P.E.A.C.H: Improved Saving Throw Feats

[Altrunchen]

So I noticed that next to no-one ever takes the "lightning reflexes", "great fortitude", or "iron will" feats because they are just a one-time boost to your saving throws by 2 whereas you could be taking a weapon focus, improved initiative, combat reflexes, or other feats that are generally much more appealing. I started thinking about this when I was playing X-Com: Enemy Within and how there is a perk soldiers can have called "lightning reflexes" where the first reaction shot taken against them each turn will miss no matter what, but only the first one (which is a huge boost for your front-line fighters but if you have a bunch of enemies all over then it can be easily bypassed by the sheer number of shots taken against you). As such, I think a homebrew version of these feats may be much more appealing to character design, instead of just some feats that hardly anyone ever takes.

For reference, I generally only consider the core rule-books and honestly can't be asked to care enough to read all the other reference books, splat books, and so on. There's just too much content and as a DM I really don't care to have to memorize all of it, it would take forever. Not to mention it'd make the game that much more obese with weird races, lore, and so on that I would have to juggle as a DM.

Anyways, here are my ideas for some improvements to these core saving throw feats:


Lightning Reflexes 2.0:
Benefit: Each combat round, the first reflex save that your character must make automatically succeeds. Any and all of the following reflex saves that must be rolled that round have a normal chance of failure.
Normal: Each combat round, all reflex saves have an equal chance of failure and of success.
Prerequisites: Dexterity of 18 or greater.



Iron Will 2.0:
Benefit: Each combat round, the first will save that your character must make automatically succeeds. Any and all of the following will saves that must be rolled that round have a normal chance of failure.
Normal: Each combat round, all will saves have an equal chance of failure and of success.
Prerequisites: Wisdom of 18 or greater.



Great Fortitude 2.0:
Benefit: Each combat round, the first fortitude save that your character must make automatically succeeds. Any and all of the following will saves that must be rolled that round have a normal chance of failure.
Normal: Each combat round, all fortitude saves have an equal chance of failure and of success.
Prerequisites: Constitution of 18 or greater.




Lightning Reflexes 2.0:
Benefit: Each round, the first reflex save that your character must make automatically succeeds. Any and all of the following reflex saves that must be rolled that round have a normal chance of failure.
Normal: Each round, all reflex saves have an equal chance of failure and of success.
Prerequisites: Dexterity of 14 or greater.



Iron Will 2.0:
Benefit: Each round, the first will save that your character must make automatically succeeds. Any and all of the following will saves that must be rolled that round have a normal chance of failure.
Normal: Each round, all will saves have an equal chance of failure and of success.
Prerequisites: Wisdom of 14 or greater.



Great Fortitude 2.0:
Benefit: Each round, the first fortitude save that your character must make automatically succeeds. Any and all of the following will saves that must be rolled that round have a normal chance of failure.
Normal: Each round, all fortitude saves have an equal chance of failure and of success.
Prerequisites: Constitution of 14 or greater.



I figure that adding the prerequisite of a relatively-high related ability score helps to explain why it is that a character is particularly good at a kind of saving throw without making the feat unobtainable or too easy to get.

[Extra Anchovies]

These are all very powerful. I would take all three with any character that had the spare feats (and would probably make room for the feats anyways). They synergize too well with the Diamond Mind save-replacing maneuvers, because with all three feats and all three maneuvers (which wouldn't be hard to get for a martial adept), you're basically immune to anything that allows saving throws (because how often do you need to make three of the same save in one round?). I've always thought the best way to fix the save-boosting feats was to make them grant a +3 or +4 bonus. Maybe combine the two, and make it a +2 bonus plus one re-roll per encounter? Auto-successes are very strong.

[Glimbur]

Feats are expensive and rare; a normal character gets 7 in their 20 levels. They should make a difference and be important to the character.

With that said, these are powerful feats. Their usefulness depends on what sort of encounters you normally face, but imagine them on NPC's. Goblin rogues just ignore the wizard's fireball, ogres ignore the fighter's Three Mountains style, and that darn noble just won't seem to be charmed or dominated by the party wizard. Maybe it needs to be obvious that they succeeded due to having this feat? Maybe these should only work 1/encounter. And maybe they shouldn't be auto-success, but instead let you 'take 15' so that the 1st level cleric can't ignore the Mind Bending* of an Elder Evil. *not an actual ability. I think.

