EarthSeraphEdna
Explorer
I am here today to enlighten you all on what I consider to be the most reprehensible issue currently plaguing Dungeons & Dragons 4e: feat tax. It is certainly not the greatest problem of the system, but the reasons why it exists and how WotC has chosen to voluntarily ignore it are certainly aggravating. Now, every game comes with its errors, and as much as Wizards of the Coast had taken care to fine-tune the math of the game, there were certain oversights that were not caught by the time the Player's Handbook had shipped out. For example, one of the three paladin builds, the Strength/Wisdom paladin, could not use the Divine Challenge class feature with any efficacy due to it being Charisma-based. WotC had recognized this error soon after it was pointed out by many a player. Their solution? They had introduced the Mighty Challenge heroic feat in Divine Power, a supplement that was released more than an entire year after the Player's Handbook, to grant a paladin the luxury of adding her Strength modifier to her Divine Challenge damage.
You see, WotC is absolutely spineless when it comes to addressing issues like these. When a certain aspect of the game causes inherent underpoweredness for certain characters, they choose not to use their errata/updates to patch the problem, for that would be an admittance of their failure. No, instead, they release tax feats, hoping that the players simple-mindedly look over them and believe "Oh, that would be a wonderful feat for my character!" instead of recognizing them as the ham-handed amendments to fundamental issues that they are. Feats should be optional upgrades, not mandatory patches. What makes these feat taxes even worse is that they are flawed themselves; Mighty Challenge, for example, does not affect Divine Sanction at all, and so a Strength/Wisdom paladin cannot make good use of any powers that impose a Divine Sanction. Let us look over the major feat taxes currently present in the system, shall we now?
Problem #1: At approximately levels 5, 15, and 25, the attack bonuses of player characters gradually begin to be unable to keep up with monster defenses, thereby causing a deterioration of player character hit probabilities as the levels rise.
Solution: Introduce the Implement Expertise and Weapon Expertise heroic feats in the Player's Handbook 2, and later, the Focused Expertise feat in Dragon Magazine #375.
Problem with the Solution: Pointlessly fills up a feat slot that could have been spent on something other than patching an issue caused by an oversight of the game designers. Also, characters are strongly discouraged from ever using an implement or weapon not covered by the respective tax feat, and characters who use two different types of weapons or implements (such as a paladin with both a magic weapon and a holy symbol) are unfairly forced to take two iterations of these tax feats.
Problem #2: At approximately levels 16 and 26, the Fortitude, Reflex, and Will defenses of player characters gradually begin to be unable to keep up with monster attack bonuses, thereby causing an increase in monster hit probabilities against these three defenses as the levels rise. This is due to masterwork armor granting an overall +1 bonus to AC at level 16 and then another +1 AC at level 26, but failing to commensurately increase Fortitude, Reflex, and Will.
Solution: Introduce the Paragon Defenses paragon feat and the Robust Defenses epic feat in the Player's Handbook 2.
Problem with the Solution: Pointlessly fills up a feat slot that could have been spent on something other than patching an issue caused by an oversight of the game designers.
Problem #3: Ardents, avengers, artificers, bards, monks, non-Brutal Scoundrel rogues, Wisdom/Charisma paladins who do not have Virtuous Strike, and swordmages cannot use melee basic attacks with any efficacy, thereby denying them the ability to perform charge attacks or opportunity attacks (thus allowing monsters to move around them with little fear of being damaged in exchanged) and use the attacks granted to them by various leader powers.
Solution: Introduce the Intelligent Blademaster heroic feat in the Forgotten Realms Player's Guide and the Melee Training heroic feat in the Player's Handbook 2.
Problem with the Solution: Pointlessly fills up a feat slot that could have been spent on something other than patching an issue caused by an oversight of the game designers.
Problem #4: Strength/Wisdom paladins cannot effectively use their Divine Challenge class feature, as it is Charisma-based.
Solution: Introduce the Mighty Challenge heroic feat in Divine Power.
Problem with the Solution: Pointlessly fills up a feat slot that could have been spent on something other than patching an issue caused by an oversight of the game designers. Also, Mighty Challenge is not compatible with Divine Sanction powers, thereby arbitrarily denying Strength/Wisdom paladins the ability to efficiently use such powers.
Problem #5: The avenger is the worst striker class in the entirety of the system.
Solution: Introduce the Painful Oath paragon feat in Dragon Magazine #382.
Problem with the Solution: Pointlessly fills up a feat slot that could have been spent on something other than patching an issue caused by an oversight of the game designers. Also, heroic-tier avengers cannot benefit from this feat in any way.
Problem #6: Even with the Barbarian Agility class feature, a barbarian is forced to invest in proficiency with heavy armor in order to acquire a non-abysmal AC defense.
Solution: Introduce the Hide Armor Expertise heroic feat in Primal Power.
Problem with the Solution: Pointlessly fills up a feat slot that could have been spent on something other than patching an issue caused by an oversightof the game designers. Also, Strength/Constitution barbarians are inadvertently granted defender-level AC and hit points due to the benefit of the feat stacking with Barbarian Agility, rendering them obscenely durable strikers. Strength/Charisma barbarians cannot make use of this feat at all, and are arbitrarily relegated to taking feats for heavy armor proficiencies that shall never put their AC on par with that of a Strength/Constitution barbarian.
