No multiclass, but everyone get a free feat in the first level

[etrpgb]

Multiclass is an optional rule and arguably many combinations allow to make characters that fills a concept more that the standard classes. Still, even more often multiclass is just used for power playing purposes. Since I'll have to DM I was thinking an alternate approach, as the title says, no multiclass (and no variant human), but everyone get a feat in the first level. And this feat does not count in the general rule you cannot take the same feat twice.


A feat is powerful, but not as general multiclass. For example: Magic Initiate Warlock can give anyone a reliable ranged attack (useful to Paladins for example); Weapon Master can give the missing weapon for a class (e.g., the whip and/or the Heavy Crossbow to rogues); Resilient is a simple way to have a better Saving Throw...

What do you think? You'd play with this rule?


As an opinion based question, there are no "wrong" answers. I am trying to surmise if such a modification would make the game more or less fun.

[Aussiehams]

I'm a big believer in a starting feat. It can make a character more interesting from the get go.

[Daphne]

Honestly, I'd just not start at first level.

[False God]

Absolutely, since I don't multiclass anyway it's just a free soda with my Preferred Playstyle Pizza.

[pr4wn]

I would play. A feat at first level makes it much more enjoyable at low levels (as opposed to "I just need to survive until next level").

What would I play with a free feat at first level? Bugbear Druid with Tavern Brawler! Smokey the Bugbear, fights with a shovel. :smallsmile:

-pr4wn

[elyktsorb]

Free starting feat, multiclass allowed, start at 3rd lvl.

[DeadMech]

I believe a feat at first level should have been PHB from day one. Hey game designers. Maybe more people would play with feats if
1. They weren't optional rules.
2. Everyone had access to them at the most commonly played levels in the fricken game.
Duh!

As for multiclassing I've only done it once. I didn't feel overpowered but it didn't involve warlock. I swear if you just kill hexblade multiclassing and make eldritch blast scale off warlock levels instead of character level 90% of people's issues go away.

[Mork]

You could probably get away without even giving the feat, both feats and mutliclassing are optional rules and the game works without them. But in general giving something instead of just "taking away" will feel better to the players.
But I think more importantly is your players. Some might consider me a power player, but building a charachter is part of the fun for me, taking away options would be reducing my fun. If you have a party of powergamers I would suggest just upping the CR of your challanges, or just giving every enemy 25% more HP to make up for the stronger charachters.
If you have some powergamers and some casuals ;), the way I would prefer to go about it is asking the powergamer to not make a charachter focussed on damage. A optimized buffer, healer, ?tank? is not stealing the show all the time but is helping the rest of the party shiny even brighter!
If there are no powergamers in your party.. then what is the problem? They are only multiclassing for charachter development :).

if you see a lot of hexblade dips.. just ban that one. That is arguably too big a pay off.

In addition you can be more stringent RP to the requirments before multiclassing. You want to multiclass into warlock? well you should have done a dark ritual summoning your patron and write the actual contract. You want to become a cleric/monk/palladin? At least a year of downtime in a church/monastry of the god of your choice. Wizard, you have to have a teacher. Sorcerer.. why would your dragon lineage come up now, have you interacted/eaten a dragon?
That way if someone wants to multiclass you'll get some story out of it.

[CTurbo]

Free feats are almost standard where I play. One DM even allows free feat AND variant human. A free feat is not going to break anything.


The last time I DMed, I allowed a free feat, but you had to roll for it at random. Came up with some fun stuff.

[Mr Adventurer]

Gloomstalker 3 is showing up as a popular multiclass for us. Haven't seen any Hexblade multiclass yet. We run free feat at 1st level, but I wouldn't default to it in my own games if it wasn't already established practice.

[nickl_2000]

Certainly I would play it. I've got multiple ideas running around in my head for a single classed character and having a free feat makes the come online sooner.

I also adore the free random feat at level 1, or the free feat that doesn't include the "power choices" (GWM, PAM, SS, Warcaster, things like that)

[Mr Adventurer]

Is Warcaster really a power choice? I've never taken it but I guess it just feels like more of a feat tax for Gish builds than actually powerful?

