Weapon Training - feat [3.5]

[Godskook]

Ok, we all know that weapon focus is a borked feat, but like monk, everyone has their own 'fix'. Here's my(2nd!) attempt:

Weapon Training [Fighter]
Benefits: Choose one weapon, you gain the skill for that weapon as a class skill at all levels.

----------------------

New skill:

Weapon(see text;trained only)
Like the Craft, Knowledge and Profession skills, Weapon actually encompasses a number of unrelated skills. It represents a study and training of some particular weaponry.

You always use the same ability score when making a weapon check that you use on attack rolls with that weapon.

Check:
Whenever you make sunder, trip, disarm, grapple or similar check, you may make an opposed Weapon() check. If you win, you add 1/4 your ranks in the skill as a circumstance bonus on the initial check. If you lose, you take the same amount as a penalty.

Checks made while you are considered unarmed always fail.

Untrained:
Untrained checks are made with a bonus equal to half your HD plus the relevant ability modifier for the weapon with which you are armed. You may not add any other bonuses to this roll. You may choose to make an untrained check even if you have ranks in the skill.

At specific ranks, you gain the noted benefits:
{table=head]Rank|Benefit

1|Proficiency
4|+1 Attack
6|+1 Damage
7|+4 to resist being disarmed
8|+2 Attack
10|+2 Damage
11|Improved Critical
12|+3 Attack
14|+3 Damage
15|Iterative penalty is -4 instead of normal.
16|+4 Attack
18|+4 Damage
19|Improve damage by one step
20|+5 Attack
22|+5 Damage
23|Iterative penalty is -3 instead of normal[/table]

Buying ranks:
Poor BAB base Classes have access to simple weapons as cross-class skills
Medium BAB base Classes have access to simple and martial weapons as cross-class skills
Full BAB base Classes have access to all weapons as cross-class skills
All classes have access to weapons they're proficient with as cross-class skills

You may not take ranks in a weapon skill at a particular level unless you have access to the skill, either cross-class as above, or as a class skill.

Class adjustments:
The Fighter class treats all weapon skills he is proficient in as class skills, even if he gains proficiency from another class(but not if he gains proficiency by spending skill points). When using this variant, a Fighter gets 2 additional skill points per level

The Warblade's Weapon Aptitude class feature now allows you to treat any weapon skill you have at least 1 rank in as equal to the weapon skill with the highest ranks.

Swordsage gains Weapon Training(Discipline) as a bonus feat at first level instead, and may spend skill points on Weapon(Discipline), gaining the bonus to all weapons of the corresponding discipline.

[Destrude]

Ok, we all know that weapon focus is a borked feat, but like monk, everyone has their own 'fix'. Here's my(2nd!) attempt:

Weapon Training [Fighter]
Benefits: Choose one weapon, you gain the skill for that weapon as a class skill.
Normal: All weapon skills are cross-classed.

----------------------

New skill:

Weapon()

Check:
You always use the same ability score when making a weapon check that you use on attack rolls with that weapon.

At specific ranks, you gain the noted benefits:
snip



Interesting idea, but I have one major point to make. This takes up something a Fighter has little of (skill points), and frees up something he has a bunch of (feats). I've heard complaints that the Fighter has too many feats and not enough to spend them on at higher levels, although those complaints may be poorly informed. I'm not experienced with high-level Fighters.

The progression seems fine though, and I like that you give more than just +Attack and Damage in there. I just question using skill points as the mechanic. Perhaps give them to the Fighter for free, or have them cost a feat slot or two?

Just my 2 coppers. :smallsmile:

[Godskook]

1.I don't homebrew with core fighter too much in mind, cause to me, he's pretty much pointless for 90% of things compared to alternative choices.

2.Fighters actually do, now have enough to spend their feats on such that freeing up a few slots by combining them is useful to them.