Again, feats should be optional luxuries rather than compulsory patches, and WotC willfully, surreptitiously refusing to repair the mechanical errors that these tax feats solve through their errata/updates in a feeble attempt to save face reeks of unprofessionalism. What is stopping Wizards from biting the bullet and directly correcting their game rather than beating around the bush and forcing taxes to follow their players even into D&D?
You see, WotC is absolutely spineless when it comes to addressing issues like these. When a certain aspect of the game causes inherent underpoweredness for certain characters, they choose not to use their errata/updates to patch the problem, for that would be an admittance of their failure. No, instead, they release tax feats, hoping that the players simple-mindedly look over them and believe "Oh, that would be a wonderful feat for my character!" instead of recognizing them as the ham-handed amendments to fundamental issues that they are. Feats should be optional upgrades, not mandatory patches. What makes these feat taxes even worse is that they are flawed themselves; Mighty Challenge, for example, does not affect Divine Sanction at all, and so a Strength/Wisdom paladin cannot make good use of any powers that impose a Divine Sanction. Let us look over the major feat taxes currently present in the system, shall we now?
Problem #1: At approximately levels 5, 15, and 25, the attack bonuses of player characters gradually begin to be unable to keep up with monster defenses, thereby causing a deterioration of player character hit probabilities as the levels rise.
Solution: Introduce the Implement Expertise and Weapon Expertise heroic feats in the Player's Handbook 2, and later, the Focused Expertise feat in Dragon Magazine #375.
Problem with the Solution: Pointlessly fills up a feat slot that could have been spent on something other than patching an issue caused by an oversight of the game designers. Also, characters are strongly discouraged from ever using an implement or weapon not covered by the respective tax feat, and characters who use two different types of weapons or implements (such as a paladin with both a magic weapon and a holy symbol) are unfairly forced to take two iterations of these tax feats.
Problem #2: At approximately levels 16 and 26, the Fortitude, Reflex, and Will defenses of player characters gradually begin to be unable to keep up with monster attack bonuses, thereby causing an increase in monster hit probabilities against these three defenses as the levels rise. This is due to masterwork armor granting an overall +1 bonus to AC at level 16 and then another +1 AC at level 26, but failing to commensurately increase Fortitude, Reflex, and Will.
Solution: Introduce the Paragon Defenses paragon feat and the Robust Defenses epic feat in the Player's Handbook 2.
Problem with the Solution: Pointlessly fills up a feat slot that could have been spent on something other than patching an issue caused by an oversight of the game designers.
Problem #3: Ardents, avengers, artificers, bards, monks, non-Brutal Scoundrel rogues, Wisdom/Charisma paladins who do not have Virtuous Strike, and swordmages cannot use melee basic attacks with any efficacy, thereby denying them the ability to perform charge attacks or opportunity attacks (thus allowing monsters to move around them with little fear of being damaged in exchanged) and use the attacks granted to them by various leader powers.
Solution: Introduce the Intelligent Blademaster heroic feat in the Forgotten Realms Player's Guide and the Melee Training heroic feat in the Player's Handbook 2.
Problem with the Solution: Pointlessly fills up a feat slot that could have been spent on something other than patching an issue caused by an oversight of the game designers.
Problem #4: Strength/Wisdom paladins cannot effectively use their Divine Challenge class feature, as it is Charisma-based.
Solution: Introduce the Mighty Challenge heroic feat in Divine Power.
Problem with the Solution: Pointlessly fills up a feat slot that could have been spent on something other than patching an issue caused by an oversight of the game designers. Also, Mighty Challenge is not compatible with Divine Sanction powers, thereby arbitrarily denying Strength/Wisdom paladins the ability to efficiently use such powers.
Problem #5: The avenger is the worst striker class in the entirety of the system.
Solution: Introduce the Painful Oath paragon feat in Dragon Magazine #382.
Problem with the Solution: Pointlessly fills up a feat slot that could have been spent on something other than patching an issue caused by an oversight of the game designers. Also, heroic-tier avengers cannot benefit from this feat in any way.
Problem #6: Even with the Barbarian Agility class feature, a barbarian is forced to invest in proficiency with heavy armor in order to acquire a non-abysmal AC defense.
Solution: Introduce the Hide Armor Expertise heroic feat in Primal Power.
Problem with the Solution: Pointlessly fills up a feat slot that could have been spent on something other than patching an issue caused by an oversightof the game designers. Also, Strength/Constitution barbarians are inadvertently granted defender-level AC and hit points due to the benefit of the feat stacking with Barbarian Agility, rendering them obscenely durable strikers. Strength/Charisma barbarians cannot make use of this feat at all, and are arbitrarily relegated to taking feats for heavy armor proficiencies that shall never put their AC on par with that of a Strength/Constitution barbarian.
Again, feats should be optional luxuries rather than compulsory patches, and WotC willfully, surreptitiously refusing to repair the mechanical errors that these tax feats solve through their errata/updates in a feeble attempt to save face reeks of unprofessionalism. What is stopping Wizards from biting the bullet and directly correcting their game rather than beating around the bush and forcing taxes to follow their players even into D&D?
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