How should feats work?

[kaomera]

So, I was looking at some of the mounted combat feats, and I got to thinking, how should the bonuses that feats provide (both straight "plusses" and other benefits) be handled?

Assuming you have a feat that, fluff-wise, covers the concept that "your guy does cool thing":

A) When your guy does cool thing, your guy gets bonus X.

B) Because your guy does cool thing, your guy gets bonus Y all the time.

C) When your guy does cool thing, your guy gets bonus Z1; also your guy gets bonus Z2 all the time.

I'm not really considering balance here, we could assume that X > Y > Z1 > Z2 or something. What I'm thinking is that option A offers the most encouragement to do cool thing, while option B is more generally useful and less reliant on cool thing being featured in the game on a regular basis. Option C is a compromise, but possibly suffers from having very minor bonuses (I would think).

 

[Nemesis Destiny]

Most of the "good" new Essentials feats seem to follow "C" but with the exception that that neither Z1, nor Z2 are minor, as in the case of all the new expertise feats. Bonus Z2 would be your juicy plus to hit per tier, while Z1 is your occasional bonus, which is, depending on feat, ranges from always on as well to often useful, and is considered worth a feat slot on its own.

They don't all follow this model, but I've noticed that most of them (the "new" feats) don't have a lot of temporary or conditional bonuses, and I think that's what a feat should be. No more crappy, conditional feats designed by folks erring on the side of caution so that their article has a better chance of being published!

If you insist on bloating the game with crunchy bits so that it resembles a bowl of granola, at least make it tasty granola for crying out loud!

 

[OnlineDM]

I think they're all fine, frankly. Clearly, the philosophy on 4e design is that all three are reasonable options, and I agree with that philosophy.

I think Option B (Constant Bonus) is the easiest for a player to remember, especially if it's something like an expertise feat that the Character Builder will factor in automatically. You have 5 more hit points. You have +4 to initiative. You have +1 to hit. These are pretty simple and hard to forget.

The other options, which have some rider benefit when "cool thing" happens, are also fine, but they're more prone to player forgetfulness.

From a design elegance perspective, I like Option B for feats. But feats that give you some benefit when you do something cool can be a lot of fun, too, as long as you remember the benefit. So, I'm fine with all of them in the end.

 

[MatthewJHanson]

I think A, B, and C are all good options. I think they fit different play styles and character buildings, and if we were to eliminate one the game would lose something.

 

[hayek]

I agree that all are viable options, and the game would suffer if some of the design styles were removed. But my major criticism of how feats have been handled (through 3e, 3.5e, and 4e) is it's not easy for a player to self-select into the style they want. There's just a bazillion sources of a bazillion feats, and a player that wants less complexity has no hope of streamlining their choice so that they can stick to the easily managed feats (constant bonus).

What the system needs is not more or less of a certain type of feat, but a way for players to easily distinguish which kind they want.

 

[Dice4Hire]

I do think feats need to have decent options. One thing for 4E feats, especially in earlier powers books is the restrictions. Race, power source, class, build, ability score, level, then possible having a power, an adjacent ally/enemy and so on and so on.

It gets to be a lot.

Overall, I would like more feats that are more open ended and not tied to every little thing in the rules.

But on the other hand, limited static bonuses, as they are boring. Strong, in most cases, but boring.

 

[eriktheguy]

A conditional bonus and a constant bonus are easy to confuse. Compare Nimble Blade to Skill Focus. Nimble blade seems conditional (bonus to hit with combat advantage and light blade).

Skill focus is a constant bonus to skill checks. However, rogues are likely to meet the conditions for nimble blade far more often than they are to meet the conditions for skill focus (a specific skill check coming up only occasionally in an encounter). Similarly, you could argue that weapon focus is conditional or constant (and both ideas could be right depending on your build).

While I like the idea of a conditional bonus in terms of balance, I also dislike it because remembering all your conditional bonuses is difficult for new/casual players.

Constant bonuses are nice because they are added on the character sheet and don't require per turn concentration and memory. On the other hand, constant bonuses can be a problem because they become taxes or balance issues...

I guess overall I prefer conditional, although I wish there were an easier way to remember them all...

 

[kaomera]

I agree that conditional vs. constant really isn't a clear-cut issue.

I think that, ideally, I prefer conditional bonuses where it's easy for the player to generate the conditions, rather than having to hope that the DM will include it. I also think that I like the idea of benefits that stack - not just stacking numerical bonuses, but multiple effects (or perhaps options fro effects?) from a single condition. I think you might have to go the option route for balance sake, but I'm not sure how that would work. If you have several feats that (for example) each applied an extra effect when you hit a target and have combat advantage, that can get pretty powerful pretty quick. But if you're only allowed to apply one of those effects, then each subsequent such feat is likely to become less attractive. idk, the idea of having multiple options like that seems neat, but I think I expect most players to dismiss the concept on the basis of overall power.

However, several posters have brought up a good point that variety is a good thing...

 

[Nullzone]

I like a few conditional bonuses on my characters as they allow me to put a 'spin' on things. But if you add too many then it becomes cumbersome to remember all the conditions. So it needs to be a healthy mix of both; a few conditional bonuses so you can 'gimmick' your character in whatever way makes sense, and static bonuses just to add to your power base.

 

[babinro]

Constant bonuses.

4e has a lot of conditional factors to track within the powers. Constant bonuses give a strong sense of meaning to feat as it changes how your character performs at all times.

All printed feat bonuses should stack with one another...and many feats should be allowed to be taken multiple times (although this could easily throw out the games balance)