Overpower, Underpower, or just right?

[Digeridew]

I am working on a my campaign for an up comming game. It will be a Pathfinder game, but I will allow 3.5 books as for the most part they're under powered compared to the pathfinder stuff.

I am pondering a feat of my own making.

Hearty
Reqs: Con 13+
You receive 1 to the die roll whenever you gain hit points.
This can not bring your roll beyond it's maximum and can not give you more than max hit points. This feat can be taken multiple times.
Example:
Jomblar the Fighter's player Adam has terrible dice luck and he knows it. he takes hearty at 1st level as his human bonus feat, AND as his first level feat.
This convinces copycat Sam to also take the feat twice, even though Sam is playing a wizard named.. Sam.
at second level Adam rolls an 8 on his d10. Hearty makes the die a 10.
Sam rolls a 3 on his d4. he also has two applications of hearty, but hearty can not bring the die beyond a 4.
If he'd been a rogue it would have brought it to a 5.


So, overpowered or a complete waste of a feat? It gives you a minimum amount you can roll on hp every level with out increasing the max.

So, OP or crappy?

[Malimar]

Hm. It's Improved Toughness, except it doesn't necessarily take effect every level, but you can take it more than once, but you get diminishing returns each time you take it (as the probability that you get the full effect goes down), and each level it's more likely to benefit large-HD beatsticks than small-HD casters (which is always good, 'cause casters don't need nice things).

Seems just about right to me, maybe slightly underpowered. You might consider making it retroactive, to bring it even more in line with Improved Toughness. (Though that might have the side effect of people taking the feat just for a free reroll for all their HD, which isn't necessarily a bad thing.)

[Re'ozul]

I'd actually say its weak.
Its effectively Improved toughness with the benefits becoming lower the more often you take it.
Make the base version 2hp in a roll and it would be an okay feat in my opinion.

[Killer Angel]

So, OP or crappy?

It's a worse version of PF's toughness, and to have it work, you must take it at the beginning, delaying the aquisition of better feats. I consider it decisely in the crappy side.
Let the player roll 2 dice for HP, keeping the best one.

[nedz]

Compare with Improved Toughness from CWar which adds 1 HP per HD.

The PF version grants 3 HP initially then +1 per level after 3rd.

[Digeridew]

I'd actually say its weak.
Its effectively Improved toughness with the benefits becoming lower the more often you take it.
Make the base version 2hp in a roll and it would be an okay feat in my opinion.

So you think it would be better if it was increase the die roll by 2 for the first time and 1 for each additional time?

[Malimar]

So you think it would be better if it was increase the die roll by 2 for the first time and 1 for each additional time?

I might actually suggest that the design philosophy behind feats like Font of Inspiration and Psionic Talent is better in this case. Maybe have the amount the feat gives you go up by 1 each time you take it. The first time you take it, it gives you 1; the second time, it gives you another 2 (for a total of 3); the third time, another 3 (for a total of 6), and so on. That would counterbalance the diminishing returns of it being less likely to take effect if you take it more than once.

[Gorbalog]

I like the idea of this feat but it feels a teensy bit underpowered.

[Digeridew]

I might actually suggest that the design philosophy behind feats like Font of Inspiration and Psionic Talent is better in this case. Maybe have the amount the feat gives you go up by 1 each time you take it. The first time you take it, it gives you 1; the second time, it gives you another 2 (for a total of 3); the third time, another 3 (for a total of 6), and so on. That would counterbalance the diminishing returns of it being less likely to take effect if you take it more than once.

Thats very interesting and I think it could be a good way to do it.
1st 1
2nd 3 (maxing every d4 hp roll)
3th 6 (maxing every d6 hp roll)
4th 10 (making even d12's almost gaurentee'd max hp)

[Novawurmson]

In my campaigns, the players get one roll of the dice; it it's equal to or more than half their hit dice (4 for a d8, 6 for a d12, etc.), they take their roll. Otherwise, they take half.

Normally, a d12 hit die means you get an average of 6.5 HP per level; with this variant, it's an average of 7.75, but you've got a much higher minimum.

The benefit of DM fiat over this feat is that your high-HD beatsticks don't need to use a precious feat on this, no matter how good it is.

[ericgrau]

It's worse than PF toughness but only a hair worse, and it stacks the with toughness. I'd make the pre-requisite toughness to keep people from doing dumb things. Other than that it's a handy feat.

The interesting thing is is that it gives 25% less hp to those who need it the most. So at best it's about a 10% increase in hp.

It's balanced fine compared to other feats. There is a risk of stacking hp for some builds, but they're uncommon, and since it's only ~10% hp even then it's not abusive. Good for a lot of people, not for everyone, that's where a feat should be.

My only complaint is that you have a limited number of feats and the more you make available for numbers stacking the faster certain builds will run out without doing many interesting things. But as long as you don't make a dozen such feats it's fine.

[Kelb_Panthera]

If you're that worried about low hp rolls, why not just switch to average hp/HD. If you never roll the die it can't come up on a 1.

I might be biased though. My game always uses average hp. The detriment of a low roll outweighs the benefits of a high roll by too much IMO. Especially if you're unfortunate enough to get a string of bad rolls.

[Daftendirekt]

Compare with Improved Toughness from CWar which adds 1 HP per HD.

The PF version grants 3 HP initially then +1 per level after 3rd.

If you take the feat after 3rd level they end up doing exactly the same thing in the long run. PF Toughness just doesn't have stupid prereqs.

[Andreaz]

As all feats on the "more hp" line since 3.0, this sucks. All it does is sub in for rules most people prefer to take, and gives less and less to those who really use it. It also doesn't make you better than you could be without it. PF Toughness is better (+1 hd/hit die), and toughness sucks!

[Kelb_Panthera]

If you take the feat after 3rd level they end up doing exactly the same thing in the long run. PF Toughness just doesn't have stupid prereqs.

Isn't Improved toughness' only prereq' a base fort save of +2? That's something that literally any character with 6 or more HD meets.