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View Full Version : D&D 5e/Next Homebrew, party tailored feats (PEACH!)



Lailoken42
2019-04-08, 03:10 AM
Hi, I'm in my first year as a DM and wanted to try out handing out custom abilities instead of feats, as suggested by Matt Colville (I'm too new to post links). My players are on board to trust me with this and I want to give them some stuff that is cooler/more thematic than standard feats but is also not completely OP. I also want them to feel like they earned this stuff, not simply a reward for getting to level 4, so I will be handing them out as they accomplish certain things within the range of levels 3-5. I would also like these feats to be available in other games with standard feat picking for anyone who wants to use them, so overall balance would be nice.


For Willow, a warforged who went dormant in some sacred woods for 75 years after a traumatic war. When he woke he swore fealty to Queen Yavanna (from LOTR, a friendly nature goddess) becoming a Oath of the Ancients Paladin and taking on some decidedly tree-like physical traits. He really likes to grapple things but he also likes to use his shield, making things slightly awkward (not impossible, just awkward) for him.


Viny growth
You have an extra growth under one of your arms that can be used to grapple and hold items, but is not dextrous enough to use martial items effectively. This growth is quite flexible and can be easily concealed under clothing.
- You have a third hand with regards to grappling
- As an action this hand can be used to grab any appropriate and sturdy terrain feature (DM fiat obviously) to gain advantage on subsequent saving throws or contested ability checks to avoid being displaced or knocked prone. Any movement automatically releases this grab, whether intentional or not.
- This hand cannot be used to wield any weapon or shield effectively, but it can hold items as a normal hand
- Gain advantage on any acrobatics(strength) checks used for climbing in exchange for half climb speed


For Torbud, a noble drunken monk, who was disowned by his family. He expressed a desire to use improvised weapons so I gave him improvised proficiency for free and said they could count as monk weapons. He has been really creative with this, taking every opportunity to grab some random item lying around an use it for his attacks, so I decided to give him something that would let him be a little more like Jackie Chan in Drunken Master, using various objects and the environment to be a whirlwind that never lets up. I like the idea of grabbing a downed enemy's sword and throwing it at someone else too. Also breaking things over people's heads. I might have gotten a little carried away with this one.


Momentum
You are a master of using your environment to your advantage, and steamroll your opponents with a barrage of different attacks
- Gain proficiency with improvised weapons and they count as monk weapons, and should use the statistics for an equivalent monk weapon from the PHB
- Attacks made with a weapon you are using for the first time gain ˝ proficiency bonus to damage. This only applies to weapons acquired in the past minute
- non-ranged critical hits made with non-magical weapons break the weapon and maximize a single die.
- Gain 1 free item interaction per successful attack
- Flurry of blows can be used to throw weapons or make melee attacks with weapons that were acquired this turn


For Ptesterra, a wood elf ranger. This player is not super interested in lore and character building. He is also a bit of a power gamer despite picking ranger in the first place. Thus far he has mostly been sneaking and shooting people, and had his whole progression picked out after reading forums, that included taking sharpshooter. Also, I hate sharpshooter in that it removes an interesting element from the game. Making cover not matter was bad design imo as it removes decision points and reduces interesting terrain and situational possibilities. I thought this captured those points of sharpshooter without just handwaving cover away.


Careful aim
You know how to take your time to line up a shot
- Gain the ability to line up shot as an action or in place of an extra attack against a single enemy within range
- Once a shot is lined up, the next ranged attack against that target ignores cover and long range penalties and automatically scores a critical hit.


For Faelynn, another wood elf ranger. This player is completely new to D&D and is the girlfriend of one of my other players. Also she is basically the opposite of the above player in terms of powergaming. It's hard to gauge what she is actually into, but she wants to go beastmaster and was raised by wolves. She really leans into the nature thing also. I'm having a hrad time getting her to come out of her shell, and I am hoping letting her turn into a feral but somewhat sentient wolf (think Ladyhawk) will give her interesting RP opportunities


