Ways to get an additional [General] feat at 1st level?

[redking]

Certain feats are only allowed to be taken at 1st level. How can one go about getting 2 1st level only feats?

[thorr-kan]

Human
Strongheart halfling
Are you FLAWED citizen?
Pledge to an Elder Evil

I'm sure there are others.

Some "1st-level only" feats have the "only one feat of this type" disclaimer.

[Kalkra]

If you're playing with retraining rules from PHBII and you have a racial bonus feat, I think you could retrain it when you take your first level. Not sure that works, but I think it should.

[Telonius]

If you're playing with retraining rules from PHBII and you have a racial bonus feat, I think you could retrain it when you take your first level. Not sure that works, but I think it should.

Adding to this one, there's the possibility of using the "Dark Chaos Shuffle." This is considered horrible cheese and theoretical optimization at most tables, but listing it for completeness. The idea is that you get somebody to cast an 8th-level spell called "Embrace the Dark Chaos" (from Fiendish Codex I) on you. It turns any feat you have into an Abyssal Heritor feat. Then, have them cast "Shun the Dark Chaos" (same spell level and book) on you. That turns the Abyssal Heritor feat back into a regular feat of your choice.

This isn't exactly getting an "extra" feat (as in, more feats than you started out with). It's turning a feat from something you don't care about into something you do.

Major problems: finding a spellcaster who's willing to cast both of them on you, affording the spellcasting fee at level 1, dodging the flying rulebooks hurled at you by the DM.

[redking]

Human
Strongheart halfling
Are you FLAWED citizen?
Pledge to an Elder Evil

I'm sure there are others.

The Elder Evil obeisance should garner vile feats only. Thanks for the other suggestions.


Some "1st-level only" feats have the "only one feat of this type" disclaimer.

Oh. This throws a spanner in the works. How prevalent is this?

[MaxiDuRaritry]

You could always get a number of extra feats (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?400840-List-of-Feat-Granting-Items-Locations-Grafts&p=18879298&viewfull=1#post18879298), acquire negative levels or level penalties (via a fistful of [un]holy arrows, as an example), do the Dark Chaos Feat Shuffle as mentioned above (possibly via Craft Contingent Spell or psionic contingency), and then use a friend, purchased casting, contingent effect, scroll, or potion to remove the negative levels.

Alternatively, if you can keep the negative levels or level penalties up for long enough, do some retraining, as mentioned in the PHBII.

Enjoy your new 1st level feats.

[redking]

You could always get a number of extra feats (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?400840-List-of-Feat-Granting-Items-Locations-Grafts&p=18879298&viewfull=1#post18879298), acquire negative levels or level penalties (via a fistful of [un]holy arrows, as an example), do the Dark Chaos Feat Shuffle as mentioned above (possibly via Craft Contingent Spell or psionic contingency), and then use a friend, purchased casting, contingent effect, scroll, or potion to remove the negative levels.

Alternatively, if you can keep the negative levels or level penalties up for long enough, do some retraining, as mentioned in the PHBII.

Enjoy your new 1st level feats.

I doubt either of those work. The first will be shot down by most DMs. As for retraining, I don't think it works like that. You have to rebuild your character, starting at level one, and thus could not take a feat you don't qualify for at level one. Thus, even if you had 20 feats because you are level whatever, at level one when you are retraining/rebuilding your character, you only have what is appropriate to that level.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

I doubt either of those work. The first will be shot down by most DMs. As for retraining, I don't think it works like that. You have to rebuild your character, starting at level one, and thus could not take a feat you don't qualify for at level one. Thus, even if you had 20 feats because you are level whatever, at level one when you are retraining/rebuilding your character, you only have what is appropriate to that level.Yes, and you're level 1 because of the negative levels or level penalties, so you would retrain as appropriate for a level 1 character.

And the DCFS would definitely work.


If the subject possesses any Abyssal Heritor feats, one of them is immediately removed and replaced by any other feat for which the subject qualifies (except an Abyssal Heritor feat).And since you'd be level 1, you'd qualify for 1st level only feats.

If a DM doesn't like it, he can Rule Zero it, but it's still a houserule.

[Biggus]

Oh. This throws a spanner in the works. How prevalent is this?

You can explicitly only have one [regional] feat. The language is less clear with [ancestor] feats, I think you're only intended to be able to have one but it doesn't actually ban humans from having two in so many words. [racial] feats don't have a limit, and neither do any [general] feats I'm aware of (very few 1st-level-only feats are [general] though).

[daremetoidareyo]

Dragonborn yoself at second level?

[Particle_Man]

There might be some things that say "You get feat X; if you already have feat X, pick a general feat". Then you just need a way to get feat X first (and this frees things up depending on what X is, as maybe a cleric domain gets you X).