[nickl_2000]

Is Warcaster really a power choice? I've never taken it but I guess it just feels like more of a feat tax for Gish builds than actually powerful?

I included ones that I have seen excluded in the past. They tend to be combat only feats, with the intent to give the PC more flavorful feats at level 1 like actor, prodigy, and other such things. Personally, were I giving away a free feat, I would just leave it open

[KorvinStarmast]

What do you think? You'd play with this rule?

As an opinion based question, there are no "wrong" answers. I am trying to surmise if such a modification would make the game more or less fun. I would only give a feat at first level to vHumans, and offer feats at ASI 4 and beyond. Just like it says on the tin.

But if you say "we are starting a game next week, create your character, and add a feat at first level" I'd be happy to do so. And if you also say "no multiclass" I'd also be happy.

Sure. :smallsmile:

Free feats are almost standard where I play. One DM even allows free feat AND variant human. A free feat is not going to break anything.

The last time I DMed, I allowed a free feat, but you had to roll for it at random. Came up with some fun stuff. Neat idea, buit what happens when a Fighter or Barbarian rolls up Weapons Master feat. Do you let them re roll? :smallconfused:

[Quietus]

Starting as a Tiefling with infernal constitution to resist fire, cold, and poison at level 1? That sounds pretty great to me.

[FaerieGodfather]

Take it with a grain of salt, because I'm not a 5e player anyway-- but "no multiclassing" is a hard nope from me. I've been playing D&D for 27 years and in all that time I have only ever played a single-class character once and it was my first PC ever. (Also an illegal race/class combination, but WotC took that option away from me.)

Banning multiclassing is fine, because the game really isn't designed to require it the way 3.X was; it's an optional rule for a reason, and even if I violently disagree with that reason, it's a legitimate reason and the game won't fall apart if you exclude it. Giving a free feat at 1st level is one of the most common 5e house rules I'm aware of, and the only levels where it really makes a difference are the levels the XP table is designed to rush you through as quickly as possible.

Unless you're specifically trying to get me to play with you, these are player-friendly houserules that probably won't cause you any problems at all.

[Willie the Duck]

What do you think? You'd play with this rule?
As an opinion based question, there are no "wrong" answers. I am trying to surmise if such a modification would make the game more or less fun.

I would play with this rule. I don't think it solves all issues, however. I think if the game had been explicitly designed such that all concepts could be captured using a combination of feats and archetypes (using those to thematically replace multiclassing), that would probably have been an interesting and elegant design decision. But, as it stands, they didn't do that, and there are still gaps in what can be done without MC as an option.

So it is an interesting concept to explore, and I'd definitely play it, but I don't think it addresses all the problems that the system as it stands has.


I believe a feat at first level should have been PHB from day one. Hey game designers. Maybe more people would play with feats if
1. They weren't optional rules.
2. Everyone had access to them at the most commonly played levels in the fricken game.
Duh!

I don't know where the 'Duh!' part comes in at all. Optional rule is optional, that's the point. And there is an option for getting one at first level -- Variant Human. I'm not sure what the problem is. Yes, yes: but what if you want to play a non-human with a feat at first level? In a perfect world (or one with more rules expansions, at least) there would be a variant version of all the major races. Still, there is an option to get a feat at first level. All a feat for all at first level does is make using feats mandatory*. This seems to me to be giving one... group of preferred playstyle (for want of a better term) preferential treatment at the expense of another groups (effectively eliminating that group's playstyle), even though the first group already has an option for getting what they want.
*or effectively so, as yes you could just choose not to take the feat when offered.

As to more people would play with feats issue, I'm unconvinced that there are vast swaths of the player base who aren't playing with feats but want to.


As for multiclassing I've only done it once. I didn't feel overpowered but it didn't involve warlock. I swear if you just kill hexblade multiclassing and make eldritch blast scale off warlock levels instead of character level 90% of people's issues go away.

