Long Time Lurker submitting Feats for Assessment

[Pyoor]

Here are a couple feats that I use in my campaigns. I'm sure I'm not the first person to come up with feats like this, but I haven't come across them before.

ARMORED ARCANE [GENERAL]
Prerequisites: Dex 13, Armor Proficiency (light)
Benefit: You reduce your Arcane Spell Failure Chance by 10% while wearing light armor.
Special: A character may gain this feat multiple times. Its effects stack.

ARCANE SHIELDBEARER [GENERAL]
Prerequisites: Str 13, Shield Proficiency
Benefit: You reduce the Arcane Spell Failure Chance to 0% while using all shields except tower shields.
Special: The character needs to have one hand free to cast spells with somatic components.

One of my players suggested that they are open to abuse by taking a level in a class that grants Armor Proficiency (light) and Shield Proficiency feats, although it hasn't been a problem in my games. A ambitious min-maxer would have to acquire the armor and shield proficiency feats, meet the ability score prerequisites and then spend another three feats, Armored Arcane twice and Arcane Shieldbearer, just to be able to wear a chain shirt and use a shield. That would result in an AC of 17 (Dex 13). If they take Armored Arcane again and aquire mithral chainmail or breastplate the character could have and AC of 18. 6 feats to get an AC fo 18 doesn't seem unbalanced to me. Comments are greatly welcomed!

 

[Arkhandus]

I think all I'd suggest is to add a "BAB +2 or greater" as a prerequisite to both.

 

[Ilium]

Do you allow the Twilight enhancement on armor in your game? It was published in PHB II (and somewhere else, but I don't remember where). It reduces ASF by, I think, 10% as well. Just something to consider.

 

[Sound of Azure]

Shield Bearer-> I like the this feat a lot. I, too would add in a base attack bonus requirement, and possibly a spellcraft requirement (say 6 or 7 ranks or something) to reflect training in both arcane matters and combat.

Armoured Arcana-> I created a feat of same name a while back that reduced Arcane Spell Failure by 15% for a particular armour you are proficient with (any type).
It had a BAB requirment of +2 and Spellcraft requirement of 8 ranks.

 

[Dagger of Lath]

Do you allow the Twilight enhancement on armor in your game? It was published in PHB II (and somewhere else, but I don't remember where). It reduces ASF by, I think, 10% as well. Just something to consider.

Book of Exalted Deeds???

 

[librarius_arcana]

Here are a couple feats that I use in my campaigns. I'm sure I'm not the first person to come up with feats like this, but I haven't come across them before.

ARMORED ARCANE [GENERAL]
Prerequisites: Dex 13, Armor Proficiency (light)
Benefit: You reduce your Arcane Spell Failure Chance by 10% while wearing light armor.
Special: A character may gain this feat multiple times. Its effects stack.

ARCANE SHIELDBEARER [GENERAL]
Prerequisites: Str 13, Shield Proficiency
Benefit: You reduce the Arcane Spell Failure Chance to 0% while using all shields except tower shields.
Special: The character needs to have one hand free to cast spells with somatic components.

One of my players suggested that they are open to abuse by taking a level in a class that grants Armor Proficiency (light) and Shield Proficiency feats, although it hasn't been a problem in my games. A ambitious min-maxer would have to acquire the armor and shield proficiency feats, meet the ability score prerequisites and then spend another three feats, Armored Arcane twice and Arcane Shieldbearer, just to be able to wear a chain shirt and use a shield. That would result in an AC of 17 (Dex 13). If they take Armored Arcane again and aquire mithral chainmail or breastplate the character could have and AC of 18. 6 feats to get an AC fo 18 doesn't seem unbalanced to me. Comments are greatly welcomed!

I like both of those,

 

[Pyoor]

I think all I'd suggest is to add a "BAB +2 or greater" as a prerequisite to both.

I do like the idea of adding a prerequisite of a BAB to reflect martial training. The prerequisite of Spellcraft is also an interesting choice. I think both of these make a lot of sense. I'll consider these additions to my game.

Thanks to everyone for their input!

 

[Kurashu]

I created an Arcane Armor Proficiency feat chain a while back. However, it was closer to the Warmage's Armored Mage progression. Ignore ASF for an armor you are proficient with and have Armor Focus (+1 Dodge bonus with a selected armor) with. You also had to have an arcane spellcaster level of 1 for light armor, 8 for medium, and 15 for heavy.

And yes I, took Practiced Spellcaster in too account aswell. I figured a magic user gets little to no armor proficiencies (except warmage), so dipping into fighter/paladin shouldn't be TOO bad for them.