daylight adaption feat, need feedback

[BrianDavion]

so just started running a d&d 5th edition game, we're third level, one of my players is a drow character, said drow has been on the surface for a good century now (it's a recycled character from our third edition forgotten realms game) realisticly the character's eyes should be adapted to sunlight so I'm hoping to devise a daylight adaption feat for the character, but I wanna be careful to avoid anything too weak or too powerful.

I suppose the big question I have is, is removing the penalty worth a feat on it's own, or should I couple it with a +1 to wisdom?

[JackPhoenix]

Well, depends on how you see the drow light sensitivity: If it's just because they aren't accustomed to light, I would personally let him ignore the penalty without wasting feat... make it a background feature or something. Drow aren't that powerful and this change won't break anything. Alternatively, give him smoked glass shades... as item, those can be broken/stolen/whatever.

If, as suggested, it's a divine curse... no amount of walking on the surface will change that. But perhaps there's a way to earn Eilistraee's blessing/Corellon's forgiveness during the game. Or a magic item that supresses that. Or some other in-game solution.

[Ninja_Prawn]

Removing sunlight sensitivity is not worth a feat. Not even a half-feat.

I would say that, if the character has earned some divine favour, I'd make that the feat. So like...

Eilistraee's Favour
Prerequisite: drow race, good alignment

The goddess Eilistraee has blessed you with a measure of her divine grace. You gain the following benefits:

Increase your Dexterity or Charisma score by 1, to a maximum of 20.
You are no longer subject to the Sunlight Sensitivity trait.
When wielding a finesse weapon with which you are proficient, you may re-roll any 1 on a damage die. You must keep the second result.

Or something. That's just the first thing that popped into my head (due to Eilistraee's portfolio of dancing and swords).

[BrianDavion]

Elistraee's principal weapon however is a longsword :)

anyway intreasting to hear it's a little under powered, I'll examine feats in closer detail and see what I can do, maybe +1 wis removal of the penalty and borrow a spell like ability accessable to high born drow.

[Irennan]

Well, depends on how you see the drow light sensitivity: If it's just because they aren't accustomed to light, I would personally let him ignore the penalty without wasting feat... make it a background feature or something. Drow aren't that powerful and this change won't break anything. Alternatively, give him smoked glass shades... as item, those can be broken/stolen/whatever.

If, as suggested, it's a divine curse... no amount of walking on the surface will change that. But perhaps there's a way to earn Eilistraee's blessing/Corellon's forgiveness during the game. Or a magic item that supresses that. Or some other in-game solution.

In the FR, the drow can adapt to sunlight after spending about 10 years there (which, from a drow pov, is a really short time). It's from Ed Greenwood's ''The Drow of the Underdark''. In 3e, this was a feat, but it would be rather little in 5e, for a feat, IMO.

What Ninja_Prawn proposed could work, but I'd replace ''finesse weapons'' with ''any sword'', if it is to be tied to Eilistraee.

[Ninja_Prawn]

I'd replace ''finesse weapons'' with ''any sword'', if it is to be tied to Eilistraee.

Fluff-wise I agree; the reason I went with finesse was because 'sword' is not a properly-defined category and it could run into problems with homebrewed or reskinned weapons. All of the finesse weapons in the book are sword-like (except whips, but come one, we're talking about drow), so it seemed a fair choice.

[Irennan]

Fluff-wise I agree; the reason I went with finesse was because 'sword' is not a properly-defined category and it could run into problems with homebrewed or reskinned weapons. All of the finesse weapons in the book are sword-like (except whips, but come one, we're talking about drow), so it seemed a fair choice.

Ah, I see. Well, an alternative would be listing the weapons: Greatsword, Longsword, Rapier, Shortsword, Scimitar, etc...


anyway intreasting to hear it's a little under powered, I'll examine feats in closer detail and see what I can do, maybe +1 wis removal of the penalty and borrow a spell like ability accessable to high born drow.

Borrowing a spell accessible to high born drow seems a bit weird to me, thematically, since this is a feat for the drow that are adventuring far from the Underdark. Perhaps you could add something like the possibility to reroll 1s when taking a Perception check. It would be more consistent IMO, since the feat would be all about perception.

[Stan]

For a campaign I'm planning, many drow have lived on the surface for a couple of centuries. I figured that a drow who wanted to (and had a background of living on the surface) could remove their sunlight sensitivity by reducing their darkvision to 60'. The idea was that extreme light deprivation caused both the sensitivity and superior darkvision.

[Tarvil]

(...)make it a background feature(...)

This is what you're looking for.

[Armored Walrus]

For a campaign I'm planning, many drow have lived on the surface for a couple of centuries. I figured that a drow who wanted to (and had a background of living on the surface) could remove their sunlight sensitivity by reducing their darkvision to 60'. The idea was that extreme light deprivation caused both the sensitivity and superior darkvision.

This seems like the perfect compromise to me.

[Safety Sword]

Make it a blessing bestowed on the character due to their commitment to the fight against evil.

It could actually be something that is a specific quest for the character. Gather the rare herbs from the underdark, do a favour for the elven priests in the forest who know the sacred sunglasses ritual, become a cool dark skinned elf who wields twin scimitars with stupid names and who has a magic item that summons things that are way cooler than anything in the monster manual.

RPG Goals.