Hexblades with Cha-based classes is a good argument against MC. Sorcadins too. 1-level cleric dip for wizard seems a little annoying too. Overall I haven't found MC to be too overpowered, so much as it is annoying that it is so often a more sensible option compared to the other ways of approaching a problem (who is going to take the armor feats as a wizard, when there is a dip into fighter or cleric available? etc.).

[Samayu]

You want to limit powergaming by disallowing multiclassing, but you're giving them a free feat. Not sure that discourages powergaming.

Can you talk with your players, and get them to choose a second class only with RP reasons? That might help a little.

Certain classes become less fun at certain levels. I wouldn't want my players to find my campaign less fun. But if the players revel in their own stories, this will bother them less.

Run the idea by the players first. If they get upset, don't do it. If they're only mildly bothered, present it as a challenge.

[Neoh]

Wait, why no variant human? Everyone gets a feat but the variant human is no more? So you're just left with the basic human chassis with a bonus feat?

Question : Why would anyone bother playing a human anymore?

Sure, Variant Human is strong, but take away the variant and you're left with a race without dark vision, that gets +1 to every stats (who wants a +1 to everything seriously?), no proficiencies and no goodies.

They end up weak as ****.


Even if you let the Variant Human as it is (+1 to 2 stats, 1 proficiency and a feat like everyone else) that's weak compared to the other races.

[Mr Adventurer]

I've considered banning variant human and giving a bonus feat to everyone. I've played basic human, too - it's great when you want a character with a lot of decent stats and/or don't feel like having a lot of weaknesses (worried will fit my Eldritch Knight, for example). Were I to do this, I would consider giving the human an extra free proficiency of some sort.

[Dork_Forge]

It would be fun, but would still limit some player concepts. If you're doing this to provide variety and limit powergaming, you're not really going to achieve that with this for example:

-GWM/PAM Builds get rolling immediately without the normal hinderance on stat progression

-All Elves and Half Elves can now start with Elven Accuracy, pushing their stats higher at first level (and freeing up ASIs later on) and giving them access to super advantage

-The Wizard's main weakness is it's low hp count, Tough not only fixes that but pushes it's hp beyond d8 classes, just 1hp total behind the martials (not inc. Barbarian)

-All Clerics can now just pick up MI:Druid to be Wis SAD with Shillelagh

If your primary concern is powergaming then that's more a conversation that you should have with your players and something you should consider is this: Powergaming is how some people have fun and a well built character doesn't mean that the person will roleplay any worse than if they had a more gimped character.

I fully support feat at 1st level, it gives people a reason to take fun and flavourul feats like Actor, Observant and Keen Mind but I wouldn't restrict multiclassing on top of that personally.

[Eldariel]

One of the big reasons Vuman is so popular (and powerful) and why many feats never see play is because there's such a premium based on feats. ASIs are really important and powerful, so it sucks to give one up for a feat. You can do that for the best feats, but Linguist or Keen Mind? Yeah, you probably would rather just take +2 Int, unless you have an odd Int score anyways. Starting feat alleviates all these issues. Though I believe in giving characters feats that don't compete with ASIs over leveling as well (once every 5 levels). Mostly this just means characters have enough feats to pick some of the less powerful, but more interesting ones up without gimping their character (basically everyone wants Resilient in either Con or Wis, most also some combat feats and so on), especially in shorter games.

[diplomancer]

How about this:
No variant human, regular human gets one extra skill and the choice of any feat.
Other races are limited to either racial feats or half-feats. (Except perhaps resilient con/wis- to be tested, if every one and their mother is getting one of those, ban it, you want flavour, not power boosts)
If playing point-buy, you can't get to an 18 in any ability score.

It keeps humans relevant while giving some flavoured boosts to the other races.

I strongly dislike the idea of random feats to be honest. Maybe fine for a one-shot (where I'd be fine with random anything), but not for a campaign. I come to a campaign with a character well in mind, getting a feat that doesn't fit at all with my character backstory forces me to either change the whole character or to ignore the existence of the feat.

