Ronin Arts -- 101 Feats Available Now!

[Cheiromancer]

This is a nice collection of feats you have Phil. I just picked it up and read it today and I'm liking what I see!!

I give out feats every level so this is going to be printed out and at least shown as a nice option to my players.

Are there any that you aren't going to allow? I got it too, and there are a number that I am hesitant about. Either because they seem too weak/limited, or appear overly powerful.

 

[Crothian]

Are there any that you aren't going to allow? I got it too, and there are a number that I am hesitant about. Either because they seem too weak/limited, or appear overly powerful.

I don't disallow the weak feats. I figure if the players want weak feats, more power to them. Or less power as the case may be. None really seemed to powerful to me. Alert Opportunist might be a bit strong, I can see a character really taking advantage of that. Collectors of Arcane Objects can allow for a pretty nice bonus to those skills. Divine Wisdom can really be used to give a cleric a high DC on their saves for a while. Intelligent Defense is pretty impressive. That's just a few of them that can be problems and might be a little too strong. But I don't see myself not allowing any of them. What feats do you feel are too strong?

 

[philreed]

Some of the more powerful ones, like Arcane Threat and Crown of Rings, were gone over a few times but in the end I felt they were just too flavorful to lose. They both give just that right touch of oddness (in my mind) to make them fun for high-level and epic games.

As to too weak, those are usually feats that fill very specific purposes.

I thought overall it turned out to be a nice balance for campaigns of varying power levels.

 

[philreed]

Alert Opportunist might be a bit strong, I can see a character really taking advantage of that.

That's one of the feats I went back and forth on, tweaking the prerequisites and trying to decide if it should be an epic feat. I could certainly see a case for it being changed to an epic feat.

 

[Cheiromancer]

Aura of Holy Might made me wonder. For a paladin it's a kind of fear effect that doesn't affect your allies, has a 60 foot radius, good duration (consider a paladin's typical charisma modifier and double it!) has effects even a failed save (opponents are shaken while in the area). It's a pretty powerful spell-like ability to be granted by a feat.

Dumb Luck also seems very strong; a +4 bonus to any check, usable several times per day. Wow.

Ear to the Ground and Dungeon Sense seem more like a magical clairvoyance power than a feat.

Fighter's Discipline has the potential for adding several points of BAB to a high level multiclassed character. A feat that gives +1 to all attacks is already stronger than weapon focus, and one that gives +1 BAB is stronger still (even if BAB is capped by your level). But one that in a fighter/rogue multiclass could add +2 or +3...? BTW, there is something odd about the prerequisites for Fighter's Discipline- Fighter level 6+ makes the BAB 6+ seem redundant. And if you receive 5 feats as fighter bonus feats, don't you have to be at least an 8th level fighter? The only thing I could think of is that there must be variant fighters out there that have different BABs, feat progressions and so on. Am I right?

These are just a few of the things that jump out at me in the first part of the document. There are doubtless more if I looked more closely. I don't claim to be 100% accurate here- but these are things that I would want to get advice on before I would use it to make NPCs or allow them for the PCs. I am nowhere near as familiar as I should be with some of the other feats out there, so no doubt I am missing some killer synergies.

 

[Crothian]

Dumb lcuk is just skill checks and ability checks. It is versatile, but I don't think it is too bad.

Dungeon Sense and Ear to the Ground, are nice but I really don't see a lot of people taking them. Ear to the ground should mention that you have to make yourself prone though.

Fighters Discipoline is nice no doubt about it. A few more requirements on it would have been nice.

All of these feats I'd allow in my game.

 

[philreed]

The only thing I could think of is that there must be variant fighters out there that have different BABs, feat progressions and so on. Am I right?

Yes, there are.

 

[BryonD]

Fighters Discipoline is nice no doubt about it. A few more requirements on it would have been nice.

This one gave me pause as well. But I thought about it and I don't think it would hurt the game.
For my games I think it is safe to assume that the only way to get there would be a Fighter 8.
If you have 12 levels of Sorc or Wiz (or other like class) then you get a whopping +6 BAB!!! But, this is at 20th level and you are talking about a really serious inefficient character. A wizard at 20th level and only 12th level caster. I think it is widely agreed that Wizard Fighter makes a poor combo (the optional splash of 1 or 2 levels aside). So this feat becomes balanced by virtue of nearly all its excess powers goes into filling the hole created by the bad combo built in to getting there. It is comparable to Eldritch Knight and rather than just being another feat, opens the door on deeply suboptimal path.

In the case of a rogue or other 3/4 BAB class it is a bit harder to judge. But a Fighter8/Rogue12 would "only" get +3 BAB. That is pretty big, I admit. But I'm really not certain that this guy would outshine a straight Fighter20.

I'd allow it.
I'm one of the balance obsessive people. But I'm strict about the definition of balance as being every player has fun. I don't think this would break that idea.

 

[Man-thing]

Ear to the ground should mention that you have to make yourself prone though.

Fighters Discipoline is nice no doubt about it. A few more requirements on it would have been nice.

1) Damn! You're right. I forgot to mention that. This is one of the feats from Fantasy Player's Companion V.1 Feats. It first came out in MAy of 2004. It has gotten extensive use in my campaign particularly for dealing with invisible opponents, darkness, or ink clouds. THe characters work out a coordinate system and the eye to the ground character calls out opponent location. Damn dangerous job for him, depending on the level of intelligence of the opponent.

2) Fighter's Discipline was a tough nut, its a good feat but I think Phil tried a large number of variant requirements. I'm not sure if there is a 100% way to make it feel right to everyone and yet, I wouldn't chuck it and I'm glad Phil didn't.

Maybe this would have worked better with Test-based requirements.
Or
Making it so if they keep the Fighter BAB, they also keep the Fighter skill list (it wouldn't be as attractive to Wizards looking for an easy power boost) since if they are keeping their fighting skills sharp others would suffer.

hmm, things to time on.

 

[philreed]

2) Fighter's Discipline was a tough nut, its a good feat but I think Phil tried a large number of variant requirements. I'm not sure if there is a 100% way to make it feel right to everyone and yet, I wouldn't chuck it and I'm glad Phil didn't.

Maybe this would have worked better with Test-based requirements.
Or
Making it so if they keep the Fighter BAB, they also keep the Fighter skill list (it wouldn't be as attractive to Wizards looking for an easy power boost) since if they are keeping their fighting skills sharp others would suffer.

I like the idea of making it so the character also keeps the fighter skill list. Too bad we didn't think of that one while going over the final text.

I had toyed with including test-based requirements for a lot of the feats but in the end decided that most people wouldn't even care. This would actually make an excellent poll item . . .