[3.5] Feat tier system

[Thurbane]

Hi, has anyone created or thought about a tier based system for feats?

We all know that some feats (Domain Devotion feats etc.) are far more powerful than others (Endurance, Run etc.).

I propose a system where instead of 1 feat every three level, you get 1 "feat point" every level or HD. You then buy feats with our points, based on how powerful the feat is.

For instance, a cruddy feat like Endurance would cost 1 point, while a powerful feat like Travel Devotion might cost 3 or more.

...the premise is to make those less useful feats which you need to qualify for other feats or PrCs easier to obtain.

Thoughts?

[Ouranos]

I like it. If balanced right it would work. Trouble is classes that get bonus feats might get a little shafted depending on the typical point cost of their bonus feats. Fighters are a good example, most of their bonus feats are crap without stacking them on top of each other.

[Thrawn183]

In that case you could just make it so that Fighters can always get fighter feats for just one of their bonus feats.

[Cute_Riolu]

Perhaps then Fighters would get bonus 'fighter' feat points in a 1-2 pattern, then, as well as the normal ones.

This could also allow for expansion of existing feats in a manner similar to Fax Celestis' Investing Points system.

[deuxhero]

I'd prefer just making the junk feats skill tricks.

[Cute_Riolu]

I'd prefer just making the junk feats skill tricks.

But then you run into the fact that fighters get 2 skill points per level.

[deuxhero]

Then give them extra skill tricks on the levels they don't get feats (or something like that)

[Zeta Kai]

I propose that a character get 2FP (feat points) when they would normally get a feat.

Lame feats that don't help overly much (minor skill boosters, Dodge, Toughness, Run, proficiencies, etc.) cost 1FP.
Relatively-balanced feats that are decent in power & a Good Idea to take (Power Attack, Cleave, Improved Initiative, metamagic, item creation, etc.) cost 2FP.
Overpowered feats that significantly boost your effectiveness (Leadership, Natural Spell, etc.) cost 3-4FP.

That way, feats can be taken as they are meant to be taken. They can boost your power without creating a huge disparity in relative power levels. If the system did this in the first place, the game would be a lot more balanced, because it would be much harder to create a sub-optimal character build.

[deuxhero]

Cleave isn't anywhere near as useful as powerattack.

[Siosilvar]

Cleave isn't anywhere near as useful as powerattack.

Granularity can be increased as desired. Cleave = 3 FP, PA = 5 FP?

Also, that's not always true. If you're fighting low-HP, but still relevant monsters, Cleave's effectiveness rises compared to fighting, say, giants.

[Latronis]

Cleave is also greater in effectiveness for characters that can trigger death effects from attacks. Arguably more so than power attack.

For some of the crappier feats (let's use endurance as an example) I'm looking at making them a function of skill ranks not tricks. So for example every 5 actual ranks you have in survival grants you an +1 bonus to any saves you would make with the endurance feat.

[Temotei]

Leadership is absolutely ridiculous. That would have to be at least 5 FP if you/we go Zeta Kai's route.

[Zeta Kai]

Leadership is absolutely ridiculous. That would have to be at least 5 FP if you/we go Zeta Kai's route.

Well, let's analyze that for a second. In "my system", you'd get 2FP at each level you'd normally receive a feat for. And you'd have to be able to save them up so you could buy feats that cost 3 or more FP, unlike in our current system, in which you pretty much have to take your feats when you accrue them. With me so far? Good.

Now, Leadership still requires character level 6th as a prerequisite, & I don't propose we change that or any other feat's prerequisites (the fewer changes to the system, the better for integration & use). A 6th level character would have earned 6FP by then, 2FP for every feat they would normally have by this point (humans, of course, would have 8FP at 6th level).

At this point, you can see that even having Leadership cost 5FP would be no impediment to taking the feat ASAP. Balancing its FP cost is merely a question of how many other feats that you think a character should give up to take such an OP'd feat. Also, remember that even when using this "system," some DM's would still not want to deal with Leadership in their game & just ban it. Especially the ones who would push for a high cost.

[Temotei]

Well, let's analyze that for a second. In "my system", you'd get 2FP at each level you'd normally receive a feat for. And you'd have to be able to save them up so you could buy feats that cost 3 or more FP, unlike in our current system, in which you pretty much have to take your feats when you accrue them. With me so far? Good.

Now, Leadership still requires character level 6th as a prerequisite, & I don't propose we change that or any other feat's prerequisites (the fewer changes to the system, the better for integration & use). A 6th level character would have earned 6FP by then, 2FP for every feat they would normally have by this point (humans, of course, would have 8FP at 6th level).

