"Fake" feat chains

[Tenno Seremel]

Feats that pretty much the same but with more numerical value to it. For example: Psionic Endowment and Greater Psionic Endowment, Power Penetration and, well, Greater Power Penetration, etc.

What do you think of them? (not necessary listed ones, just in general) Mechanically they might be nice boosts but in the end if feels to me that you end up with a few different feats with little diversity to your character. You can skip them altogether or take only one but then you might be less effective.

Increasing feat/level rate somewhat helps with this so you can take nice feats like, say, Psymbiot (CP). I never thought at first that bonus feats for Psion (or Wizard) is a nice class feature to have.

So, do you take those feats? Do you have more than 1 chain like that? How do you fix that or do you feel it's fine as is?

[nyarlathotep]

Due to scarcity of feats I find them mechanically underwhelming on all but the most feat independent of characters (non-metamagic mages) and flavorwise they add nothing.

[Flickerdart]

Feats that do that are usually also feats that give flat bonuses (like WF/GWF). That makes them offensive twice - once for being boring, and once for not scaling.

On the other hand, Improved Psionic Sidestep is a valid feat "sequel" to the regular version because even though it only increases the movement by 5 feet, it takes that movement from a 5ft step, which anyone can do, to a 10ft step, which very few people can and which triggers stuff like Skirmish. It's a legitimate increase in power to carry the cost of a feat, especially since psionic classes often have bonus feats.

[Person_Man]

In my mind, any feat that provides a non-scaled numerical bonus is a "junk" feat, and should be completely avoided in game design. Having a +1ish to AC, or To-Hit, or Damage, or a Skill, or Power Points, or essentia, or some situational bonus, or whatever. It's doesn't make things more fun for the player. It doesn't add more options to the game. It's just a fiddly book keeping exercise. And it's either a pointless waste of a Feat (Dodge, Mobility, Weapon Focus, etc) or a "mandatory" Feat tax that they player "must" take in order for that build concept to work properly (most ranged weapon feats, Two Weapon Fighting Feats, and a bunch of different things in 4E).

[Tenno Seremel]

Hmm… if you collapse them (possibly with +X base and +Y at later character level), would that be any better? Although flavorwise it's not likely to change much I guess.

[Tenno Seremel]

On the other hand, Improved Psionic Sidestep is a valid feat "sequel"
BTW, what source has it? I don't seem to remember it.

[Flickerdart]

In my mind, any feat that provides a non-scaled numerical bonus is a "junk" feat, and should be completely avoided in game design. Having a +1ish to AC, or To-Hit, or Damage, or a Skill, or Power Points, or essentia, or some situational bonus, or whatever. It's doesn't make things more fun for the player. It doesn't add more options to the game. It's just a fiddly book keeping exercise. And it's either a pointless waste of a Feat (Dodge, Mobility, Weapon Focus, etc) or a "mandatory" Feat tax that they player "must" take in order for that build concept to work properly (most ranged weapon feats, Two Weapon Fighting Feats, and a bunch of different things in 4E).
A feat that adds a flat bonus to something that doesn't normally scale (such as Improved Initiative) is a much more reasonable thing to offer, though (besides which, "going first more often" is a very nice perk since it effectively gives more actions). Bonus essentia is also fine since that's the only way to get it for classes that don't progress it.


BTW, what source has it? I don't seem to remember it.
Psionic Sidestep and Improved Psionic Sidestep are both online.

[danzibr]

BTW, what source has it? I don't seem to remember it.
Yeah, I was totally unaware of a 10 foot step. That seems awesome.

[Flickerdart]

Yeah, I was totally unaware of a 10 foot step. That seems awesome.
It's not without restrictions - you get it only when provoking an AoO, letting you frolic merrily out of the threatened square before your opponent can hit you.

[Lord.Sorasen]

On this topic, what do you guys think of font of inspiration? The factotum seems pretty dependent on it, but I really think I don't like the feat at all. The way it's built means if you want it to have any value you need to take it again and again, which seems to inevitably mean you don't get any real variety at all. I suppose inspiration seems to do pretty much everything at all anyway, but it still seems somehow wrong to me in the way of it providing a flat bonus and sort of breaking someone's feat choices into little bits.