Blessing of Rillifane
You can turn into a Direwolf or a wolf and back again at will
- Change into a direwolf (or regular wolf) or back again as an action
- Unlike with wild shape, your HP pool is shared between forms
- Similar spellcasting rules to wildshape
- Use all ability scores of dire wolf (or wolf). Thinking becomes more feral, but you know who your friends are and vaguely remember objectives at a high level. You do not like being ridden. You can understand any languages you know but you cannot speak them or read them
- You can use extra attacks and cunning actions in animal form
- Use your normal saving throw proficiencies
- Gain stealth, perception, and survival proficiency instead of your own skills
- Instead of listed skill and attack bonuses, use your proficiency plus ability modifiers as normal. DC to knock prone when biting is 8 + str + proficiency.
- Equipment merges, drops, or is worn, as per wild shape


I have a 5th person who is way into RP. He is a gnome bard and he is a bit on the silly end of the spectrum but he isn't disruptive. For example he writes insults for every use of vicious mockery. His concept is a rapping (he also writes and recites actual raps when he uses bardic inspiration) sewer gnome who made a mechanical beatbox using the rock gnome rules. He makes things out of found objects (a habit he picked up from living in the sewers). Anyways I decided to give him some way souped up tinkering rules I found online (again, too new to post links), that allow you to make wacky inventions with an element of randomness. I am going to incorporate my own ingredient system into the rules I found so that he finds the parts needed to make stuff instead of just buying what he needs. Do you guys think this is sufficient for a feat? Or should this just be a general homebrew and I should come up with some other feat for him?

Thanks for any and all input!

nickl_2000
2019-04-08, 08:21 AM
Viny growth
You have an extra growth under one of your arms that can be used to grapple and hold items, but is not dextrous enough to use martial items effectively. This growth is quite flexible and can be easily concealed under clothing.
- You have a third hand with regards to grappling
- As an action this hand can be used to grab any appropriate and sturdy terrain feature (DM fiat obviously) to gain advantage on subsequent saving throws or contested ability checks to avoid being displaced or knocked prone. Any movement automatically releases this grab, whether intentional or not.
- This hand cannot be used to wield any weapon or shield effectively, but it can hold items as a normal hand
- Gain advantage on any acrobatics(strength) checks used for climbing in exchange for half climb speed




I would make this very similar to the Loxodon's trunk from Ravnica.

Trunk. You can grasp things with your trunk, and you
can use it as a snorkel. lt has a reach of 5 feet, and it can
lift a number of pounds equal to five times you r Strength
score. You can use it to do the following simple tasks:
lift, drop, hold, push, or pull an object or a creature;
open or close a door or a container; grapple someone;
or make an unarmed strike. Your DM might allow other
simple tasks to be added to that list of options.
Your trunk can't wield weapons or shields or do any-
thing that requires manual precision, such as using
tools or magic items or performing the somatic compo-
nents of a spell.


That says the same thing in a bit of a simpler manner. If you want to also add in advantage on climb, I don't see any issue with it.









Momentum
You are a master of using your environment to your advantage, and steamroll your opponents with a barrage of different attacks
- Gain proficiency with improvised weapons and they count as monk weapons, and should use the statistics for an equivalent monk weapon from the PHB
- Attacks made with a weapon you are using for the first time gain ˝ proficiency bonus to damage. This only applies to weapons acquired in the past minute
- non-ranged critical hits made with non-magical weapons break the weapon and maximize a single die.
- Gain 1 free item interaction per successful attack
- Flurry of blows can be used to throw weapons or make melee attacks with weapons that were acquired this turn




-You really don't need proficiency in improvised weapons since they are monk weapons, but it doesn't hurt to have it in there.
-The part about adding damage with improvised weapons the first time if you have picked up in the past minuter seems overly complicated. In the end, as a monk, I would be picking up rocks and throwing them almost all the time to get this bonus damage. Although if it were me, I would consider just making it an improvised weapon fighting style that gives a +2 to damage with improvised weapons. It would simplify it significantly.
-One free item interaction per successful attack seems overly complicated to. I see the point, because you want them to be able to break things and then grab more. It would be simpler to allow the to pick up and item and throw it as part of an attack, ignoring the item interaction clause completely.









