What's the big deal with "feat taxes?"

[Ryujin]

BS

The former is a choice. Expertise, especially for a melee character, is weaker than tactics. Combat advantage, leader bonuses, status effects, monster knowledge, etc. all add up.

For the latter, some times you simply don't qualify for feats until Paragon even from a mechanical standpoint. Take Superior Will, as an example. If all I can squeeze out in heroic is a 14 Wisdom or Con, I can't take it there. But as a defender or leader, it's mechanically worth it to use a paragon feat on it.

There are more examples too. Your statement is made in a vacuum.

No, no BS. Your statement presumes that Expertise doesn't function in the presence of things like leader bonus, combat advantage, etc..

 

[UngeheuerLich]

No! Of course you wouldn't, because I'm clearly having a lapse in judgment. My feats aren't written to help you define your character; they're written to fix a mistake I made when I wrote the game. And the fix doesn't really fix the problem! Well, the only difference between my mistake and WotC's mistake is a few bonuses. So why should I accept WotC's mistakes as "character definitions," when I'd most likely be out of business?

I never liked every adventurer beeing equally good with every weapon he has on its class list.
It seems a bit old fashioned, but in ADnD you had a class list of weapons (4e´s proficiencies) and you had to distribute your proficiencies (4e´s expertises)
You don´t have to accept this fix. And I also would be more confortable if wizardz went out and gave every class 2 expertize feats to start with from the beginning... but I can totally live with it.

 

[DEFCON 1]

I don't follow football, but I don't think your analogy is very apt. Correct me if I'm wrong, but the fans have zero control over the lock out situation, and are stuck with the consequences whether they like it or not.

D&D fans have no control over what becomes RAW, but we do have another option. House rules, honey!

Hey, I agree with you... but I was speaking to the other side who says they either can't house rule or shouldn't have to. Inevitably, they are the ones who have the biggest problem with Expertise and the other taxing feats, because they feel that's their only option to fix the math. Anything else isn't "official", and thus a house rule (which they won't use.)

 

[DEFCON 1]

Can't really agree with this. Feats most definitely help define the role-playing space of a PC. They don't definitively define the PC in his or her entire, but they do help delineate restrictions and freedoms that make them what they are and how they do things.

Why am I thinking about those weapon and armor feats for my Dwarven Starlock? Because they would help make him look more the "traditional dwarf"...which, given the REST of his background, is something he needs help with.

But didn't you also say you weren't going to be taking the weapon and armor feats until paragon or epic? If so... how is your character fitting your mental image of a traditional dwarf until then? Is he not becoming a traditional dwarf until halfway through his adventuring career, or are you just assuming he is one from the beginning, even though you haven't taken the feats necessary to support it?

And if the latter is true... and you are just handwaving the necessity of having a weapon and armor feat until later on in paragon... why bother taking those feats at all (since they pretty much are useless to a starlock/psion anyway?) If he's a traditional dwarf from the beginning (which you are saying he is based entirely on how you roleplay and not by the feats he has)... then you don't actually need the feats at all, now or later.

 

[billd91]

So no... WotC in no way requires or demands you have Expertise to have an effective character, or a fun character. You may choose to take Expertise because it's easier to get it than any of those other dozens of possible bonuses you have access to... but you do *not* need it. Especially once you get it out of your head that there's some mythical hit percentage that all of a sudden turns the switch in the game from "not fun" to "fun".

I agree. The same comment generally holds for all high-end forms of optimization.

But the Expertise feat comes with additional baggage that most other choices do not: it's a dominant option. Billed as a "fix" to the math that was supposedly fixed in the first place (and probably too tightly balanced around a set of "sweet spot" expectations), it's obviously better than many other conditional attack bonus feats. It's just got too much baggage to be looked at like any other run of the mill feat, for good or ill.

I blame WotC for this. If they're so willing to patch other elements of the game (like monster damage) years after initial release, why wouldn't they do the same with monster defenses? If the PC attack values were falling behind progressively in each tier, why not adjust the defenses of the creatures in those tiers and make an end run around having the players opt into getting the fix and grumbling about feat taxes?

 

[Tequila Sunrise]

I never liked every adventurer beeing equally good with every weapon he has on its class list.

Again, you don't need Expertise to have some variation in weapon skill. That's what Weapon Focus and whatnot are for.

 

[Destil]

Hey, I agree with you... but I was speaking to the other side who says they either can't house rule or shouldn't have to. Inevitably, they are the ones who have the biggest problem with Expertise and the other taxing feats, because they feel that's their only option to fix the math. Anything else isn't "official", and thus a house rule (which they won't use.)

I shouldn't have to houserule anything. The thing I like about 4E is that there's very little that needs fixing. As a DM and someone who likes tinkering with rules I had several hindered pages of house rules in 3E largely because I found it a fun project to work on. I've since realized that asking a player to read more than half a page of house-rules is too much. Players should be able to not have to worry about cross-referencing a house rules document whenever they sit down to play or update their characters.

Also, I should be able to let the players simply use the character builder, because that's the bloody point of the thing. Maybe with a few guidelines.

For what it's worth, expertise and NADs were an easy fix before the new essentials feats, I just lowered monster defenses and attacks vs NADs and banned those feats (my house rules were a list of about 6 banned feats and a handful of items, and something very similar to the essentials implement rules. Totally manageable). Now I'm stuck where I don't have a workable solution if players want something like the staff expertise reach and non AoO and that sucks.

 

[DEFCON 1]

If the PC attack values were falling behind progressively in each tier, why not adjust the defenses of the creatures in those tiers and make an end run around having the players opt into getting the fix and grumbling about feat taxes?

1) Because before they created Expertise, the concept of "feat tax" didn't exist. So they had no way of knowing beforehand how bent out of shape some players would get over it... enough so to create a whole new term to define way they were annoyed about.

2) Adding a few feats to the game was a lot less of a mess than changing the defenses of every single monster in the game. You want to talk about too much errata... having errata for every single monster would have been ridiculous.

 

[C4]

Hey, I agree with you... but I was speaking to the other side who says they either can't house rule or shouldn't have to. Inevitably, they are the ones who have the biggest problem with Expertise and the other taxing feats, because they feel that's their only option to fix the math. Anything else isn't "official", and thus a house rule (which they won't use.)

True, DMs have the power to make feat taxes a non-issue. But if you're a player in a RAW game, there's not much you can do but pay your feat taxes. And IME, RAW games far outnumber house ruled games, because many DMs are afraid to deviate from official rules for whatever reason. And I suspect, because if any players use the CB the DM feels like he's putting those players out. (Has WotC even added house rule options in the online CB yet?)

So I can understand gamers complaining about feat taxes, even if they're easy to fix. Just like I can understand pot smokers railing against the laws that make it illegal, even if there's an easy fix. (Don't get caught!) Dumb rules are a nuisance at the very least, so naturally people will complain about them.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

And then I ask again:

Is learning a weapon not an important goal, every adventurer should aim for?

I guess this is the time where I want my 2nd edition back, with weapon and nonweapon proficiencies seperated...
So combat and non-combat feats seperation would be somethig to think about in 5e.

I would love 5e to one day have COmbat Exploits and Non COmbat Feats... both having the same feat like things but now fully siloed...