At this point, you can see that even having Leadership cost 5FP would be no impediment to taking the feat ASAP. Balancing its FP cost is merely a question of how many other feats that you think a character should give up to take such an OP'd feat. Also, remember that even when using this "system," some DM's would still not want to deal with Leadership in their game & just ban it. Especially the ones who would push for a high cost.

Indeed. Banning is the best solution.

Maybe it should be worth 10 FP. That severely hinders the character's development. Still broken, but it's at least harder to break the game with the feat. :mitd:

[Melayl]

Sean K. Reynolds had posted a feat point system on his website. I seemed rather functional. If I have time later, I'll try to find the link and post it.

Edit:
Here's that link. (http://www.seankreynolds.com/rpgfiles/misc/featpointsystem.html) He takes all the feats in the PHB and gives them a price based on usefulness. Worth looking over, at least.

[Thurbane]

Sounds good. I'd really like to get something like this in place for my next homebrew campaign.

All feats were not created equal! :smalltongue:

[Jane_Smith]

Meh, most games I run, I make leadership part of the reputation system and ban the feat itself. If player's wish for followers, they have to actively attempt to gather them - gaining more based on their reputation scores, not their level or their charisma, etc. Tends to make it abit more realistic.

Anyway - I like the general idea of this. Everquest the RPG/d20 also had a simular system - you got 4 or so Training Points each level. You could spend a few days meditating, training in town, etc, to 'spend' these points. You cant just spend them in the middle of a dungeon crawl. Effectively - 1 point could be spent to gain 1 skill point to spend in any of your skills, 3 points could be spent to gain a bonus feat, and 5 points could be used to increase one of your ability scores by +1 permanently. This was ontop of normal skill, feat, and ability advancement. Weee bit powerful, but just a bit of info for you guys to digest.

Goodluck and hopefully you guys make something out of this. :smallcool:

[Drolyt]

I kinda like this idea, but then you might as well redefine the whole system, since the existing feats weren't designed for this. For many feats instead of feat chains you could just allow people to invest more points into the one feat to gain more benefits. The downside is this variant makes character creation more complicated, which I really like to avoid in RPG design, but since it would only likely be used by veteran players on this board I guess that's fine. Also feats are hardly the most unbalanced thing in the game, if they were Fighters wouldn't be tier 5, so I'm not sure how much this will help other than to give a leg up to people who like crappy feats for flavor. As for Fighters I say just give them extra feat points every level, don't limit what they can spend it on. Many other classes (Wizard) shouldn't get bonus feats anyway, so just ignore them.

[Surgo]

The wiki in my signature does a "tier system" for homebrew feats with four plus one levels, where each feat is said "in terms of power, this most closely matches <this WotC feat>.

However, we also have that "plus one" for unquantifiable power. This includes feats like Leadership. I don't think there's a way around having an unquantifiable tier, and it would honestly be impossible to say a priori how many points it would cost for one of those feats.

[Drolyt]

The wiki in my signature does a "tier system" for homebrew feats with four plus one levels, where each feat is said "in terms of power, this most closely matches <this WotC feat>.

However, we also have that "plus one" for unquantifiable power. This includes feats like Leadership. I don't think there's a way around having an unquantifiable tier, and it would honestly be impossible to say a priori how many points it would cost for one of those feats.

I can't find it.

[Surgo]

I can't find it.

Link is on the front page. (http://dungeons.wikia.com/wiki/Dungeons_and_Dragons_Wiki:Balance_Points) That said, I'm not so much throwing that out there as an idea as talking about the problems of unquantifiability in feats. Leadership is completely unquantifiable, and some other feats share the issue.

[Drolyt]

Link is on the front page. (http://dungeons.wikia.com/wiki/Dungeons_and_Dragons_Wiki:Balance_Points) That said, I'm not so much throwing that out there as an idea as talking about the problems of unquantifiability in feats. Leadership is completely unquantifiable, and some other feats share the issue.

I got that, but I still wanted to see it. At any rate the unquantifiable feats should be priced either how they are expected to be used or how they will most likely be used, not how they could possibly be used.
Edit: Can't believe I missed that. I went right to search instead of reading the front page.

[Melayl]

Here's that link. (http://www.seankreynolds.com/rpgfiles/misc/featpointsystem.html) He (Sean K. Reynolds) takes all the feats in the PHB and gives them a price based on usefulness. Worth looking over, at least.