[Flickerdart]

FoI with a flat inspiration increase might be a little too powerful. Factotum works fine without it, so I guess WotC were afraid of people loading up on two or three FoI with a Factotum dip and doing ridiculous things. This way, if you want to be swimming in Inspiration, you have to take Factotum all the way, which makes things as little less prone to crippling brokenness.

[FMArthur]

What? :smallconfused:
You can take Font of Inspiration just as much as a full factotum even if you only dipped 1 level, and can get quite a respectable IP pool without touching the classes' comparatively weak IP progression.

I think what you want is one feat that scales with your factotum level.

[Flickerdart]

What? :smallconfused:
You can take Font of Inspiration just as much as a full factotum even if you only dipped 1 level, and can get quite a respectable IP pool without touching the classes' comparatively weak IP progression.

I think what you want is one feat that scales with your factotum level.
Huh - could have sworn that FoI was limited to half your Factotum level. Turns out it's Intelligence modifier. Whoda thunk it?

[Forbiddenwar]

Superior Unarmed Strike (the improved Improved Unarmed Strike), IMHO, is a good feat chain, mainly because the provide different bonuses and the second scales with level.

[Larpus]

Honestly I always felt that some feat chains were supposed to be something like "you take this feat then at level X it changes to Great feat and at level Y it becomes Greater feat", that is due to how little feats a PC gets and how many are needed for pretty much anything (especially melee).

So yeah, usually a waste of time and total newbie trap (I'm looking at you, Weapon Focus!!).

[Midnight_v]

Honestly I always felt that some feat chains were supposed to be something like "you take this feat then at level X it changes to Great feat and at level Y it becomes Greater feat", that is due to how little feats a PC gets and how many are needed for pretty much anything (especially melee).

So yeah, usually a waste of time and total newbie trap (I'm looking at you, Weapon Focus!!).

+1
Frank and K's Tome Series was the first time I really got exposed to that Idea and that was pretty late on but yeah. Feats... specifically combat feats, and skill feats are supposed to scale to level, so to speak. That part of the system seems to work better that way.

Example:


Great Fortitude [Combat]
You are so tough. Your belly is like a prism.
Benefits: at base attack bonus
+0 You gain a +3 bonus to your Fortitude Saves.
+1: You die at -20 instead of -10.
+6: You gain 1 hit point per level.
+11: You gain DR of 5/-.
+16: You are immune to the fatigued and exhausted conditions. If you are already immune to these conditions, you gain 1 hit point per level for each condition you were already immune to.

Or... for skills:

Combat Casting [Skill]
Having a sword sticking out of your chest doesn’t noticeably
impede your ability to do. . . well, just about anything.
Concentration ranks:
0: You gain +3 to your Concentration checks.
4: You can take 10 on Concentration checks and
caster level checks.
9: You may maintain concentration on a spell as a
move action (DC 25 + spell level). If you beat the
DC by 10 or more, you can maintain concentration
as a swift action. If you fail your check, you lose
concentration.
14: If you would be nauseated, you’re sickened instead.
19: All Concentration DCs are halved for you.

[WarKitty]

Honestly I always felt that some feat chains were supposed to be something like "you take this feat then at level X it changes to Great feat and at level Y it becomes Greater feat", that is due to how little feats a PC gets and how many are needed for pretty much anything (especially melee).

So yeah, usually a waste of time and total newbie trap (I'm looking at you, Weapon Focus!!).

This is essentially what pathfinder does with many of these feats. A lot go up with class levels/BAB/skill ranks. Not enough, but more of them.

[Tenno Seremel]

Great Fortitude [Combat]
You are so tough. Your belly is like a prism.
Benefits: at base attack bonus
+0 You gain a +3 bonus to your Fortitude Saves.
+1: You die at -20 instead of -10.
+6: You gain 1 hit point per level.
+11: You gain DR of 5/-.
+16: You are immune to the fatigued and exhausted conditions. If you are already immune to these conditions, you gain 1 hit point per level for each condition you were already immune to.

I'd like this Great Fortitude. Although if those are levels counting from the level you have taken this feat opportunity cost will probably lock me out of its highest effects.

[Flickerdart]

I'd like this Great Fortitude. Although if those are levels counting from the level you have taken this feat opportunity cost will probably lock me out of its highest effects.
That's BAB, it says so in the third line.

