Investing a Stat Point in Maxed Stat

[Starchild7309]

I have just gained 12th level and I was interested in getting the Telekinetic feat. The problem is my CHA is 20 already. I have the option of bumping INT or WIS, but both of those scores are low. The feat allows for you to push or pull a creature 5ft with a STR saving throw of DC 8 + your proficiency bonus + the ability modifier of the score increased by this feat.

If I increase INT or WIS, this saving throw will be 12, easily passable. Can you put a point into a stat at 20 and it just doesn't go higher or cannot you just put it there at all? I am sure this s more of a DM question, but would like to hear opinions.

[animorte]

As a DM I would simply allow you to place the stat wherever you need and just use your primary stat, if you’re willing to invest in the feat.

However, had you planned ahead of time and allocated your stats differently (essentially holding off maxing out you primary stat in Cha), then you wouldn’t have this problem. :smalltongue:

In the end, it would ultimately look exactly the same as if you had planned it out accordingly anyway.

[Psyren]

I have just gained 12th level and I was interested in getting the Telekinetic feat. The problem is my CHA is 20 already. I have the option of bumping INT or WIS, but both of those scores are low. The feat allows for you to push or pull a creature 5ft with a STR saving throw of DC 8 + your proficiency bonus + the ability modifier of the score increased by this feat.

If I increase INT or WIS, this saving throw will be 12, easily passable. Can you put a point into a stat at 20 and it just doesn't go higher or cannot you just put it there at all? I am sure this s more of a DM question, but would like to hear opinions.

If I were your DM, I would simply allow you to retcon one of your previous +2 ASIs into another half-feat. For example, instead of 18 Cha->20 Cha at 8th level (I assume?), I would let you change that previous one to be 18 Cha->19 Cha (Skill Expert or Resilient or something), then grab Telekinetic now.

Essentially, I wouldn't be penalizing you for not planning out your whole build at level 1.

[Chronos]

If I were your DM, I would simply allow you to retcon one of your previous +2 ASIs into another half-feat. For example, instead of 18 Cha->20 Cha at 8th level (I assume?), I would let you change that previous one to be 18 Cha->19 Cha (Skill Expert or Resilient or something), then grab Telekinetic now.
Or alternately, to a +1 Cha/+1 something else. Ability score improvements have the option of splitting them across two scores built in.

[Lvl 2 Expert]

Or alternately, to a +1 Cha/+1 something else. Ability score improvements have the option of splitting them across two scores built in.

A true optimizer might consider this cheating because "you got the good stat for longer and you got the feat!" I am not a true optimizer. I wholeheartedly support just placing the point in another stat.

(With maybe the potential asterisk that I'd have you think twice about it maybe if you already had by far the strongest character in the party and you had trouble finding ways to share the spotlight. But that's an edge case scenario.)

[Greywander]

In the end, it would ultimately look exactly the same as if you had planned it out accordingly anyway.
This is one of my house rules: you can rebuild your character at any time, so long as you end up with the same stuff. It helps with analysis paralysis, allowing you to focus more on actually playing the game and less on meticulously planning your build out to level 20 when you're starting at level 1.

For example, say you start as a fighter and take the Defense fighting style. Then you multiclass into paladin, and you want to take the Archery style. But Archery isn't available to paladins. You can rebuild your character taking Defense as your paladin style, allowing you to take Archery as your fighter style.

In a similar vein, another of my house rules is that you can spend epic boons to get more class levels, while your character level stays locked at 20. The extra class levels are treated like those of a gestalt character. This allows you to not worry too much about your class level distribution and what you might be giving up by multiclassing. Most campaigns won't make it to 20 anyway, so most of the time this house rule is merely hypothetical. If you do get to 20, the competition with epic boons is pretty stiff.

[ImproperJustice]

As with most things of this nature in 5e:

Ask your GM :)

I don’t expect my players to plan out their characters and prefer a light and fun player centered game most of the time, so I would probably let that excess stat point go into another mental stat like Wis or Cha.