Feats, Feats, Feats

One feat combo I'd watch out for is Wintertouched/Lasting Frost. With a Frost weapon it gives you CA (+2 to hit) and an extra 5 damage each hit (watch out for rangers especially with this)

If you ban Wintertouched / Lasting frost (something I worry my DM might do, or even Wizards-Of-The-Nerf), the melee ranger will just take prime punisher and called shot. Will you ban those too? They're from Dragon Magazine, which is still Core. Beware banning one issue of Dragon and not others, or your players will point out favoritism if someone else gets that nifty power from another dragon article. This has happened to a group I was in, and the DM was basically left with either a) ban ALL dragon mag content, which meant 2 other characters would lose feats and powers, or b) risk the player re-speccing their character from one of the other PHB 1 options, which are quite often, just as powerful. Wintertouched / Lasting frost is PHB-1. If they errata that now, three years later, a pox on you Wotc, if it's too cheesy now it was too cheesy then, by far, since there weren't other options such as Called Shot or Headman's Chop back then, to offer some extra DPR options at the cost of building your entire character and playstyle around.

Called Shot is about as iconic a concept to rangers as anything else I've seen, really, and doesn't incur the cost of the frost weapons, which are darned expensive. (if a player can even buy them to begin with, that is).

E.g. I made this new ranger / sorc hybrid for a 4e game, and came up with better stats, more fun, more playability, cheaper and more optimal in every way, by using Called Shot and taking hybrid talent for prime shot rather than TWF style. Even taking Toughness as an extra feat was no problem, to be on-par in terms of HP. The double weapon I used I just handwave is two weapons in my head. Bonus : All my sorcerer powers, not just cold ones, benefit from the +5 from called shot. On top of that, When I do have CA AND Prime Shot bonuses (via powers or situationals), my max-to hit is 1 greater than the cold-cheesed TWF ranger. It works out even better for me, as I can get a Jagged Double-ax for less than half the price of two frost weapons, at level 11, and benefit from enchanced crit rate ten levels sooner. Also, mechanically, I can do stuff with my offhand like use my Star of Correlon for implement powers on my turn without having to swap weapons.

The main reason I decided to go the Called Shot route is because I have no faith in Wotc, or the idea that frost weapons will be accepted in the new game I'm joining, or if the DM will just keep throwing cold-resist creatures at us, so I sort of said screw this option. There is nothing wrong or cheesy about an entire character based on cold spells, cold breath weapon, cold feats, and cold weapons, since they're part of the system and it opens you up to being foiled quite easily by certain monsters having resistances. Even that can be bypassed, but can you buy the ice gloves to do that? not necessarily.

I always thought, for the longes time that Frostcheese was, well, cheesy, but actually, Called Shot is better for a ranger IMO, and frost does have it's place if you have a good theme going on for your character. That removes the "cheese" part for me.

And unless the DM bans that Prime Punisher/Called Shot, it works by changing the way you fight and making you exposed and off on your own to fight enemies solo, which is risky for a ranger to do. So, there is some balance there, and doesn't depend on items whatsoever so the side benefit for the DM is no item wish-lists are needed to make the build function properly.

It works at range, with multiclass powers, whatever. That's a huge plus. If anything, frost cheese should have been fire cheese focusing on pure damage, and lasting frost would have dazed instead of extra damage instead.

Firetouched would have prevented regen or bypassed fire resistance or something useful. Wintertouched is a little of redundant for rangers who don't exploit Called Shot and fight off on their own, IMO. Just wait to have CA normally before you nova. If anything, I would worry about those ranger who take BOTH those extra +5 options. That, would be too crazy indeed for me if I were DMing. But think about it this way. Monsters HP go up 5x as fast as player's DPR by epic, do you really want to ban that? All you need to do is not drop frost weapons for now : problem solved. No banning necessary. Or have them be so rare they only find one or two per tier, max, and have to re-enchant their favorite weapons one at a time, so as to ramp up damage more gradually.

Rogues, on the other hand....love them some Wintertouched.
 
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I think the feat situation in 4e is just completely out of control.