[Spore]

Free starting feat, multiclass allowed, start at 3rd lvl.

This. Also two things:

1) Multiclasses get SLA/feats at 4th/8th and so forth.
2) Class levels need to be in the range of minimum 2:1. So no Warlock 2 dips past Level 6.

[diplomancer]

This. Also two things:

1) Multiclasses get SLA/feats at 4th/8th and so forth.
2) Class levels need to be in the range of minimum 2:1. So no Warlock 2 dips past Level 6.

If you are going to use that rule 2, the effect won't be much different from simply banning multi-classes. Apart from the infamous paladocks, sorcadins and coffeelocks, very few multi-classes can work with that proportion.

For a simple example of why, a 4th level character has to be with the most inefficient split, 2/2. You can't get level 3 spells or extra attack before level 8.

It's better to banish multiclassing than to punish those who choose to do it without considerable system mastery.

If you want to go in that direction, it's better to borrow a page from 2nd edition dual-classing, and say that ONCE you start multiclassing, you can't gain new levels of the main class without keeping that proportion. It would at least allow some ok multi-classes like fighter/rogue without forcing the poor fighter to get his 2nd attack at level 8.

[Guy Lombard-O]

This. Also two things:

1) Multiclasses get SLA/feats at 4th/8th and so forth.
2) Class levels need to be in the range of minimum 2:1. So no Warlock 2 dips past Level 6.

Yeah, that doesn't sound good to me either.

Doing it this way prevents the characters who switch classes entirely, like after a 5 or 6 level dip. While some of those are pure power building (sorcadin), others are done either because of roleplaying or simply because certain classes (looking at you, PHB ranger) become very unattractive after a certain level. Also, dipping for flavor and fun in non-power builds would become impossible (I recently dipped 1 level of rogue on a trickery cleric - definitely not a power move).

In terms of the OP's setup, I'd definitely play on those rules. But it would push me into playing certain classes. Or more accurately away from certain classes, since I feel like some of them only really work as dips or secondary classes and aren't fun as single classes for a long term campaign.

[ArtIzon]

Multiclass is an optional rule and arguably many combinations allow to make characters that fills a concept more that the standard classes. Still, even more often multiclass is just used for power playing purposes.

I usually use it for both. I optimize the ever-loving crap out of my characters, and also craft multi-page backstories for them because I'm a huge nerd. Like probably everyone else on this forum.


Since I'll have to DM I was thinking an alternate approach, as the title says, no multiclass (and no variant human), but everyone get a feat in the first level. And this feat does not count in the general rule you cannot take the same feat twice. A feat is powerful, but not as general multiclass. For example: Magic Initiate Warlock can give anyone a reliable ranged attack (useful to Paladins for example); Weapon Master can give the missing weapon for a class (e.g., the whip and/or the Heavy Crossbow to rogues); Resilient is a simple way to have a better Saving Throw...

What do you think? You'd play with this rule?

As an opinion based question, there are no "wrong" answers. I am trying to surmise if such a modification would make the game more or less fun.[/QUOTE]

You are correct in that there is no such thing as right or wrong fun. It is for that reason that the only people who will be able to adequately answer the question for you are your players because they are the only ones affected by it. But since you asked my opinion anyway, I might still enjoy a game without it because I've made plenty of characters that weren't based on a multiclass (usually bards/clerics/wizards). The only thing I know I will never enjoy is playing a fighter without feats.

[NecessaryWeevil]

I generally have several concepts lined up and as soon as I have the prospect of playing in a new game I get excited because I can try one out.
So if you say "Welcome to my game but no multiclassing," I'm going to be a bit disappointed because many of the concepts include multiclassing.
But I'd suck it up because games are hard to come by and it's not THAT unreasonable.

[Mr Adventurer]

Yes, the whole reason my sorcerer multiclasses is so he can be proficient in all three mental saves. Under your system, he could just take Resilient twice.

I don't think you get saves from multiclass. Some high level class features do grant additional saves but you lose a lot of spellcasting.

