When Skill Focus loses its value

[Driddle]

Your perspective, please -- at what general character level does the Skill Focus feat lose its attraction as a valuable addition to your developing character?

Consider this comparison:

1st level -- 4 skill points (maxed), +3 Skill Focus ... 20 percent chance of success raised to 35 percent ... but those three points mean a 75 percent improvement to the core ability.

13th level -- 16 skill points (maxed), + 3 Skill Focus ... 80 percent chance of success raised to 95 percent ... but those three points mean a 19 percent improvement to the core ability.

Additionally, many common adventuring actions don't require more than a certain minimum of skill points (unless your DM keeps pushing the envelope). You could probably stop buffing your Riding skill, for example, at about 10 skill points. You're only going to need to control your mount so well and not much more -- X number of logs you have to jump during a chase through the woods, or X horseback combat scenes. And as your character improves with experience, so will appropriate enhancements via magic/attributes/etc. So why keep developing the skill to its maximum potential?

In other words, a single +3 improvement loses its relative value as the base number increases with experience. At what point do you stop considering picking such skill enhancement feats as useful options?

 

[Joshua Randall]

Skill Focus is always useless from a pure min/max point of view. Feats are too valuable to waste being converted into skill points.

 

[Kae'Yoss]

I concur. From the powergamer's point of view, the feat is quite useless. It is mainly used for PrC prerequisites and "roleplaying".

 

[Swiftbrook]

In addition ....

There are many feats of the +2/+2 variety, some even better. If I were going to burn a feat for skills, I'd pick a +2/+2 instead of Skill Focus.

For example: "Ehlonna's Way [General]" a Greyhawk regional feat from Dragon 315 gives a +3 Hide and +3 Survival when in woodlands. Plus you get a +4 bonus to attack vs. cover.

-Swiftbrook

 

[morbiczer]

You should take into consideration that the feat you mentioned is a regional feat, and those are admittedly somewhat more powerful than normal feats.

But I agree, in general +2/+2 feats are better (= more powerful) than simple skill focus feats.

 

[Planesdragon]

Simple. When you are able to achieve the result you need all the time.

From a character-development standpoint, however, I need to disagree with everyone else in this thread. Skill Focus is a great feat for two things: pushing a skill to the absolute max, and becoming competent in a cross-class skill. A fighter who's spent his 3 points / level on Craft, Ride, and Jump could use a general feat to become competent in Heal, Hide, or Sneak--er, sorry, Move Silently.

OTOH, IMC Skill Focus is a better option because skill-items don't grant a bonus, they have ranks of a skill in their own.

 

[zcthu3]

I'd disagree that Skill Focus is a useless feat - it is extremely useful for pumping up cross-class skills. Admittedly, the Fighter is really the only character who has the Feats to burn for this sort of build but there you go.

 

[jmucchiello]

I'd disagree that Skill Focus is a useless feat - it is extremely useful for pumping up cross-class skills. Admittedly, the Fighter is really the only character who has the Feats to burn for this sort of build but there you go.

The fighter does not have feats to burn for this. Burning feats makes him less effective at his core competence - killin' stuff. I've never seen a fighter build where the fighter throws his hands up and goes, "hmm, skill focus Survival would be better." (And while there is a dearth of good high level feats in the core books, the number of 3rd party books with high level feats is quite numerous. Even I've written one. )

 

[Ranger REG]

In other words, a single +3 improvement loses its relative value as the base number increases with experience. At what point do you stop considering picking such skill enhancement feats as useful options?

Probably when a desired skill have reached the rank of 10.

For skills that are useful in opposed skill checks, it is still useful to get as much bonuses to increase your advantage over your opponent's skill check.

 

[green slime]

I disagree that the feat skill focus is useless. It is only almost useless, due to how the game treats skills in general.

It is of limited use, when, using cash, a character can easily supplant the skill itself with magical items and/or spells.

Want to Hide? Don't bother placing skill points in hide; Just purchase a cloak of Elvenkind (+5 competence bonus 2,500 gp), or an elixir of Hiding (+10 competence bonus 250 gp), and raise your Dex. At 10th level, and using invisibility, why worry about the skill?

In general spells grant to high a bonus to skills. Magical items that increase skill levels are also still too cheap.

Cash is always present in the game, and indeed, it is to a high degree expeced that players will be able to purchase or create these items themselves. Spells are a readily renewable resource.