3.I have plans to 'integrate' the 'brew into 3.5 more properly, but was waiting until the feat/skill was evaluated on its face before adding them. One probable change is adding both skill points and class skills to the fighter class, as well as adjusting other classes so that they 'work' with the new system(Warblade and Swordsage both would require adjustments).

[Alefiend]

I agree with Destrude that this approach would hurt fighters more than it would help them. Relying on skills (especially cross-class) to get the benefits of increased weapon skill leaves most fighters with no points to spend on anything else, and it doesn't get much better if you make it a class skill for fighters. My current character is a human with +2 INTmod (lucky dice), and I still have barely enough to go around.

A skills-based approach also closes the combat gap between fighters and other classes, many of which have more skill points to throw around. A rogue, for example, could make great use of such a skill dump. If these skills are equivalent to feats for purposes of qualifying for other feats and PrCs, this makes it even more attractive for them. A wizard who wasn't interested in knowledge skills would also get huge benefits from this.

The progression itself is pretty good, but again, if skill levels are feat equivalents then Improved Critical becomes redundant. I suppose one could use the skill progression for one weapon and the feat chain for another, but that starts to become more a limitation than a benefit.

Lastly, we'd need to modify our character sheets to have a place to record the bonuses from specific skill tiers, leading to more recordkeeping.

[Seerow]

The progression itself is pretty good, though it doesn't allow Improved Critical as soon as a feat-chain approach would



Actually it does. It comes at 11 ranks, which is at level 8. Improved Critical requires BAB+8, so you get it at the same time.




Now that said, I agree that this isn't necessarily a great boon for fighters who are typically very strapped for skill points. On the other hand, just about anyone else with more skills and a favored weapon will likely take this feat, or even invest a couple cross class ranks.



The other problem I have is the reduced penalty on itteratives. That is a very potent effect which will greatly increase average damage on a full attack, way beyond what anything else on that list will. It seems out of place, especially as an ability anybody can obtain for 1 feat and skill points. I'd remove that entirely and have the bonus damage scale up faster (right now you have attack and damage scaling at the same rate. In practice a bonus to hit is worth more than a bonus to damage, so you can afford to give a couple more +damage effects, maybe even take away one of the +hit effects.)

[Alefiend]

Actually it does. It comes at 11 ranks, which is at level 8. Improved Critical requires BAB+8, so you get it at the same time.
I caught that already. Neener-neener. :smalltongue:


The other problem I have is the reduced penalty on iteratives. That is a very potent effect which will greatly increase average damage on a full attack, way beyond what anything else on that list will.
I know this isn't what the OP intended, but perhaps that could be modified as such: The iterative penalty is reduced, but the number of attacks you get doesn't change. Thus, at max level, the routine is +20/+17/+14/+11, and that's it. Still an improvement, assuming there's anything with enough AC to make a difference, but not allowing the 2 extra attacks per round it otherwise would.

[AugustNights]

I believe Eldan came up with something akin to this not to long ago, since I have crafted my own "Weapon Focus Skill" not unlike your own.

I don't see the need for a Feat, but rather making it a Fighter only skill.
(Of course Factotums will jump on with it, and various feats/class abilities, but a DM who is already implementing house rules could always find a way around that problem)

My own system looks like this, based heavily after his.
It uses the Weapons Groups (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/buildingCharacters/weaponGroupFeats.htm)rather than specific weapons, similar to a craft or perform skill.

Anyhow, the large problem I see here is that Weapon focus wasn't a Fighter only Feat, and many PrCs require it. And it seems thematic for other characters. Rogues who are skilled with daggers, or for players who wish to have that sort of Final-Fantasy Weapon specialization built around a character theme feel.

I like the idea of ranks giving bonuses, but there should also be the way to use the skill no? I have yet to find an active use (perhaps convert Perform Weapon Drill) but a decent passive one is to allow it to be used in place of Bab when defending against attacks that require attack rolls to defend (being disarmed and the like).