[Tenno Seremel]

That's BAB, it says so in the third line.

Oh, I missed that (~_~)

[Midnight_v]

They have a good system. There was this whole failure of feat write up they made that basically, described what you're describing, did a little math on the issue and remeasured the core feats. Even at that you and a few others really hit the head on the nail. Taking a feat should really grow on its own at certain points. Basic/Improved/Greater/Final. Here's the write up.


4.2 The Failure of Feats
“How about instead of being able to travel anywhere in the multiverse, transform yourself into anything you can think of, stop time, and slay everyone you can see, we just give a nice +1 to hit with your secondary weapon?
Deal?”

Feats were an interesting idea when they were ported to 3rd edition D&D. But let’s face it; they don’t go nearly far enough. Feats were made extremely conservative in their effects on the game because the authors didn’t want to offend people with too radical a change. Well, now we’ve had third edition for 6 years, and we’re offended.
Feats are an interesting and tangible way to get unique abilities onto a character, but they have fallen prey to two key fallacies that has ended up turning the entire concept to ashes in our mouths.
The first is the idea that if you think of something kind of cool for a character to do, you should make it a feat. That sounds compelling, but you only get 7 feats in your whole life. If you have to spend a feat for every cool thing you ever do, you’re not going to do very many cool things in the approximately 260 encounters you’ll have on your way from 1st to 20th level.
The second is the idea that a feat should be equivalent to a cantrip or two.
This one is even less excusable, and just makes us cry. A +1 bonus is something that you seriously might forget that you even have. Having one more +1 bonus doesn’t make your character unique, it makes you a sucker
for spending one of the half dozen feats you’ll ever see on a bonus the other players won’t even mention when discussing your character.
We all understand this problem, what do we do about it? Well, for starters, Feats have to do more things. Many characters are 5th level or so and they only have 2 feats. Those feats should describe their character in a much more salient way than “I’m no worse shooting into melee than I am shooting at people with cover that isn’t my friends.”
This was begun with the tactical feats, but it didn’t go far enough. It’s not enough to add additional feats that do something halfway interesting for high level characters to have – we actually have to replace the stupid one dimensional feats in the PHB with feats that rational people would care about in any way. Spending a single feat should be enough to make you a “sniper character” because for a substantial portion of your life you only get one feat.
Secondly, we have to clear away feats that don’t provide numeric bonuses large enough to care about. The minimum bonus you’ll ever notice is +3, because that’s actually larger than the difference between having rolled well and having rolled poorly on your starting stats.
Numeric bonuses smaller than that are actually insulting and need to be removed from the feats altogether. 3.5 Skill Focus was a nice start, but that’s all it was – a start.
Furthermore, the fundamental structure of feats has been a disaster. The system of prerequisites often ensures that characters won’t get an ability before it would be level appropriate for them to do so, but actually does nothing to ensure that such characters are in fact getting level appropriate abilities. Indeed, if a 12th level character decides that they want to pursue a career in shooting people in the face, they have to start all over gaining an ability that is supposed to be level appropriate for a 1st level character.
Meanwhile, when a wizard of 12th level decides to pursue some new direction in spellcasting – he learns a new 6th level spell right off – and gets an ability that’s level appropriate for a 12th level character.



I Spoliered it for you. Hopefully you can enjoy and get some use out of the idea. Good gaming.

[Tenno Seremel]

Thank you.

[Larpus]

They have a good system. There was this whole failure of feat write up they made that basically, described what you're describing, did a little math on the issue and remeasured the core feats. Even at that you and a few others really hit the head on the nail. Taking a feat should really grow on its own at certain points. Basic/Improved/Greater/Final. Here's the write up.

I Spoliered it for you. Hopefully you can enjoy and get some use out of the idea. Good gaming.
You are right on the money, my dear internet person, couldn't have put it better myself and I shall make it one of my mantras to the home system I'm brewing to play with friends.

[PlzBreakMyCmpAn]

In my mind, any feat that provides a non-scaled numerical bonus is a "junk" feat, and should be completely avoided in game design.I disagree. I looooove cobbling together a monstrousity from small parts.

What you seem to not like is a lack of bala

[NNescio]

Font of Inspiration
Font of Inspiration
Font of Inspiration
...

Font of Inspiration.

Of course, they do 'stack' and 'scale-up'.