D&D 4E Hopefully D&D 4E will give us feats every level . . .

[DungeonmasterCal]

My ultimate character creation and level advancement would see everything based on skills and feats. Abilities that are now class specific would become feats, open to everyone. Rather than regimented attack bonuses, these would be handled just like skills. Players could choose to add ranks to melee attacks, grappling attacks or ranged attacks as they see fit. Armor class would be a defense bonus and handled the same way. Spellcasting, the same. I know it's a pretty farfetched idea and the idea hasn't completely gelled in my head...but I think it would work.

But I also know I'm a lazy s.o.b. I'll just wait for Iron Lore and eat that up with a spoon.

 

[mattcolville]

Feats are fun. Feats open up a large number of possibilities and really help customize a character.

I want a feat every time I gain a level. I'd happily sacrifice class features for a feat each and every level.

There's an easy way to do this now, and it fixes a problem.

If, every level, you get a Feat Point, and some feats cost more than one point, then you could have lots of smaller feats, or a few awesome feats. For instance; improved initiative is useful in every combat, which means virtually every session of every game. Whereas Alertness is only useful now and then. Make ALertness a 1 Point Feat, and Improved Initiative a 3 point feat. Characters get three feat points at 1st level, and an additional feat point every level after that.

 

[A'koss]

There's an easy way to do this now, and it fixes a problem.

If, every level, you get a Feat Point, and some feats cost more than one point, then you could have lots of smaller feats, or a few awesome feats. For instance; improved initiative is useful in every combat, which means virtually every session of every game. Whereas Alertness is only useful now and then. Make ALertness a 1 Point Feat, and Improved Initiative a 3 point feat. Characters get three feat points at 1st level, and an additional feat point every level after that.

I take it your idea is a variant on Sean Reynolds "Feat Point" system?

This is something you may also want to look into philreed, you can find it here: http://www.seankreynolds.com/rpgfiles/misc/featpointsystem.html

A lot of people have said it's pretty good and you can acquire more feats than normal if your mix includes some of the weaker ones.

Cheers!

 

[mattcolville]

I take it your idea is a variant on Sean Reynolds "Feat Point" system?

Possibly his is a variant of mine.

 

[Henry]

I want a feat every time I gain a level. I'd happily sacrifice class features for a feat each and every level.

I believe you've just described d20 Modern and Grim Tales. In theme, at least. They substitute Talents for Class abilities, and it seems to work for them pretty well.

 

[arscott]

I believe you've just described d20 Modern and Grim Tales. In theme, at least. They substitute Talents for Class abilities, and it seems to work for them pretty well.

The thing is, Modern and GT classes work more like fighters. They get the standard 1/3 feats, and 1/2 bonus feats (and 1/3 for most of modern's advance classes).

It really would save alot of time if you had a 1 feat per level system instead of sometimes nothing, sometimes one, and sometimes two. And this would only give an extra feat every 6 levels.

The only problem is that bonus feats are never as powerful as regular feats, because the selection is limited. Blue Rose solves this problem by having Warrior, Expert, and Adept feats, each takable only if you're a member of the appropriate class. For the More open, multiclass friendly Modern/GT, you'd have to come up with a different system.

 

[jodyjohnson]

Too many feats, not enough characters.

 

[The Shaman]

I believe you've just described d20 Modern and Grim Tales. In theme, at least. They substitute Talents for Class abilities, and it seems to work for them pretty well.

The thing is, Modern and GT classes work more like fighters. They get the standard 1/3 feats, and 1/2 bonus feats (and 1/3 for most of modern's advance classes).

Of course, they also get a talent 1/2 (base classes) or a class ability 2/3 (advanced classes) - personally I think the talents are often much better than feats or class abilities.

In fact, that would be the one real draw for me of Grim Tales - being able to take more talents by going past 10th level in a base class.

 

[Henry]

The only problem is that bonus feats are never as powerful as regular feats, because the selection is limited. Blue Rose solves this problem by having Warrior, Expert, and Adept feats, each takable only if you're a member of the appropriate class. For the More open, multiclass friendly Modern/GT, you'd have to come up with a different system.

I disagree, because Grim Tales does the same thing, and some feats are members of multiple trees (strong/tough, or smart/fast, etc.) And if a bonus feat is less powerful, at best it's only marginally so, because taking feats with those bonus slots frees you up to take other feats with the general 1/3 slots, and the bonus feats offered aren't by any means "slouchy."

 

[Ace]

Feats are fun. Feats open up a large number of possibilities and really help customize a character.

I want a feat every time I gain a level. I'd happily sacrifice class features for a feat each and every level.

I think most class features should be feats myself -- the 3 class system in Blue Rose and Unearthed Arcana touches on this -- in BR each role (class more or less) gets 1 feat per level -- feats include the usual suspects along with spell abilities and things like favored enemy and sneak attack

I like this approach as it makes thinks like Fighter who can become a Wolf-- not a werewolf mind just a wolf easy

The only flaws I can see are feat repeating and in the Blue Rose (aka True 20) version the facts that skills use feat choices--