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demonslayerelf
2017-12-30, 05:43 PM
I'm back again, here to bring you a handful of vaguely-class-based feats!
In the same way Martial Adept not so subtly took from the Battlemaster, and Tavern Brawler pretty subtly took a page from the Monk, I've made a page full of feats that do similar things, with many other class features. They range from obvious to "Which class had anything like this?", and I hope you all enjoy them.

Here it is! (http://homebrewery.naturalcrit.com/share/BJqM2urmf)

Feedback is always appreciated!Except grammar nazis. ;]

Lalliman
2017-12-31, 01:41 PM
Great idea, I've always wanted certain class features to be available through feats. However, many of these are very weak. This isn't made for one of those alternate systems where every feat is split into two half feats, is it? Because it really seems like that. I'll elaborate one by one.

Adrenaline Rush is hard to judge, but seems fine.

Angry Warrior is impractical. Rage is powerful, but it's rarely worth completely missing a turn to activate it. As a full feat that grants only one Rage per day, it can easily afford just being a bonus action.

Class Act is terrible. Getting one Bardic Inspiration die wouldn't be worth a feat to begin with, let alone one that costs your action to give out. The expanded options for what to do with it don't really help. I mean, what kind of character are you playing that causing a 1d6 penalty to a single enemy roll is a worthwhile use of your turn? For the cost of a feat, I would honestly give the full functionality of Bardic Inspiration, minus the scaling die size.

Chakra Healing is interesting if you're already a monk, I guess. Extra ki is always good, and you'll have a lot of healing at your disposal. For anyone else though, it's just casting Cure Wounds once per long rest. Meanwhile there are official feats (e.g. Drow High Magic) that let you cast higher level spells more than once. This feat should either be made worthwhile for non-monks, or get a monk-only restriction to keep it from being a trap.

Divine Favour: This one seemed good until the final line. Another gravely unnecessary restriction. I mean, suppose that I'm an 8th level character and I spend my valuable feat on Divine Favour, choosing the Life domain. With Preserve Life, I can now once per day spend my action to heal a whopping total of 15 HP. At level 8. Dafuq?

Fate and Fortune seems fine, just because of how ludicrously good Lucky and Portent are.

Flexible Magic is just far too little bang for your buck. Evidently you modelled it after Martial Adept, but Martial Adept is trash too.

Forged Pact: While some invocations are very good, I'd be much more inclined to take a 2 level dip in warlock to get them, rather than ever use this. I would expect to get at least two invocations for the price of a feat.

Quick Wit is alright. It's an alternative to Alert if you're a wizard.

Magical Resilience is... maybe decent if you choose bludgeoning, piercing or slashing as the damage type. Even then I would expect it to be a half feat for how unreliable it is, and how easily an intelligent opponent can get around it. For a non-physical damage type it's trash. Compare Infernal Constitution from Xanathar's Guide, which gives resistance to two damage types as a half feat.

Mystic Awareness: I can see this being useful in a very specific campaign with a masquerade-type set-up. But outside of that, this is a really hard sell. I would definitely make it a half feat, with a +1 to probably Wisdom.

Natural Shifter seems fun, no complaint there.

Skirmisher's Stealth: This is reasonable, though I would honestly be inclined to raise the speed bonus to 10 and allow the bonus action to hide regardless of circumstance. I mean, you can get Cunning Action with a two level dip in rogue. Are you really going to spend a resource that you only get once every four levels to get a vastly downgraded version?

Specialised Magic is good.

Specialty Hunter: The bonus just isn't large enough to justify the opportunity cost. Think about it this way: If you take this feat, you get +3.5 damage on one attack per round, against one type of creature. If you use your ASI to raise your Str or Dex, you get a +1 attack and damage with every attack, against anything. If you have two attacks, that's a total roundly bonus of +4, if you count attack bonus and damage bonus as equal (which they aren't, attack bonus is usually better). That means that even when facing your favoured enemy, raising your Str or Dex STILL grants a better offensive bonus, and that's without considering the bonus to saves and skills.

Touch of Vitality might be interesting for a paladin, just for the ability to dramatically overcharge your own HP. For a non-paladin, it's 5 THP per long rest, for the price of a feat. Again, this should not be presented as a valid option for a non-paladin.

Trained Combatant: If you're the type of character who wants to take a fighting style, you probably already have proficiency in whatever weapons you need. Which means that this is just a fighting style for the price of a full feat. None of the fighting styles are worth that. Should be a half feat.

Thuggish Fighter: Same problem as Specialty Hunter. Why take +3.5 damage on one attack per round under certain circumstances, if you can get +1 attack and damage on every attack?

I do like the idea behind a lot of these, but you've seriously overshot in trying not to make them overpowered.

demonslayerelf
2017-12-31, 02:18 PM
Good points across the board(And I will be changing some because they ARE good points), but the main concern wasn't balance. I don't believe such a thing can exist in DnD anymore.

No, the main concern was "Does this step on the toes of the parent class?"

For instance, on the "Class Act" feat, if you got bardic inspirations like a bard, only they were all d6's... Until you got to pretty high levels for Magical Secrets, why would you play a bard, when you can have a Wizard/Sorcerer/Other Caster(Or Rogue, for dem skillz) with Class Act? Cutting Words is nice, but Bards don't get many great things until 6 or 10.
That said, it IS too weak, and that's one I'll be changing, but you get the point.

The other concern was "If an X takes the feat that gives X powers, will it totally break everything?"

