D&D 4E Most useless 4e Feat?

[Otterscrubber]

I was making a character and looking at some of the feats. Some of them really make my eyes roll and I'd like to see what folks considered the most useless of all.

My personal favorite is "Wintertouched" which gives CA against creatures with vulnerability to Cold. Frankly, I can't even think of a creature off the top of my head that has a vulnerability to cold. I'm sure there is some other feat that ties in with this, but probably not in a great way. Please let me know what your nominee is.....

 

[JasonZZ]

What's vulnerable to cold? Several magma-themed creatures from MM1, and anything subject to Lingering Frost (paragon tier feat). Incidentally, Lingering Frost, Wintertouched, and a frost weapon were for a time considered a pretty good combination for rogues.

Personally, I'd consider the elemental-damage feats from PH1 more useless.

 

[Zaran]

Linguist came to mind as soon as I read the thread title. At least the elemental feats can be used in a specialized way. I was hoping they would get updated in the errata since Essentials is coming out with Implement focus feats.

 

[renau1g]

I was making a character and looking at some of the feats. Some of them really make my eyes roll and I'd like to see what folks considered the most useless of all.

My personal favorite is "Wintertouched" which gives CA against creatures with vulnerability to Cold. Frankly, I can't even think of a creature off the top of my head that has a vulnerability to cold. I'm sure there is some other feat that ties in with this, but probably not in a great way. Please let me know what your nominee is.....

Lol... it's one of the best feats once you get to paragon...at least with a frost weapon and lingering frost. Just ask the CO boards

Useless feat? Barreling Charge (MP2) - Rules no longer require charges to stop in first square

 

[DracoSuave]

Linguist has a use if you're in a campaign with a lot of cross-cultural roleplay, and where languages actually matter.

Most useless one would be Focused Expertise.

 

[Minifig]

Linguist came to mind as soon as I read the thread title. At least the elemental feats can be used in a specialized way. I was hoping they would get updated in the errata since Essentials is coming out with Implement focus feats.

Linguist is fantastic for bards.

 

[Mengu]

I don't know about useless, but the number of feats I'd never consider picking up, and have never seen in use is staggering. PHB3 has some stand outs, like Cascading Rush, Combat Intuition, and Shifting Defense.

But there are other silly feats I'd never consider wasting a very valuable feat slot on, Angry Grandfather, Cleanse the Madness, Animal Empathy, and a plethora of other feats that come into play during a lunar eclipse in midwinter if you're fighting rot grubs and standing next to shrubbery...

 

[Mapache]

Most useless one would be Focused Expertise.

Focused Expertise isn't actually in the game. It was a playtest Feat that got replaced with Versatile Expertise.

Agreed that Barreling Charge, under current rules, does absolutely nothing, so it's at least tied for the current "winner". Are there any Feats that actually make your character worse?

 

[LuckyAdrastus]

Are there any Feats that actually make your character worse?

Power Attack from PhB1.

Note: there are corner cases in which Power Attack might be useful, but for 95%+ of characters and situations, its a self de-buff.

It decreases your hitting chance by 10% to increase your damage by frequently well less than 10%. Plus you miss on the benefits from your "hit" like dazing or prone or whatever.

 

[Tony Vargas]

Wintertouched is pretty good if you can inflict Cold Vulnerability easily, as with Lasting Frost or Arcane Fire, for instance.

Linguist synergizes with some other feat that gives you a diplomacy bonus based on the number of languages you know. And, there's a set of uncommon 'items' (words of creation) that making knowing Supernal (which you can't just take at 1st, you need to use Linguist) suddenly desireable.