Careful aim
You know how to take your time to line up a shot
- Gain the ability to line up shot as an action or in place of an extra attack against a single enemy within range
- Once a shot is lined up, the next ranged attack against that target ignores cover and long range penalties and automatically scores a critical hit.



So, I would never give free criticals on hit to a power gamer. He may have his character all planned out, but doing this is going to completely change his character. He will likely go nuts trying to increase the damage dies (I know I would and I'm only partially a power gamer). Archery is a very power build, I would look into giving him out of combat abilities, or abilities that help him in combat but don't give direct bonuses to damage.






Blessing of Rillifane
You can turn into a Direwolf or a wolf and back again at will
- Change into a direwolf (or regular wolf) or back again as an action
- Unlike with wild shape, your HP pool is shared between forms
- Similar spellcasting rules to wildshape
- Use all ability scores of dire wolf (or wolf). Thinking becomes more feral, but you know who your friends are and vaguely remember objectives at a high level. You do not like being ridden. You can understand any languages you know but you cannot speak them or read them
- You can use extra attacks and cunning actions in animal form
- Use your normal saving throw proficiencies
- Gain stealth, perception, and survival proficiency instead of your own skills
- Instead of listed skill and attack bonuses, use your proficiency plus ability modifiers as normal. DC to knock prone when biting is 8 + str + proficiency.
- Equipment merges, drops, or is worn, as per wild shape








I've got a meeting, but I will come back and edit this a little more afterwards.

Lailoken42
2019-04-08, 12:16 PM
Thanks so much for your help!


I would make this very similar to the Loxodon's trunk from Ravnica.
Thank you, that is very similar! It occurs to me that the ability to grab something to steady himself as an action is something he will ask for if it ever comes up anyways, and doesn't need to be specifically called out.


You really don't need proficiency in improvised weapons since they are monk weapons, but it doesn't hurt to have it in there.
Good point, I didn't think of that! Fewer words is better.


The part about adding damage with improvised weapons the first time if you have picked up in the past minuter seems overly complicated. In the end, as a monk, I would be picking up rocks and throwing them almost all the time to get this bonus damage. Although if it were me, I would consider just making it an improvised weapon fighting style that gives a +2 to damage with improvised weapons. It would simplify it significantly.
I am ok with him picking things up and using them as weapons all the time as that is already what he does. I guess I wanted to encourage switching weapons on top of that. Just machine gunning rocks though, definitely does not capture what I was going for. I did not write this but the intention was that the free item interaction was only after a melee hit. I get that it is a little complicated (ok a lot) but I am struggling to find a way to simplify it without ruining all the flavor. Certainly a flat bonus to damage doesn't do it for me. Also I really struggled finding an appropriate damage bonus, is +2 not too much? There weren't really any other comparable feats. The only other thing I could find was a whopping 10 damage but at the cost of accuracy.


So, I would never give free criticals on hit to a power gamer. He may have his character all planned out, but doing this is going to completely change his character. He will likely go nuts trying to increase the damage dies (I know I would and I'm only partially a power gamer). Archery is a very power build, I would look into giving him out of combat abilities, or abilities that help him in combat but don't give direct bonuses to damage.
The problem with giving him non combat stuff is I want him to have fun and I don;t think he would with that. I try to acommodate everyone;s play styles as long as it doesn't hurt anyone's fun. Hopefully he doesn't read this but he is actually remarkably bad at power gaming. Not sure why as he is very smart. I guess he just didn't grow up playing mechanical games like I did. Anyways, all of his min maxing thus far has been through looking up guides, and he won't find this in a guide anywhere. Still though, I want this to be balanced, and sometimes trying to optimize an ability can be fun. Do you think that increasing the penalty from a single attack to an entire action (so your first attack from stealth would still be very strong if combined with, say, hail of thorns). During combat though, you are essentially trading auto misses for an entire turn, for a single guaranteed crit. Not to mention it is tied to a specific creature so by the second turn, that guy might be dead or almost dead, making the crit pointless. I guess there is still plenty of room for abuse. A quick glance through ranger spells brings lightning arrow to mind.

How about keeping the requirement as-is (so combine two attacks into one essentially) but have a smaller, less abusable bonus? Maybe a maximized die? Archery is a power build but that is only because of feats isn't it? Can you think of any other mechanical advantages that would be worth giving up a turn/attack?

