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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Tony Vargas" data-source="post: 5275788" data-attributes="member: 996">Melee Training as a feat effectively delivered a very large attack and damage bonus.  If your STR is 8 and your INT is 20, Melee Training gave you a +6 to hit and damage with your MBA.  OK, it's only an MBA, but still, +6?  No feat gives a +6 to hit.  So that might be a reason to suspect something's wrong, but, it wasn't really as scary as it sounded.  All it did was bring your MBA up even with your other powers.  Effectively, it gave a non-STR builds access to OAs, Charging, and MBA-enhancing items (like bracers of mighty striking).   Now imagine if there were no OA or Charge Mechanic, but there was a feat that would let you charge.  Wouldn't that be a pretty good feat?  What about one that let you hit anyone that tried to move past you?  Both?  For characters who dump STR, Charge and OA almost might as well not have existed and gaining those options, plus an effective attack that doesn't provoke in melee (if your regular ranged/area attacks all do) was probably worth more than one feat.But that's not really it, either.  Those are generally available options, so they're not as valuable as they would be if /on one/ got them without a feat.The real impact of Melee Training was in the balance between STR builds and non-STR builds.  Before Melee Training a low-STR or STR-dumping build could forget about charging or using an OA or getting a free attack from Commander's Strike.  That was just part of not having a high STR, and the non-STR builds all had plenty of really good powers.  The STR builds, OTOH, often were a little lacking in the Power department.  Consider the STR paladin who lacked /any/ STR power at 9th level.  Or, the STR Cleric, a build that's largely been consigned to the trash heap not just by optimizers, but by WotC.  I don't think Melee Training, alone, killed those builds - Fighters and Warlords remained viable - but I don't think it was good for them, because it made things available to everyone at the cost of one feat that formerly required the major undertaking of investing significantly in STR.But, that's not why WotC finally (and gently) nerfed Melee Training.  No, it was because Melee Training as it existed broke the Knight and Slayer.  To maintain the 'backward' compatability of Essentials with 4e, therefor, 4e had to be changed.</blockquote>

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