Paladin Feats

[TerakasTaranath]

So I'm making a 6th lvl paladin, oath of the ancients character, race is regular human but with house rules everyone gets a feat at first lvl (human V is unavailable)

So I get two feats and I can't decide. I plan on going with 2 handed weapons so the obvious choice is great weapon master, and I love the RP opportunities I could get with prodigy. I am however very open to suggestions of feats and/or ASIs.

Any help is appreciated :D

[Taebyn]

Polearm master is pretty good on Paladin.

[Rhaegar14]

Resilient (Constitution) is also a very good choice. Combine with Aura of Protection and you're basically guaranteed to make your concentration checks unless you take a ton of damage in a single hit.

[Pex]

Inspiring Leader. The temporary hit points you give to everyone is a significant boost.

Magic Initiate or Spell Sniper to have a decent range attack via Cantrip.

If you take great weapon master you want ST at 18. Are you allowed to use great weapon style on smite dice? If yes you won't need great weapon master for damage.

[SociopathFriend]

You want to be a Paladin and smite evil (or good I won't judge) eh? And you want a feat to make you better at doing so?

Alarm
+5 to initiative to make you smite all the sooner
You can't be surprised so nobody can try sneaking around and stabbing you in the back to prevent said smiting

Inspiring Leader
You're good at talking to other people about why smiting evil is awesome- everyone gets temporary hitpoints equal to your level plus your Cha mod.

Lucky
Know what's better than Smiting? Making a Smiting blow that would've missed hit 3 times a day.

Magical Initiate
Useful if you want other spells non-related to Smiting- though there's nothing better than a good Smite on a nice day.

Martial Adept
Know what's better than Smiting an opponent on their feet? Smiting one you've knocked prone or disarmed or any other maneuver you've chosen to facilitate your Smiting needs.

Mobile
They're not in Smiting range- go faster- get in Smiting range.
Is someone else in need of Smiting? Go get them and be free from your previous opponent with little worry.

Mounted Combat
Smiting from atop your glorious steed is sometimes the best smiting. You gain advantage when mounted when attacking foes smaller than your mount, you can choose your mount to take damage instead of you, and your mount basically has Evasion to help keep it (and you) alive for more Smiting.

Ritual Caster
As with magical initiate- in case you want other smiting spells... which are good in their own way AND because they're rituals they won't detract from your ability to Smite.

Sentinel
If you find your enemies are running away from your Smiting too often, stop them and force them to take it anyways.
Are they targeting an ally within 5 feet of you? SMITE

Tough
Always useful to make you better at Smiting, hit points are Smiting potential just by another name.

Heavy Armor Master
Like tough, the longer you stand, the more Smiting you can get done; though this gives damage reduction from normal weapons rather than actual health- mechanically it's the same.

[LudicSavant]

Don't forget about the possibility of just putting your ASIs into stats. Every +2 you put into Cha is another +1 for potentially the entire party's saving throws, thanks to the Ancients Paladin's amazing aura.

For 2H Paladins, Polearm Master is excellent. It gives you 1-2 extra attacks per round that you can append critfishing smites and the like to. At later levels, getting extra attacks will become even more important because of your level 11 ability.

Sentinel + Polearm Master can straight up no-sell certain enemies entirely (such as those that need to get within 5 feet to attack).

Heavy Weapon Master + Polearm Master can lay on quite a lot of burst damage, but the -5/+10 isn't quite as valuable for Paladins as it is for some other martials (basically, the more bonus damage you can put onto your attacks, the more important it is that you hit in the first place). It's also worth remembering that it's essentially -6/+9 compared to boosting your Strength by 2 with the same ASI. It's still good, though.

Resilient (Constitution) will help you make your Concentration saves, particularly when combined with your aura.

Ritual caster is good for added utility, particularly if nobody else in the party has rituals. However, many Paladins won't have the requisite 13 Int or Wis.

Mounted Combatant is really good when your steed is around and you're fighting unmounted things that are smaller than it. On the other hand, it doesn't do anything when your mount isn't around.

Alert is just generally good for everyone.

[McSkrag]

In general the constraint on Paladins is they need STR and CHA and a decent CON as well. You probably want to start with a 16 STR, 14 CON, and 16 CHA at the minimum.

With your extra feat at level 1 you have 1 feat and 5 ASI's to build with assuming you get to level 20.

You want to get at least an 18-20 STR and 20 CHA. That's 3-4 ASI's and 1-2 extra feats.

To consistently land those -5 attack / +10 damage GWM blows you need to have a high attack (STR) and a consistent source other attack bonuses like bless or advantage to counter the -5. It works a lot better for classes like Barbarians who can reckless attack for advantage at will or Fighter Battlemasters with Precision Attack.

The other thing is Paladin's do their nova damage by landing hits and smiting.

You're probably better off going with Polearm Master. It gives you an extra 1d4 + STR attack bonus action every round. The extra damage is consistent and adds up over time. It also give you another chance to Smite in case you miss with your regular attacks.

PAM also goes with Sentinel like apple pie goes with ice cream if you can spare the feat.

So for that level 1 feat if you want to use a 2H I suggest you take Polearm Master.

For your 4th level feat you should take +2 STR or +2 CHA. After that you should keep adding to STR and CHA until they hit 20.

[Arkhios]

This might be a bit off-topic self-input, but it just occurred to me that a highly charismatic paladin with Inspiring Leader and Martial Adept feats (assuming they can afford those two and not suffer too much for it) could be pretty interesting if you chose Rally as one of the two maneuvers you get with Martial Adept.

Do note that not every option you have absolutely must be directed towards killing things. D&D is about more than just that.

[diplomancer]

It is somewhat campaign dependent, but Mounted Combatant is a really good feat for a Paladin, what with the 2 Find Steed spells. The steed basically solves one of the main problem of the Paladin (getting into combat against ranged enemies, or flying enemies once you reach Level 13), and the feat allows you to have the steed survive for a lot longer, as well as giving you advantage against a lot of creatures.

[Sception]

There are a ton of feats that a paladin would love, and generally they don't get to take many of them because of the class's MADness issues, wanting to max out both their physical and magical attack stat by the time they get to level 20.

If given a bonus feat at first level, I like to take a half feat to help smooth out the point buy. Best choices there are Heavy Armor Master if you don't think your campaign's going to run past level 10, or Resilient Constitution if you think it will, or if you're playing a Conquest build (holding on to concentration is a lot more important for them; though Menacing, if UA skill feats are allowed, is a very strong alternative).

But if you skip the half feat, and with +1 to all stats you might not need it, then Sentinel, Inspiring Leader, Healer, Magic Initiate, Polearm Master, Alert, Lucky, Mounted Combat, Shield Master, Martial Adept, Ritual Caster, and Prodigy are all excellent choices, none of which would go to waste. Just look at each of them and pick one that gives you role playing ideas or that matches the tone of the character you already want to play - inspiring leader for a knight in shining armor type, healer for more of the hermit/hedge knight, mounted combat for a cavalier, ritual caster or magic initiate for more of a mage knight, sentinel for, well, a sentinel, etc.

I'd personally save Great Weapon Master for Vengeance or Devotion builds, with their accuracy boosting channel divinities to cancel out the hit penalty. But if you frequently open combats by Blessing yourself, which isn't actually a bad tactical move regardless, then it can still work.