The earlier point about banning feats altogether is a very interesting one. They came in with 3e, and at the time appeared to be a great idea, and when they came across in 4e I didnt even think about it. At the time, to me, feats appeared to be here to stay.

Im just not convinced they are a great idea any more. Not saying players shouldn't be able to customize, but its just that feats are, well, on my "conceptual reviewing board". Im pretty certain you can make a good d&d system without them whilst still allowing interesting characters.

My mind is wondering....
 

Problem is

the feat system, various bonus types not stacking, MC / hybrid system, these are all in place to allow character concepts while in theory trying to be balanced against core classes.

If you remove feats you will just end up coming up with something very similar "character archetype points" that you will have a mess of a time balancing. Honestly, without feats, lots of interesting stuff wouldn't be possible, and it you make it possible, you will need to limit their combinations by fiat and constant house-ruling.

As crappy as the 4e feat system is, it's not that bad if you have a builder (take your pick, old or new). But agreed, bad / useless / outclassed feats need to be purged completely. It's like a hoarder's place in there.

E.g. why does Master of Arms give bonuses with all weapons a 1 / 11 / 21 plus free quickdraw, but Versatile master only gives +2 at level 15? This should be fixed, but I guess they didn't get around to it because "to it"s are hard to come by (especially the round ones).
 

Im just not convinced they are a great idea any more. Not saying players shouldn't be able to customize, but its just that feats are, well, on my "conceptual reviewing board". Im pretty certain you can make a good d&d system without them whilst still allowing interesting characters.

You can make a character with entirely math feats. +5 HP here, +1 attack there, +2 damage elsewhere, weapon upgrade from d8 to d10, armor upgrade for +1 AC, improved defenses, +2 to saves, +X initiative, etc.

I think if these feats didn't exist, we wouldn't necessarily feel their absence, from a play stand point.

But then there are feats that allow you to do something you couldn't otherwise do, slide an extra square, gain combat advantage, daze people with your dailies, etc. Stuff that's still useful in combat, but aren't really math feats. I think these feats would be missed.

And then there are the non-combat feats skill training, skill focus, languages, gaining cantrips, etc, that I almost feel guilty for gimping my party when I pick one of these up. But I do believe they add to a character so if there was no way to do these things, I'd likely be upset.

Not sure if the feat system needs to be thrown out, but it could use a reevaluation. I'm all for separating design spaces. Divide feats into 3 groups maybe, math feats, combat feats, and non-combat feats. Maybe make it so you start with 1 of each, you get 1 feat per level thereafter, and can never have more math feats than combat feats, and more combat feats than non-combat feats.

I don't know, just spit balling ideas. I think feats are a good idea for customization, it's just too broad of a design space.
 

I always thought, for the longes time that Frostcheese was, well, cheesy, but actually, Called Shot is better for a ranger IMO, and frost does have it's place if you have a good theme going on for your character. That removes the "cheese" part for me.

The cheese in frostcheese comes not from the fact that the combo is effective (although it would certainly attract less attention if it weren't), but from the fact that it pursues a mechanical benefit through methods that make little sense in game.

Frost-based mage is a strong archetype; perhaps even a stereotype. If you're magically affiliated with elemental cold, it makes sense that the PC pursues that line of study.

"I'm really really deadly when my sword is cold, but not when it's hot"? Not so much, particularly in a game with the approach to treasure that 4e has. In 4e, a martial frostcheeser is "Guy who has a cold sword, then another one, then another one..."

That's where the cheese comes in.
 

If you ban Wintertouched / Lasting frost (something I worry my DM might do, or even Wizards-Of-The-Nerf), the melee ranger will just take prime punisher and called shot. Will you ban those too?

(a) The ranger could take both ... they do stack
(b) You can't build an entire party around Prime Punisher and Called Shot, but you can build an entire party around Wintertouched/Lasting Frost. The 'easiest' solution is to just not make frost weapons trivially easy to get, not necessarily ban the feats. If everyone has the combo (and some can even forgo the lasting front feat, they still benefit from the vulnerability one way or the other) it's not just one person getting +5 damage to their attacks, it's everyone. There is a problem when EVERY weapon user's charOp has these feats pop up.

