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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Elder-Basilisk" data-source="post: 1036323" data-attributes="member: 3146">Since this thread is where the debate appears to be happening, I'll post here despite this being a response to the Ryan Dancey quote on the other thread.The idea that "any feat which is a must have" should be a class feature instead of a feat is decent but does not reflect anything in the design of 3.0--and even less in the design of 3.5.For fighters, for instance, weapon focus, specialization, and the greater versions of those are feats rather than class abilities. Similarly, for wizards spell penetration and greater spell penetration are feats not class abilities. And for conjurers, Augment Summoning is a feat not a class ability. These are all must have feats for nearly any fighter, wizard, or sorceror.Now, the role that WF, WS, GWF, GWF, SP, GSP, and AS play in the game is as "must have" abilities for particular designs of a class. Fighters, wizards, and sorcerors are not like bards, rogues, rangers, paladins, or barbarians who have the vast majority of their needed class features spelled out for them. They have more flexibility. That's why every fighting class doesn't have weapon focus as a class ability for instance, even though it's very nearly a must have feat for many designs--some characters will want it but others won't. Similarly, some wizards want Augment Summoning but not Spell Penetration and others would want a different feat. By being feats instead of class abilities they preserve the flexibility of the classes.Spell focus fits that category exactly. It's just as must have for a focussed wizard as weapon focus is for a focussed fighter. However, it's not a class feature since some fighters and some wizards are designed so as to make it unnecessary and making it a class feature would make such designs more difficult to pull off. Thus the Dancey was missapplying the "no must have feats" principle. There are plenty of "must have" feats and Spell Focus exactly fits the description of what other "must have" feats have in common.</blockquote>

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