Looking forward to hearing your responses, and opinions on the wolf thing.

nickl_2000
2019-04-08, 01:56 PM
Blessing of Rillifane
You can turn into a Direwolf or a wolf and back again at will
- Change into a direwolf (or regular wolf) or back again as an action
- Unlike with wild shape, your HP pool is shared between forms
- Similar spellcasting rules to wildshape
- Use all ability scores of dire wolf (or wolf). Thinking becomes more feral, but you know who your friends are and vaguely remember objectives at a high level. You do not like being ridden. You can understand any languages you know but you cannot speak them or read them
- You can use extra attacks and cunning actions in animal form
- Use your normal saving throw proficiencies
- Gain stealth, perception, and survival proficiency instead of your own skills
- Instead of listed skill and attack bonuses, use your proficiency plus ability modifiers as normal. DC to knock prone when biting is 8 + str + proficiency.
- Equipment merges, drops, or is worn, as per wild shape



This will actually be very powerful at level 1, I may put a limit of Wolf at level 1, and Dire Wolf starting at level 3. Extra attack gets a little funny, do you do the damage of a normal Dire Wolf attack or something else? A Dire Wolf is balanced around a single normal attack. I would instead look at the Dire Wolf attack bonus changing with the characters proficiency bonus.possibly).

Overall this will somewhat loose it's appeal as the character gets higher level, unless you do something to boost it further. Maybe the damage increases over time, the to hit certainly needs to increase, or you need to create more wolf form options. I would person scale the damage slightly and scale the to hit with proficiency and that should be enough to keep it viable.






The problem with giving him non combat stuff is I want him to have fun and I don;t think he would with that. I try to acommodate everyone;s play styles as long as it doesn't hurt anyone's fun. Hopefully he doesn't read this but he is actually remarkably bad at power gaming. Not sure why as he is very smart. I guess he just didn't grow up playing mechanical games like I did. Anyways, all of his min maxing thus far has been through looking up guides, and he won't find this in a guide anywhere. Still though, I want this to be balanced, and sometimes trying to optimize an ability can be fun. Do you think that increasing the penalty from a single attack to an entire action (so your first attack from stealth would still be very strong if combined with, say, hail of thorns). During combat though, you are essentially trading auto misses for an entire turn, for a single guaranteed crit. Not to mention it is tied to a specific creature so by the second turn, that guy might be dead or almost dead, making the crit pointless. I guess there is still plenty of room for abuse. A quick glance through ranger spells brings lightning arrow to mind.

How about keeping the requirement as-is (so combine two attacks into one essentially) but have a smaller, less abusable bonus? Maybe a maximized die? Archery is a power build but that is only because of feats isn't it? Can you think of any other mechanical advantages that would be worth giving up a turn/attack?

Looking forward to hearing your responses, and opinions on the wolf thing.


I would look at either a lesser bonus or something else that could be used in combat and make the character more interesting. For example, maybe you could give the PC 1 user of an arcane archer shot per long rest (where you either get more uses and more options as you level up more.) This would give him more options in combat and would stretch him out a little bit more. Or you can give him trick shot options.
Here's a few things that come to mind
1) Curving shot, can move around a corner and hit with full cover
2) Double shot/rapid shot, shoot at disadvantage with both, but can load 2 arrows and shoot them both at once at a single target instead of an attack
3) Power shot, sacrifice a bonus action to add extra power to all shots this round giving it extra damage equal to your strength modifier.
4) Can spend downtime making some trick arrows (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trick_arrows)


Overall it's not a huge power boost but gives the PC more to do, and everyone loves more to do.

Lailoken42
2019-04-08, 03:50 PM
This will actually be very powerful at level 1, I may put a limit of Wolf at level 1, and Dire Wolf starting at level 3. Extra attack gets a little funny, do you do the damage of a normal Dire Wolf attack or something else? A Dire Wolf is balanced around a single normal attack. I would instead look at the Dire Wolf attack bonus changing with the characters proficiency bonus.possibly).