Also, at least one feat is "must take at 1st level, unless you are a kobold and take this other feat at first level - then you can take it at 3rd level instead" (Dragonwrought Kobold and Dragon Wings, I belive are the two feats in question).

[Saintheart]

There might be some things that say "You get feat X; if you already have feat X, pick a general feat". Then you just need a way to get feat X first (and this frees things up depending on what X is, as maybe a cleric domain gets you X."

Frostblood Orc and Frostblood Half-Orc sort-of do this, albeit in reverse. You get Endurance for free at first level, but if you later get it again for free elsewhere, pick "any other feat for which you qualify". Rangers get free Endurance.

Dark Chaos Shuffle is particularly useful when playing elves, since their weapon proficiencies with longsword, longbow, etc are expressed explicitly as feats - not part of a standard suite of proficiencies their type automatically gets.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

Frostblood Orc and Frostblood Half-Orc sort-of do this, albeit in reverse. You get Endurance for free at first level, but if you later get it again for free elsewhere, pick "any other feat for which you qualify". Rangers get free Endurance.

Dark Chaos Shuffle is particularly useful when playing elves, since their weapon proficiencies with longsword, longbow, etc are expressed explicitly as feats - not part of a standard suite of proficiencies their type automatically gets.RotD web kobolds (http://rpg.nobl.ca/archive.php?x=dnd/we/20060420a) gain two bonus feats (Weapon Proficiency for both Heavy Pick and Light Pick, which nobody would ever miss, so they're basically just free DCFS fodder).

[St Fan]

As mentioned, Flaws are probably the simplest way to gain feats; the rules allow up to two at first level.

You can find a greater selection of Flaws in Dragon Magazine (compiled on a PDF titled Complete Dragon Magazine 3.5 Feats, Flaws & Styles), as well as the D&D Wiki (https://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/3.5e_Flaws) for homebrew.

Also, the Half-Elf Racial Paragon is one class giving a bonus feat right away at level one.

Of note, among the aforementioned Dragon Magazine flaws is "Quarter Elf", a flaw for half-elves that remove Elven Blood and elven immunities in exchange for a feat. I interpret that as giving the Human subtype, but still otherwise counting as a half-elf (for longevity, prerequisites, etc.). It would be very easy to consider this as a racial option rather than a flaw (the bonus feat thus treated the same as a human's), which sole change is to still allow two other flaws at level 1. And you can still take a level in Half-Elf Racial Paragon on top.

[FauxKnee]

A Faustian Pact Insidious (Fiendish Codex II, pages 23-25) can get you two additional feats in exchange for acting lawful evil and/or your immortal soul. (The Pact Certain only gets you one feat--see text.)

[redking]

Some good ideas. So we've got quarter elf paragons (1 character level feat, 1 quarter elf flaw feat, 1 half elf paragon), that is negotiating with harvester devils (2 feats garnering 8 damnation points, just 1 short of consignment to the Nine Hells - and also have to do somehow avoid gaining levels), that bows down to Elder Evils (first vile feat for that will come at level 5 IIRC, so not exactly applicable in this scenario). That is 5 feats at level one. Correct me if I am wrong.

Why is it that you only get free feats for doing evil stuff? How come Pelor doesn't say "good boy, here's a bonus feat"?

[Saintheart]

Some good ideas. So we've got quarter elf paragons (1 character level feat, 1 quarter elf flaw feat, 1 half elf paragon), that is negotiating with harvester devils (2 feats garnering 8 damnation points, just 1 short of consignment to the Nine Hells - and also have to do somehow avoid gaining levels), that bows down to Elder Evils (first vile feat for that will come at level 5 IIRC, so not exactly applicable in this scenario). That is 5 feats at level one. Correct me if I am wrong.

Why is it that you only get free feats for doing evil stuff? How come Pelor doesn't say "good boy, here's a bonus feat"?

Mechanical reflection of the idea that evil will throw lots of cookies at you so long as you hand over your soul. Good requires that you demonstrate commitment and sacrifice something for freebies (see: Vow of Poverty and Exalted feats.)

[Inevitability]

Technically, if you have Skill Focus (Diplomacy) already, the Marshall's first-level feature can give you any single feat for free. There's no convenient way to obtain Skill Focus without spending a feat on it, though, which defeats the purpose.

Also, depending on what 'character level 1' is taken to mean, you might be able to play a high-int race with high RHD, use that to qualify for Loremaster or Court Herald, and get a bonus free feat at what's technically your first character level. If it's something like lycanthropy you could even get it cured afterwards (once you qualify for the PrC without the RHD), lose the RHD, and keep the feat.

[Malphegor]

There’s also the generic classes in UA which pretty universally give you a bonus feat of your choice at the level you take them (or you can take their ‘class features as a feat’ feats) https://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/genericClasses.htm