They're from Dragon Magazine, which is still Core. Beware banning one issue of Dragon and not others, or your players will point out favoritism if someone else gets that nifty power from another dragon article. This has happened to a group I was in, and the DM was basically left with either a) ban ALL dragon mag content, which meant 2 other characters would lose feats and powers, or b) risk the player re-speccing their character from one of the other PHB 1 options, which are quite often, just as powerful. Wintertouched / Lasting frost is PHB-1. If they errata that now, three years later, a pox on you Wotc, if it's too cheesy now it was too cheesy then, by far, since there weren't other options such as Called Shot or Headman's Chop back then, to offer some extra DPR options at the cost of building your entire character and playstyle around.

Tons of stuff in PHB1 was too cheesy, and they are STILL errata'ing it. How long before they got to the orbizard?

Again, headman's chop needs you to get someone prone (which ranged people in your party have to deal with, and isn't trivially easy). Doing cold damage with your attacks means owning a frost weapon. Hardly "building your entire character and playstyle around". If you had to actualy take cold attacks, instead of getting a single weapon that makes ALL your attacks cold, I'd buy the argument. As it is, it's 2 feats and a weapon to get (nearly) permanent combat advantage and bonus damage, which extends to any other party members with cold weapons and/or attacks (which is something that the other feats you mentioned don't do). Which also means that someone grabbing frostcheese doesn't have to change their playstyle at all, they can even invest in the other dpr boosting feats to go along with it. Like knocking people prone to get Kulkor and headman's chop, etc.

Called Shot is about as iconic a concept to rangers as anything else I've seen, really, and doesn't incur the cost of the frost weapons, which are darned expensive. (if a player can even buy them to begin with, that is).

E.g. I made this new ranger / sorc hybrid for a 4e game, and came up with better stats, more fun, more playability, cheaper and more optimal in every way, by using Called Shot and taking hybrid talent for prime shot rather than TWF style. Even taking Toughness as an extra feat was no problem, to be on-par in terms of HP. The double weapon I used I just handwave is two weapons in my head. Bonus : All my sorcerer powers, not just cold ones, benefit from the +5 from called shot. On top of that, When I do have CA AND Prime Shot bonuses (via powers or situationals), my max-to hit is 1 greater than the cold-cheesed TWF ranger. It works out even better for me, as I can get a Jagged Double-ax for less than half the price of two frost weapons, at level 11, and benefit from enchanced crit rate ten levels sooner. Also, mechanically, I can do stuff with my offhand like use my Star of Correlon for implement powers on my turn without having to swap weapons.

The main reason I decided to go the Called Shot route is because I have no faith in Wotc, or the idea that frost weapons will be accepted in the new game I'm joining, or if the DM will just keep throwing cold-resist creatures at us, so I sort of said screw this option. There is nothing wrong or cheesy about an entire character based on cold spells, cold breath weapon, cold feats, and cold weapons, since they're part of the system and it opens you up to being foiled quite easily by certain monsters having resistances. Even that can be bypassed, but can you buy the ice gloves to do that? not necessarily.

There's another way to bypass cold resistance with a frost weapon ... turning it off. Unlike someone that ACTUALLY specializes in cold damage, the frost weapon user not only gets to benefit with all powers, instead of having to pick from the smaller group that have cold already, but they also have the ability to stop dealing cold damage if they want to deal more damage. They get the best of both worlds.

I always thought, for the longes time that Frostcheese was, well, cheesy, but actually, Called Shot is better for a ranger IMO, and frost does have it's place if you have a good theme going on for your character. That removes the "cheese" part for me.

(a) They aren't mutually exclusive. It's possible to get both.
(b) It doesn't address the fact that a frost cheese party or even a couple of characters, greatly boosts the effect. Everyone dealing cold damage gets the +5 damage from a single characters feat (or multiple people take the feats so even if one misses, someone else will hit before the cold vulnerability drops off).
(c) The frost feats for a spell caster (or even somone like a swordmage or blackguard) that has actual cold powers is one thing. But "owning a weapon" isn't much of a theme.
(d) One class getting a pair of feats that gives a dpr boost that is comparable to a feat available to every class that doesn't seem equivalent.