(reposted from my previous post to gain proper review)

[Surgo]

Keep in mind that this is Sean K Reynolds. Not only did he invent that horrible monstrosity known as Level Adjustment, he also seems to think (according to that link) that Improved Initiative is somehow worth less than a feat that gives you +2/+2 to two skills.

[Drolyt]

Yeah that system isn't the best. For one thing I still think if you are going the feat point route you should spread them out across the levels. For another the costs are... insane. Guy has no idea what he's talking about.

[Haarkla]

I propose that a character get 2FP (feat points) when they would normally get a feat.

Lame feats that don't help overly much (minor skill boosters, Dodge, Toughness, Run, proficiencies, etc.) cost 1FP.
Relatively-balanced feats that are decent in power & a Good Idea to take (Power Attack, Cleave, Improved Initiative, metamagic, item creation, etc.) cost 2FP.
Overpowered feats that significantly boost your effectiveness (Leadership, Natural Spell, etc.) cost 3-4FP.


Toughness is one of the more useful feats, try playing a 1st level wizard or sorcerer without it.


Cleave isn't anywhere near as useful as powerattack.
In my experience Cleave is the more useful of the two for most players, with Power Attack been better for the more experienced and optimised.

[Drolyt]

Toughness is one of the more useful feats, try playing a 1st level wizard or sorcerer without it.


In my experience Cleave is the more useful of the two for most players, with Power Attack been better for the more experienced and optimised.

Toughness is horrible. If you're Wizard is actually getting hit, either a. your Wizard is stupids, b. your Fighter isn't doing his job, or c. your DM has a vendetta against you (always possible). I agree cleave is actually pretty darn useful, but both feats are situational, and power attack is usually better.

[Eloel]

Under Sean Kreynolds' system, Combat Casting/Great Fortitude/Scribe Scroll/Skill Focus/Weapon Focus/Weapon Specialization is worth twice as much as Natural Spell.

I have no further commentary about that particular system.

On the OP issue, yes, it can be done, but would take alot of work. A good idea would be getting Sean Kreynolds' system, reversing all costs, and working on it from there.

[lesser_minion]

My personal fix for Toughness is:


Toughness
You are tougher than most in your profession.

Benefit: You gain three additional hitpoints.

Special: Select one feat that you could have taken in place of this one. You gain it next level as a bonus feat.

This feat may be taken as a bonus feat by any class which is permitted to choose bonus feats, regardless of the restrictions on those bonus feats.


I definitely like this idea, although the points costs would need work - remember that different feats can have different weights in different games and under different DMs.

You might not be able to do much better than major/moderate/minor as a split, with the major feats being ones that are utterly awesome, the moderate feats being ones that aren't definitely worthwhile, but can be, and the minor ones being barely useful.

1st level wizards and sorcerers certainly aren't immune to attack, no matter how optimised, and not everyone even brings fighters to the table.

Even then, the fighter might have better things to do than give the wizard +4 to AC (which can potentially mean doing absolutely nothing else...)



Under Sean Kreynolds' system, Combat Casting/Great Fortitude/Scribe Scroll/Skill Focus/Weapon Focus/Weapon Specialization is worth twice as much as Natural Spell.

I have no further commentary about that particular system.


Don't throw the whole thing down the drain just because of a few stupid mistakes. Most professionals actually do know what they're doing most of the time - the ones who don't are the ones who made 3.5 without bothering to work out the impact of anything they changed, ever, at all.

If you actually read the guidelines for pricing feats, they are actually fairly sensible, and predict a higher cost for natural spell.

The choice of benchmarks is out, but the guidelines he uses are actually sound when applied correctly.

[Zeta Kai]

Toughness is one of the more useful feats, try playing a 1st level wizard or sorcerer without it.

I've played many arcane casters, both as a player & as a DM, & I've never used Toughness. Not once. It is a horrible trap of a "feat." You're caster is better off taking something else & focusing on not getting hit, like Drolyt said. Also, more importantly, Improved Toughness is better in every way past 2nd level.

[Drolyt]

I think major, moderate, and minor as the split. Make Major worth 15 points, moderate worth 10, and minor worth 5. Completely useless feats could be worth less. Then give the player 3 point every level, +10 more at first level. Any bonus feat is worth 10 points, and there is no restriction on what you can buy. However, Wizard don't get bonus feats. This system should work out almost exactly like the normal one assuming you buy moderate feats, and you can never end up with more than twice the normal amount. I'll post some thoughts on what feats cost what later.