These feats are certainly better than the old versions, but I agree that they are a touch too good.

[Altrunchen]

These are all very powerful. I would take all three with any character that had the spare feats (and would probably make room for the feats anyways). They synergize too well with the Diamond Mind save-replacing maneuvers, because with all three feats and all three maneuvers (which wouldn't be hard to get for a martial adept), you're basically immune to anything that allows saving throws (because how often do you need to make three of the same save in one round?). I've always thought the best way to fix the save-boosting feats was to make them grant a +3 or +4 bonus. Maybe combine the two, and make it a +2 bonus plus one re-roll per encounter? Auto-successes are very strong.

Honestly I never considered psionic classes, since I never use them myself. I haven't even used psionics and I already get a feeling like I would hate it since it seemed like a cheap ploy by WOTC just to sell more books while making an unnecessary parallel magic system.

But that aside, your point about number of saves per round is well received.

Perhaps if it was more of a per-encounter thing like Glimbur was saying?

Or what if the prerequisites for it were increased to 18 each so that in order to take all three you'd have to have remarkably high stats in each category? Then I think that if a character has WIS 18, DEX 18, and CON 18, that they may be already min/maxed and that in that situation the likelihood of eligibility of all three feats is very low.


Feats are expensive and rare; a normal character gets 7 in their 20 levels. They should make a difference and be important to the character.

With that said, these are powerful feats. Their usefulness depends on what sort of encounters you normally face, but imagine them on NPC's. Goblin rogues just ignore the wizard's fireball, ogres ignore the fighter's Three Mountains style, and that darn noble just won't seem to be charmed or dominated by the party wizard. Maybe it needs to be obvious that they succeeded due to having this feat? Maybe these should only work 1/encounter. And maybe they shouldn't be auto-success, but instead let you 'take 15' so that the 1st level cleric can't ignore the Mind Bending* of an Elder Evil. *not an actual ability. I think.

These feats are certainly better than the old versions, but I agree that they are a touch too good.

I understand where you're coming from. They would be very frustrating for PCs to have to deal with in opposition, I'll admit. So what do you think about the idea of raising the prerequisites to 18 in their respective stats? That way selecting all three will be much more difficult or almost impossible without a LA >0 character or a very nice DM. Also, I figure that at that point in an ability (18) you are so above the 50th percentile in that particular stat that you might as well have something like this that isn't class-based. What do you think?

EDIT: I also changed the feats so that they only activate in combat rounds. So they wouldn't apply in role-play situations with the argument that your character doesn't have their defenses up so they're not ready to act on the best of their abilities.

[Extra Anchovies]

Honestly I never considered psionic classes, since I never use them myself. I haven't even used psionics and I already get a feeling like I would hate it since it seemed like a cheap ploy by WOTC just to sell more books while making an unnecessary parallel magic system.

They're Tome of Battle maneuvers, actually :smalltongue: I can see where the confusion came from with Diamond Mind, but that's just the name of one of the disciplines. Moment of Perfect Mind (MoPM) lets you replace a Will save with a Concentration check 1/encounter as an immediate action, and Mind Over Body (MOB) and Action Before Thought (ABT) do the same for Fortitude and Reflex, respectively.


Or what if the prerequisites for it were increased to 18 each so that in order to take all three you'd have to have remarkably high stats in each category? Then I think that if a character has WIS 18, DEX 18, and CON 18, that they may be already min/maxed and that in that situation the likelihood of eligibility of all three feats is very low.

A lot of the tougher dragons and outsiders could manage 18 Constitution and Wisdom easily, and those are the saves that matter. Also, if you have a high ability score you wouldn't need a save-replacer as much, so it seems a little self-defeating.


EDIT: I also changed the feats so that they only activate in combat rounds. So they wouldn't apply in role-play situations with the argument that your character doesn't have their defenses up so they're not ready to act on the best of their abilities.

Possibly make it an immediate action? Then it uses up their immediate/swift action for the round (and thus can't be used in the same round as MoPM, ABT, or MOB), and can't be used while flat-footed.