And unless the DM bans that Prime Punisher/Called Shot, it works by changing the way you fight and making you exposed and off on your own to fight enemies solo, which is risky for a ranger to do. So, there is some balance there, and doesn't depend on items whatsoever so the side benefit for the DM is no item wish-lists are needed to make the build function properly.

It does actually encourage a style of play (unlike frost cheese), it's more reliable for a player, and it doesn't require on a DM allowing it work. Those are all good things. However, it is still not as powerful as frost cheese. You can grab a couple extra feats and get the combat advantage/even bigger boost to prime shot benefit and get a better to hit bonus, but you still don't have the ability to extend the bonus damage to your allies. And you actually have to "pay" for your specialization in a more specific way. Instead of giving up other options for your weapons, you have to put yourself at risk.

It works at range, with multiclass powers, whatever. That's a huge plus. If anything, frost cheese should have been fire cheese focusing on pure damage, and lasting frost would have dazed instead of extra damage instead.

All the energy based stuff was a bit whacky out of the gate. The fact that they made it better for weapon users with an elemental weapon than for spell casters who would have to limit their options to be able to benefit seemed like a pretty big oversight. Especially because, outside of say the wizard of the spiral tower, there wasn't an implement option for changing the damage type of powers consistently.

So stuff that would, at first glance, look like a feat for magic/implement users ... was instead a feat taken by fighters and rangers and rogues. And weapon users, between superior weapons, and other support, are already far ahead of implement users in terms of support.

Firetouched would have prevented regen or bypassed fire resistance or something useful. Wintertouched is a little of redundant for rangers who don't exploit Called Shot and fight off on their own, IMO. Just wait to have CA normally before you nova. If anything, I would worry about those ranger who take BOTH those extra +5 options. That, would be too crazy indeed for me if I were DMing. But think about it this way. Monsters HP go up 5x as fast as player's DPR by epic, do you really want to ban that? All you need to do is not drop frost weapons for now : problem solved. No banning necessary. Or have them be so rare they only find one or two per tier, max, and have to re-enchant their favorite weapons one at a time, so as to ramp up damage more gradually.

Rogues, on the other hand....love them some Wintertouched.

True, it's probably easier/easiest for the DM to control the frostcheese problem by controlling access to items. If WotC would actually get the whole item rarity thing fixed, it would be much easier for DMs to do that. [Also, after the whole flaming weapon update in the DM's kit, there may be some more stuff coming down the pike].

As for Monster HP going up 5 times as fast as player's DPR ... well, that would mean that if the fights normally take 5 rounds, they are scaling at the same rate, since the DPE would go up at the same rate as the monster HP. If the fight's take longer, that's actually better for the PCs, if shorter, better for the monsters. In either case it would "pull" things towards 5 rounds of combat. Although at epic, unless you're an essential character, you have 4 encounters (or the power point equivalent) and 4 dailies, so your at-will DPR is either only being used for part of the fight, or is being supplmented with minor action attacks, immediate actions, etc.
 

Not sure if the feat system needs to be thrown out, but it could use a reevaluation. I'm all for separating design spaces. Divide feats into 3 groups maybe, math feats, combat feats, and non-combat feats.
I do like this idea. Maybe build the pure math stuff (Expertise, Improved Defenses, Focus) into the level progression, then give combat feats (extra tricks, situational bonuses, etc.) at even levels and non-combat feats (skill trainings, ritual casting, languages, etc.) at odd levels?
 

I do like this idea. Maybe build the pure math stuff (Expertise, Improved Defenses, Focus) into the level progression, then give combat feats (extra tricks, situational bonuses, etc.) at even levels and non-combat feats (skill trainings, ritual casting, languages, etc.) at odd levels?
I like this too. Some might argue that by the time you hit epic you will be behind the ball, but I would disagree.

We played an epic campaign and the players were ludicrously powerful. Half the time I was challenged trying to make encounters give them any kind of sport, and had to get, well, ridiculous in terms of what they faced, and thats with most of em forgetting to remind me they even had certain feats!!

If you were to half the number of feats players get they would still get along just fine, and then to route that to non-combat applications to "round them out" would be a nice finishing touch.

Still, the whole discussion is just "Vaporware", this little genie is WELL out of the bottle.
 



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