closely to your culture. It would make no sense that you suddenly "forgot" your culture at a higher level so you could pick up a new ability which is literally something you just learned. Nor would you want to create a mechanics incentive to ignore your culture.
I'm therefore concluding from this that feat chains won't work, or won't work well, with the policy incentives of character generation being easy and not overwhelming for beginners and 1st level feats being part of your culture.
The best solution I can think of is to eliminate feat chains. Let the only prerequisite be level.
What do you think about these concepts? Do you think feat chains can work well with the goals of non-overwhelming character generation for beginners and 1st level feats being part of your characters culture?
1) Make it easy on beginners to pick a feat without being overwhelmed by the number of choices.
As stated by Crawford, “Feat selection should not be overwhelming, and one way to do that is to break feats up into smaller groups, like with levels. If something tells you to go pick a first level feat, then that tells you right away I can ignore all the feats on this book that are 4th level, or 20th level, or any other level of feats. Instead you can focus on just the 1st level feats.”
However,
2) Feat Chains increase the incentive to be overwhelmed by the number of choices. Where one more powerful feat requires that you already have a prior lesser fear, you will have an incentive to know all the higher level feat prerequisite lower level feats out of fear you will lock out options you might way at higher levels with your choice. You essentially need to plan out much of your adventuring career from character creation if higher level feats have prerequisites impacted by your 1st level feat.
Finally,
3) A solution to this dilemma of allowing you to swap out your 1st level feat at higher levels is incompatible with the notion that your 1st level feat is part of your culture, which is represented by your background. Here Crawford emphasizes repeatedly that the 1st level feat choice is something you've been doing for years, and is tied to who you were before you took up adventuring. This feat, more than any other feat in your adventuring career, is tied closely to your culture. It would make no sense that you suddenly "forgot" your culture at a higher level so you could pick up a new ability which is literally something you just learned. Nor would you want to create a mechanics incentive to ignore your culture.
I'm therefore concluding from this that feat chains won't work, or won't work well, with the policy incentives of character generation being easy and not overwhelming for beginners and 1st level feats being part of your culture.
The best solution I can think of is to eliminate feat chains. Let the only prerequisite be level.
What do you think about these concepts? Do you think feat chains can work well with the goals of non-overwhelming character generation for beginners and 1st level feats being part of your characters culture?