[MagneticKitty]

I'd be ok with those rules. I'm more upset if I'm restricted on race. I understand no x race because unbalanced, but I refuse to play in a game where i must be x race to play or to be included.

No mc is mostly fine. Except ranger. It needs the mc into fighter, barb, cleric, druid, or rogue to function past level 8

[Petrocorus]

When i DM, i give everyone a bonus feat at level 1. Vuman are forbidden though.
I don't forbid multiclassing, but my player didn't use multiclassing a lot.


Yes, the whole reason my sorcerer multiclasses is so he can be proficient in all three mental saves. Under your system, he could just take Resilient twice.
How do you get proficiency in saves by multiclassing?


Except ranger. It needs the mc into fighter, barb, cleric, druid, or rogue to function past level 8
Don't you think the recent UA with class feature variants, if your DM allows it, helps with that?

Before this, i was advocating Scout 4 / Fighter 8 or 12 / Druid 8 or 4.

[jas61292]

I'd play, since it takes some pretty outlandish stuff for me to not want to play in a game, but I wouldn't necessarily like the idea of it. I'm sure the game could be plenty fun, but it is not a rule I would choose to use.

I'm one who actually thinks feats are too powerful for any 1st level character, and should represent far more training than such a character would have. My own group never uses variant human for this very reason (well, that, and the fact that getting a feat from a race when all other races don't is inherently unbalanced and bad design, imo).

[Pex]

I can't make you like multiclassing, but there's nothing wrong with wanting to enjoy the game mechanics part of the game. Enjoying it does not prevent enjoying and participating in other aspects of the game.

[Theodoxus]

I'd be happy to play in a game you outline.

I think if you get rid of vhuman, then I'd propose giving humans a free feat (probably random from a table of half feats) and Prodigy as well.

Before Covid wrecked a live game I was playing in, the DM didn't grant a feat at 1st level (outside of vhuman) but did give us all both a feat and an ASI at the appropriate levels.Mostly it was in lieu of giving out magic items (we were on the cusp of 5th level and hadn't found a single magic item outside of a few consumables - had I known, I would have played a Forge cleric instead of Life... oh well).

But it was an interesting option that I might consider adopting for a "standard" 5E game.

My own homebrew, I grant feats every odd level, and multiclassing is done via feats. But I also massively increased the number of feats available (to approximate 3.5 Core levels).

[bid]

My sorcerer multiclasses by taking his fiirst level in druid. With Resilient, he is then proficient in all three mental saves.
Druid gets you Int/Wis save, you add resilient(Cha). That works if you don't use concentration.

[SpawnOfMorbo]

Multiclass is an optional rule and arguably many combinations allow to make characters that fills a concept more that the standard classes. Still, even more often multiclass is just used for power playing purposes. Since I'll have to DM I was thinking an alternate approach, as the title says, no multiclass (and no variant human), but everyone get a feat in the first level. And this feat does not count in the general rule you cannot take the same feat twice.


A feat is powerful, but not as general multiclass. For example: Magic Initiate Warlock can give anyone a reliable ranged attack (useful to Paladins for example); Weapon Master can give the missing weapon for a class (e.g., the whip and/or the Heavy Crossbow to rogues); Resilient is a simple way to have a better Saving Throw...

What do you think? You'd play with this rule?


As an opinion based question, there are no "wrong" answers. I am trying to surmise if such a modification would make the game more or less fun.

I've been using the character progression rules (ASI, Feat, Multiclassing) in my signature for a few one shots and so far nothing bad has happened

[Ogre Mage]

I would play with this rule. It does make humans a weak choice, but that does not bother me.

[Azuresun]

You want to limit powergaming by disallowing multiclassing, but you're giving them a free feat. Not sure that discourages powergaming.

Can you talk with your players, and get them to choose a second class only with RP reasons? That might help a little.

In my own game, I said that multiclassing required my approval, but if it wasn't something obviously designed around rules exploits (ie, "all the CHA classes") and it can be justified for the character, I'd almost always say yes.