For instance, I didn't want to just give, for instance, a ton of one resource(Ki Points, Lay on Hands, Sorcery Points), as part of a feat. Here's why;
There's a feat that gives 5 Ki points. Monk level 1 takes this feat as a variant human. Then again at 4th level. Maybe more in the future, after his ability scores are in order. But that gives him an extra 5, 10, 15, maybe even 20 ki points, which more than doubles his pool. You think the Stunning Fist spam is bad now? Literally double it, and then some.

The outlier was the Warlock Invocation one. That one is strange, because nowhere in the PHB(That I could find) says that the invocation level requirements HAVE to be warlock levels. That's definitely RAI, but RAW, there's nothing. So to supplement my Illusionist Wizard, I sold my soul at 16th level to get At-will Invisibility and/or Silent Image, and for my Fighter, Witch Sight, so no casters can get away by going invisible or into a rat or something.

All that said, for the changes themselves, I'm thinking I'll change the Ki, LoH, and SP all to be 3, instead of one. Here's hoping double metamagic for sorcerers at level 4 isn't game breaking... That's ironic, it's more about the monks... not important.
And I'll remove the Cleric proficiency bonus line... Some of these are becoming half-feats, tooI take this back, it feels like a cop-out... Stand by for update :P

Lalliman
2017-12-31, 05:31 PM
No, the main concern was "Does this step on the toes of the parent class?"
This is indeed a concern in certain cases, but I don't think it's as likely to turn a class obsolete as you say. A sorcerer with Bardic Inspiration can indeed do a lot of what a bard can, but he is not a bard. Someone who wants to play a bard probably isn't doing it purely for the arcane spellcasting and the Bardic Inspiration. The extensive skill support and mid-liner chassis are a core part of being a bard, and a sorcerer with BI has neither. You don't play a bard to get Bardic Inspiration, you play a bard to be a bard. Also, in order to become a semi-bard, the aforementioned sorcerer needs to give up one of their ASIs, so it's not like it's a no-brainer. So I think you can afford to be a little more liberal with that.

And, of course, not stepping on the parent class' toes counts for nothing if the feat isn't worth taking. But you knew that.


There's a feat that gives 5 Ki points. Monk level 1 takes this feat as a variant human. Then again at 4th level. Maybe more in the future, after his ability scores are in order. But that gives him an extra 5, 10, 15, maybe even 20 ki points, which more than doubles his pool. You think the Stunning Fist spam is bad now? Literally double it, and then some.
Have you considered not making the feat available to the parent class? It makes sense to me: An expert mathematician won't become better at math by attending a Math For Dummies class, so why should a monk be able to increase his Ki above the level-based maximum by taking a feat that teaches you how to use Ki? These spells could simply be a way for outsiders to gain the parent class' feature at a base level. If you want a higher-level mastery, you need to actually invest in the class. Mechanically, this would make things a lot easier because you don't have to basically balance two different feats in one.

demonslayerelf
2017-12-31, 08:20 PM
This is indeed a concern in certain cases, but I don't think it's as likely to turn a class obsolete as you say...<Snip>
(Just a little thing here, not everybody uses them for that reason. I have friends who do it ONLY for magical secrets, and in the past I homebrewed a half-bard, half-rogue called the dancer, because someone basically wanted the BI, but didn't want to deal with spells.)



Have you considered not making the feat available to the parent class? ...<Snip>

I did. But then I realized that one would then have to make OTHER feats so a fully fledged monk could, as an example, heal using their Chakra. And that would basically just make a ton of half-feats.

Also it feels like a cop-out. Not many people understand my frustration with this concept(Not the feats, just a concept I am about to address) that, I'm working on something. I KNOW I can get it to work properly. Even if it's easier, I'm not gonna ditch it to make something else, because it won't work as well.

That said, I think I got most of them to work. I collapsed two into one because they were thematically similar.

Lalliman
2018-01-01, 10:28 AM
(Just a little thing here, not everybody uses them for that reason. I have friends who do it ONLY for magical secrets, and in the past I homebrewed a half-bard, half-rogue called the dancer, because someone basically wanted the BI, but didn't want to deal with spells.)
Sure, not everyone. But the fact that you are willing to make a homebrew class for someone who wants BI without spells again calls into question why you mind that bard might be used less as a result of this feat.


I did. But then I realized that one would then have to make OTHER feats so a fully fledged monk could, as an example, heal using their Chakra. And that would basically just make a ton of half-feats.
Well either you're making an excess of feats, or you're not granting the option for a monk to gain healing spells, or you're not granting the option for non-monks to gain ki without also gaining healing spells. There's no ideal choice here.


Also it feels like a cop-out. Not many people understand my frustration with this concept(Not the feats, just a concept I am about to address) that, I'm working on something. I KNOW I can get it to work properly. Even if it's easier, I'm not gonna ditch it to make something else, because it won't work as well.
Oh no I know the feeling quite well. You made the feats to fill your own intended niche, and the suggestions given, while technically sensible, may push the feat out of the intended niche, thus nullifying the reason to make them in the first place. It's like asking about an omelette and getting a recipe for scrambled eggs. It's easy to call potayto-potahto when you're an outsider who doesn't know the full story. That's why my input was merely a suggestion, not a holy commandment.

But yeah, they look pretty good now. They'll need play testing, but none of them are obvious trash anymore. Perhaps the biggest issue is that Thuggish Fighter will be savage when taken at level 1 by by a Variant Human. But then again, so are several other feats.