hamstard4ever
2007-12-04, 09:41 PM
The system of proficiency feats for weapons and armor don't really cut it for me. Martial Weapon Proficiency is a joke, and Exotic Weapon Proficiency isn't much better in most cases. Same thing with shield/armor proficiencies, except arguably worse since most classes that lack armor proficiency lose their class features when wearing heavier types of armor.
So, rather than trying to figure out a way to make all these into more viable feat options, I figured: what about replacing them with a skill instead? The idea is you'd have a catch-all Arms Proficiency skill which would work similar to Speak Language.
Buying 1 full rank in Arms Proficiency gives you proficiency with 1 martial weapon of your choice, with shields or with light armor; upgrades light armor proficiency to medium armor proficiency or medium to heavy; or upgrades shield proficiency to include tower shields
Anyone with at least 1 point of Arms Proficiency is proficient with all simple weapons
Arms proficiency is a class skill for all full BAB classes, cross-class for everyone else (adjust to taste)
You do not gain any weapon or armor proficiencies from multiclassing, but at first level you still gain all the guaranteed proficiencies of your starting class without having to spend skill points.
Prestige class prerequisites of "Proficiency with all martial weapons" are amended to "Proficiency with at least 5 martial weapons"
The main thing I haven't figured out is how to handle exotic weapons. In the interests of keeping things simple I would prefer to stick to a flat cost of 1 skill point for everything, but no one would ever spend a skill point on proficiency with a martial weapon if there exists an exotic weapon that's strictly superior. My thought here is currently leaning towards simply throwing out most of the "just like a martial weapon but 1 die size higher" type exotic weapons and putting the rest of them on parity with martial weapons (a few like spiked chain would probably need some additional tweaking).
So... comments? I know it's technically a power boost for classes like, say, wizards. But at low levels they're limited enough that I'm not going to begrudge them easy access to martial weapons, and at high levels... well, honestly, when there's a 17th level wizard teleporting all over the place demolishing reality left and right, does anybody actually care if he has a sword?
So, rather than trying to figure out a way to make all these into more viable feat options, I figured: what about replacing them with a skill instead? The idea is you'd have a catch-all Arms Proficiency skill which would work similar to Speak Language.
Buying 1 full rank in Arms Proficiency gives you proficiency with 1 martial weapon of your choice, with shields or with light armor; upgrades light armor proficiency to medium armor proficiency or medium to heavy; or upgrades shield proficiency to include tower shields
Anyone with at least 1 point of Arms Proficiency is proficient with all simple weapons
Arms proficiency is a class skill for all full BAB classes, cross-class for everyone else (adjust to taste)
You do not gain any weapon or armor proficiencies from multiclassing, but at first level you still gain all the guaranteed proficiencies of your starting class without having to spend skill points.
Prestige class prerequisites of "Proficiency with all martial weapons" are amended to "Proficiency with at least 5 martial weapons"
The main thing I haven't figured out is how to handle exotic weapons. In the interests of keeping things simple I would prefer to stick to a flat cost of 1 skill point for everything, but no one would ever spend a skill point on proficiency with a martial weapon if there exists an exotic weapon that's strictly superior. My thought here is currently leaning towards simply throwing out most of the "just like a martial weapon but 1 die size higher" type exotic weapons and putting the rest of them on parity with martial weapons (a few like spiked chain would probably need some additional tweaking).
So... comments? I know it's technically a power boost for classes like, say, wizards. But at low levels they're limited enough that I'm not going to begrudge them easy access to martial weapons, and at high levels... well, honestly, when there's a 17th level wizard teleporting all over the place demolishing reality left and right, does anybody actually care if he has a sword?