Overall this will somewhat loose it's appeal as the character gets higher level, unless you do something to boost it further. Maybe the damage increases over time, the to hit certainly needs to increase, or you need to create more wolf form options. I would person scale the damage slightly and scale the to hit with proficiency and that should be enough to keep it viable.

She won't get it until at least level 3, so level 1 is not a problem for my particular case (although druids can do better than this at level 1 but it is also a major class feature). I can see though that limiting it to wolf until level 3 or 4 might be a good idea for the general case.

The intention was that extra attack would be the damage scaling, and the line
Instead of listed skill and attack bonuses, use your proficiency plus ability modifiers as normal. DC to knock prone when biting is 8 + str + proficiencyis to hit scaling, but I can see how that might get missed given that the line starts by talking about skills. My logic around damage balance is that it is essentially just greatsword damage (which a ranger can use) with a prone rider. I might add that any class abilities or feats that affect melee attacks are kept in wolf form just to keep it competitive with simply using a greatsword. Or maybe I will leave that out because of pack tactics giving advantage to hit.

In exchange you can't shoot, cast spells, or get your armor bonus. I am considering making it a bonus action to go to wolf and an entire action to revert since wolf is the more restrictive form, the downside of choosing to go to it, is that it takes 6 seconds to get back into non-restrictive mode.

TLDR balancing factors for combat:
PROS
-decent physical ability scores without having to invest in them
-pack tactics
-prone melee attack rider

CONS
-can't shoot or cast spells
-low armor class
-very low int (hope you don't need to make an int save)
-can't stabilize downed allies, or interact with the environment or items in ways that require hands
-attacks are non-magical (although I might change this for dire wolf)
-can't benefit from magical martial gear

And some non-combat bonuses:
-perception, survival, stealth, keen smell
-melee option without having to carry around a greatsword

Cynthaer
2019-04-08, 05:00 PM
-The part about adding damage with improvised weapons the first time if you have picked up in the past minuter seems overly complicated. In the end, as a monk, I would be picking up rocks and throwing them almost all the time to get this bonus damage. Although if it were me, I would consider just making it an improvised weapon fighting style that gives a +2 to damage with improvised weapons. It would simplify it significantly.
(Emphasis mine.)

It sounds like the goal is to incentivize/reward using lots of different objects, so that part seems good to me. Granted, a flat bonus to all improvised weapons might work fine—it sounds like the player is happy to use different objects even without encouragement—but IMO it'll feel better if he's actually being rewarded for it.

The problem for me is that it's overtuned in this form. The standard monk turn has 3-4 attacks, and right now it's optimal to use a new weapon for every single one. That's way too much churn. Jackie Chan uses a handful of objects in interesting ways during a fight; he doesn't just throw a new item every two seconds.

I would use the Dual Wielder feat as a point of comparison. It's too weak, but the core design is clever: It gives +1 AC and effectively +1 damage (by allowing d8 weapons instead of d6), which is almost the same increase in combat power that taking the +2 Dex ASI would have given you.

I say we do something similar here, while adjusting the "new weapon" incentive to favor changing it up once per turn (with no penalty for more frequent changes). I also want to smooth out a couple of unnecessary wrinkles.

Momentum
You are a master of using your environment to your advantage, and steamroll your opponents with a barrage of different attacks.



You are proficient with improvised weapons, and improvised weapons are monk weapons for you.
You may pick up a weapon as part of making an attack with that weapon.
Any time you could make an unarmed strike, you may instead make a melee or thrown ranged improvised weapon attack.
When you wield a new weapon for the first time, you gain the following benefits until the beginning of your next turn:
(A) You gain +1 to AC.
(B) Your improvised weapon attacks deal +1 damage.
(C) When you score a critical hit with an improvised weapon attack, you may forgo rolling one damage die and use the maximum value instead. If the weapon is not magical, it breaks during the attack.


This is more complexity than I'd be willing to publish for general use, but I think it works for this.

Items 1 and 2 are power-neutral, and basically just make the concept work. I dropped the "use stats for a similar weapon" clause, because (A) that's already how improvised weapons work, and (B) just let it be 1d4 and grow with your Martial Arts die. This lets the player use a mental shorthand of "improvised weapons are like unarmed strikes", so there's less for him to remember.