Of course in this sort of change you'll want to offer Fighters 4+Skills, or at the very least 3+Skills.

[Godskook]

The other problem I have is the reduced penalty on itteratives. That is a very potent effect which will greatly increase average damage on a full attack, way beyond what anything else on that list will. It seems out of place, especially as an ability anybody can obtain for 1 feat and skill points. I'd remove that entirely and have the bonus damage scale up faster (right now you have attack and damage scaling at the same rate. In practice a bonus to hit is worth more than a bonus to damage, so you can afford to give a couple more +damage effects, maybe even take away one of the +hit effects.)

I'm balancing that against two things:

1.Many popular homebrews run BAB at +20/+15/+15/+15 instead of 20/+15/+10/+5 with no issue. I see no reason that +20/+17/+14/+11 is going to, on average, be any different.

2.Greater Manyshot, which offers -8 on all attacks instead of normal iterative penalties.

Plus, having attacks that are 15 points apart in a d20 system is kind of ridiculous to balance other things against. You wind up with the wonky situation where people attacking with iteratives either have an auto-pass attack roll or an auto-fail one(barring natural 1s or 20s). This way, you can have ACs that are relevant to all attacks made by a given character.


Anyhow, the large problem I see here is that Weapon focus wasn't a Fighter only Feat, and many PrCs require it. And it seems thematic for other characters. Rogues who are skilled with daggers, or for players who wish to have that sort of Final-Fantasy Weapon specialization built around a character theme feel.

I didn't make it a fighter-only feat.


I like the idea of ranks giving bonuses, but there should also be the way to use the skill no? I have yet to find an active use (perhaps convert Perform Weapon Drill) but a decent passive one is to allow it to be used in place of Bab when defending against attacks that require attack rolls to defend (being disarmed and the like).

This stuff is in the works, but I wanted to get the feat+rank benefits out of the way first so that I could have framework to build the other stuff.


Of course in this sort of change you'll want to offer Fighters 4+Skills, or at the very least 3+Skills.

In the upcoming adaption section, fighters will be getting more skill points, some more class skills, as well as some other classes too.

[AugustNights]

I didn't make it a fighter-only feat.


Right, no idea what I was thinking.
Carry on then.

[Godskook]

Made some adjustments and started adapting D&D for it.

[NeoSeraphi]

Okay so you say that you can only take ranks in the skill if you have it as a cross class, but Fighters only have Exotic, by RAW of what you have written. I get the RAI is you have access to this and everything the lower BAB classes have, but I thought I'd point it out for you anyway.

This looks good, the adjustments really helped make the feat viable and balanced.

[Godskook]

Okay so you say that you can only take ranks in the skill if you have it as a cross class, but Fighters only have Exotic, by RAW of what you have written. I get the RAI is you have access to this and everything the lower BAB classes have, but I thought I'd point it out for you anyway.

1.Good catch

2.Oddly, Fighter is the only Full-BAB class for which you're not correct, due to wording below which gives them access to all the others as class skills.


This looks good, the adjustments really helped make the feat viable and balanced.

It kinda concerns me that the only OP objection was pointed directly at reducing the iterative penalties.

[Godskook]

Made some more adjustments, including the addition of a check that you can use the skill for.

[Jjeinn-tae]

I like the skill based bonus to weapons, it makes sense, I am curious though, with the iterative penalty reduction... Does it grant extra iteratives then? Kind of a throwback to 2ed AD&D there. I like that if it does. :smallbiggrin:

[Godskook]

I like the skill based bonus to weapons, it makes sense, I am curious though, with the iterative penalty reduction... Does it grant extra iteratives then? Kind of a throwback to 2ed AD&D there. I like that if it does. :smallbiggrin:

It shouldn't be granting additional iteratives. The improvement to DPRound is already immense from that adjustment.

[noob]

I see the interest of that feat only for one barbarian if you took a one level fighter dip.
But then you are more restrained in the weapons you use than if you took one more jump attack feat.