Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Gaiden" data-source="post: 456552" data-attributes="member: 103">Pax,  Its not a matter of the fact that the halfling sorcerer does better damage with a crossbow.  Its a matter of the usefulness of the feat.  Take your str 6 halfling sorcerer.  When will he get to take advanantage of this feat.  Certainly (all else being equal) not before level 10 as you won't get that second shot from iterive attacks.  At level 10 you have access to more than enough 2nd level spells and assuming your construction of the iconic party your second level cleric buddy can simply cast bull's str on you (if he doesn't get it in a wand, or simply have an item giving you a boost to str).  At that point you could simply take martial weapon proficiency bows and be at the very least equivalent.  (You would in fact be better as you can increase your str even further and actually get bonus damage to the bow).However, going back to the usefulness of the feat, as you suggested, most combat oriented characters won't use the crossbow in the first place.  Rather they use bows.  This is simply because they get access to the bows for free and can reload as a free action normally.  So it is only the non combat characters that would use a crossbow in the first place.  Why would a non combat character take a combat feat?  Since I begged teh question I will answer:  only if that combat feat significantly counteracts a weakness (as a fighter might do with iron will, or a spell caster might do with expertise) or if that combat feat in fact augments a preexisting power/ability/spell.  This certainly would not be the combat feat of choice to make up for a weakness.  My God, its one of the worst feats in the game (yeah that's bias, I know).  Seriously though, no combat oriented character would ever take this which should say something.  If you are going to take a combat feat to make up for a weakness you need to take only the best of combat feats.  Such choices might include improved unarmed strike, expertise, blindfight, weapon focus, weapon finesse, etc.  Certainly not this feat though.  You are yielding at most 3 additional attacks (if you include rapid shot) each at significant penalties from your BAB (-2, -7, and -12) to your already abominatably low attack bonus.  Now, augmenting a preexisting power is a valid reason to take a combat feat.  For example, arcane tricksters focusing on ray attacks to deal sneak attack damage and consequently taking point blank shot, and other ranged attack feats is a very valid feat course selection.  Taking Power attack to use in combination with true strike (assuming you went spellsword or multiclassed) is another very valid optioin.  Such feat selections, again, make a lot of sense.  They have high yield relative to other feats for your powers.Now, your 6th level sorcerer, what combat augmentation feats could he use.  First lets ask what spells does he have that would be used in conjunction with feats.  A rough list (IDHMBWM) might be:shieldmage armortrue strikescentjumpmelf's acid arrowflame arrowproduce flamevampiric touchray of frostfinger of flamehastetensor's transformationbull's strcat's graceenduranceshocking graspchill touchray of enfeeblementI am sure the list goes on.The most useful actual combat spells I would have to say would be tensor's transformation and haste.  Tensor's gives you the str boost to make rapid reload irrelevant in comparison to a bow and perhaps be worse as you can get a max of +8.  Haste for a sorcerer would certainly be more useful casting spells.The rest either have nothing to do with crossbows or would apply equally to any sort of ranged attack.By a noncombat character taking rapid reload, they try and make up for a weakness of their equipment, which can better be overcome by better equipment and spells.  Moreover, it is so much more worthwhile to take a feat that focuses on their powers.  If you have a 6th level sorcerer contemplating a feat choice, consider any of the metamagic feats, great fortitude, spell focus, etc.  Seriously, worrying about a sorcerer running out of spells challenges my notion of realistic encounters for your level.  Once you get to the midlevels you should have enough spells to more than last a daily alotment of encounters.  Finally, if you are relying on a crossbow at higher levels to deal damage, you need to make better spell selections.I stand by my original position - rapid reload absolutely sucks. - no exceptions</blockquote>

Verification