Item 3 makes this explicit. No need to get into "is this a Flurry of Blows attack or a Martial Arts bonus action attack"; just swap out all unarmed strikes for improvised weapon attacks. This is actually kind of power-neutral, in that it lets you make attacks at range, but it doesn't actually increase your damage output.

In item 4, I've changed the incentive structure for grabbing new weapons. Your version rewards using a new weapon for each individual attack, and requires that you track which weapon you're using because there's a one-time bonus for each weapon individually.

In my version, you only have to grab one new weapon each turn, and then the bonuses work with all improvised weapon attacks until next turn (when you grab a new weapon again). This reduces bookkeeping, and I think it brings the pace and feel closer to an actual Jackie Chan movie. Importantly, there's no penalty for grabbing weapons faster, so you can spend a turn throwing a bunch of pool balls, etc.

4A and 4B are cribbed from Dual Wielder, and they help this feat keep pace with the "just get +2 to Dex" alternative. The +1 AC is thematic, IMO, since grabbing an object to block an incoming attack is a staple of this kind of action scene. The +1 damage is just a simpler way to grant the damage boost.

Finally, I've simplified 4C to remove the "non-ranged" clause. It's hardly overpowered, so might as well make it simpler. Honestly, I think it still adds more complexity than I'd like to a feat that already has 6 (!) bullet points, but it's satisfying enough. It's not my favorite, in part because so many improvised weapons naturally break when used anyway. It's also not needed to encourage swapping weapons, and it means there are two distinct, unrelated "extra damage" clauses in the same feat.

From a design perspective, this is the first thing I'd look to replace.

If you look at the design as a whole, it's actually not that powerful. Compare the mechanical benefits with simply taking +2 Dex in a normal monk build:



This Feat
+2 Dex


+1 damage
+1 damage


+1 AC
+1 AC


"unarmed strikes" are ranged
+1 to hit


+1.5-4.5 damage on crits (average, scales with Martial Arts die)
+1 Dex save



+1 to Dex ability checks



+1 to initiative



When you lay it out like that, it's clear how much you're paying for the privilege of using improvised weapons instead of just punching people. That's not necessarily a bad thing, just something to keep in mind.

Overall, I like this, although I'd prefer to replace the "break on crit" part with something simpler and a little more powerful. I haven't been able to come up with anything so far that would be better there, though.

Lailoken42
2019-04-08, 05:30 PM
@Cynthaer

Wow! Thanks for this excellent analysis on momentum!

Let me know if you think of any good alternatives for 4C. Also would you allow all unarmed strike effects to apply to improvised weapon attacks?

You say it's a little too complex for general use, but do you think it has potential for such? This doesn't worry me terribly, but I'm just curious if you think the concept as a whole is too complex, or just this particular implementation?

Cynthaer
2019-04-09, 05:05 PM
Let me know if you think of any good alternatives for 4C. Also would you allow all unarmed strike effects to apply to improvised weapon attacks?
The answer is "no", but it barely matters.

Almost nothing triggers off of unarmed strikes specifically. Stunning Strike keys off of melee weapon attacks, and the Open Hand Technique stuff triggers off of "attacks granted by your Flurry of Blows".

The only things I can see are Ki-Empowered Strikes (your unarmed strikes count as magical) and Quivering Palm (land an unarmed strike and kill someone a week later), and neither of those really make any sense with improvised weapons. This feat is about wacky bar fights, not overcoming a demon's immunity to non-magical damage by throwing a rock at it.


You say it's a little too complex for general use, but do you think it has potential for such? This doesn't worry me terribly, but I'm just curious if you think the concept as a whole is too complex, or just this particular implementation?
If we could fix 4C, I'd be comfortable publishing this as homebrew. All the other complexity is simply what's necessary for this fighting style to work smoothly, and I think the result is worth it.

Lailoken42
2019-04-10, 09:49 AM
This feat is about wacky bar fights, not overcoming a demon's immunity to non-magical damage by throwing a rock at it..

:tongue: Haha! I was actually going to give him ki empowered as well but you have convinced me otherwise.