Can't wait till Wednesday (I get paid).

I've been clamoring for a product like this since 3.5 debuted.

Glad we could finally make this happen for you! :)

Personally, I despise Feat Chains, for anything other then Improved or Greater versions of a feat, as they should be listed directly after the feat they improve alphabetically anyway (i.e feat, improved). One of the problems I see in doing Feat Chains is that potential for multiple feats requiring overlapping prerequisites, but having nothing to do with each other by the end of the chain, and ending up reading as a confusing interlocking mess, when a straight alphabetical listing leaves one to look for themselves, at which point if someone doesn't understand, that is on them, not you.

Thanks for the data-point!

I love it! I'm thinking about making some more for bombs, lay on hands, and maybe an idol on eidolon feat that doesn't require a familiar. But that could be tough to balance.

I struggled with both bombs and lay on hands, because they really are iconic powers of alchemists and paladins respectively. The problem I ran into was how to balance those d6-based abilities in a way that wasn't overpowered for a feat, but was still relevant after about 6th level. Sneak attack wasn't as much of a problem, because it stacks onto normal attacks, so even 1d6 of sneak attack remains useful at higher levels, since you're adding it to whatever higher-level attack you've got. But bombs and lay on hands stand alone, and as a 15th level character I don't really care about a 1d6 bomb-throwing ability.

I may yet find the right balance, but for the first Feats of Multiclassing product once I hit 10,000 words, I decided I was going to have more material than I wanted to stuff into a single volume anyway.

This comment is very interesting to me, and I want to take a moment to see if there's a strong sense of agreement with it. We originally went with the pure-alphabetical listing based on feedback way back when we announced Feats of Battle, and a lot of folks who were unhappy with Paizo's feat-chain format asked if we could make the table pure-alphabetical instead. That's been our format for two years now, and no one has commented on it (that I recall) until now.

Now, things change, audiences expand, and standards shift. If there's a strong call to change to the feat-chain format, we can do that.

Thoughts?

As I'm cursed with ambiguity, I can see both sides of this particular issue.

If you're looking for a specific feat, then your natural inclination when looking at those tables is to look for it alphabetically. Hence, it can be frustrating to find it indented beneath another feat that takes it out of alphabetical order.

On the other hand, if you want to have an at-a-glance reference for how a feat chain progresses, there's virtually no resource for that save for using the indented arrangement on the feat table. This can be helpful if you want to look at a feat chain overall and determine how much investment you want to make in it ahead of time.

I personally prefer the latter format (indenting feats so as to make the feat chain in the table), simply because there's no other easy resource for charting a feat chain. Given that the feats themselves are in alphabetical order anyway, having the chain listed in the table seems like a nice counter-point.

Ah, I thought this was common knowledge? Those were part of my contribution to Ultimate Magic.

Owen, can you talk a little about the balance of those feats? I don't think there's a problem, but a friend of mine says that if you take the entire feat chain to gain the aberrant bloodline's powers - particularly unusual anatomy and alien resistance - then it's overpowered, as you can make any character have a 50% chance to ignore criticals and sneak attacks as well as SR equal to your class level +10. What do you think?

Great file. I have only found one glaring error though. The Eldritch heritage feats in the file credit the original text as from the Advanced players guide. These feats were introduced in the Ultimate magic book. Otherwise this gives me and my group more options for character flavor.

Thanks Owen for you and the rest of SGG for all your hard work.

I would rather have the feats listed as chains. The reason is simple: I want to see quickly how one feat leads into another. If I need to find a specific feat, I can just ctrl-f and type it in.

Great file. I have only found one glaring error though. The Eldritch heritage feats in the file credit the original text as from the Advanced players guide. These feats were introduced in the Ultimate magic book.

D'oh! That's what I get for thinking I knew everything I needed to know about those feats because I had written them. I went off memory, and memory was sadly mistaken.

Otherwise this gives me and my group more options for character flavor.

Thanks Owen for you and the rest of SGG for all your hard work.

You're welcome!

Hey look, it's live!

:)

Cool

Owen K. C. Stephens wrote:

This comment is very interesting to me, and I want to take a moment to see if there's a strong sense of agreement with it. We originally went with the pure-alphabetical listing based on feedback way back when we announced Feats of Battle, and a lot of folks who were unhappy with Paizo's feat-chain format asked if we could make the table pure-alphabetical instead. That's been our format for two years now, and no one has commented on it (that I recall) until now.

Now, things change, audiences expand, and standards shift. If there's a strong call to change to the feat-chain format, we can do that.

Thoughts?

As I'm cursed with ambiguity, I can see both sides of this particular issue.

If you're looking for a specific feat, then your natural inclination when looking at those tables is to look for it alphabetically. Hence, it can be frustrating to find it indented beneath another feat that takes it out of alphabetical order.

On the other hand, if you want to have an at-a-glance reference for how a feat chain progresses, there's virtually no resource for that save for using the indented arrangement on the feat table. This can be helpful if you want to look at a feat chain overall and determine how much investment you want to make in it ahead of time.

I personally prefer the latter format (indenting feats so as to make the feat chain in the table), simply because there's no other easy resource for charting a feat chain. Given that the feats themselves are in alphabetical order anyway, having the chain listed in the table seems like a nice counter-point.

Owen K. C. Stephens wrote:

Ah, I thought this was common knowledge? Those were part of my contribution to Ultimate Magic.

Owen, can you talk a little about the balance of those feats? I don't think there's a problem, but a friend of mine says that if you take the entire feat chain to gain the aberrant bloodline's powers -...

Enlightening

Xandar Draxil wrote:

Great file. I have only found one glaring error though. The Eldritch heritage feats in the file credit the original text as from the Advanced players guide. These feats were introduced in the Ultimate magic book.

D'oh! That's what I get for thinking I knew everything I needed to know about those feats because I had written them. I went off memory, and memory was sadly mistaken.

Xandar Draxil wrote:

Otherwise this gives me and my group more options for character flavor.

Thanks Owen for you and the rest of SGG for all your hard work.

You're welcome!

Truth

Frerezar wrote:

Now I am curious, does being a synthetist/wizard allow you to take the Ajuoga feat?

Picky RAW I'd say you can take the feat... but it does you no good. You give up your familiar with the Ajuoga feat, and (officially) give up your eidolon ability with synthesist in favor of Fused Eidolon, which is a different ability. So while you qualify for the feat, you have no eidolon to gain the listed abilities the feat describes.

That's pretty hair-splitty, and that's what happens when archetypes mix with multiclass feats. In the end, if a GM is okay with a multiclass witch/wizard/synthesist, go ahead and allow it to work with fused eidolon. But look out for wonky character builds that use synthesist to weird results.

If a player built a multiclass synthesist summoner/witch/Ajuoga character called The Cairnwood Demon, and has a character history where his patron allowed him to call upon the spirit of a supernatural being to wreck havoc on the patron's enemies, AND the character looks reasonable, I'd probably allow it. If it looked like a cheap power-grab to get free physical stat boosts for a a character, I'd probably fall back on my read of RAW.

A little confusing

Reviewed here, on DTRPG and sent to GMS magazine. Cheers!

Reviewed here, on DTRPG and sent to GMS magazine. Cheers!

Many thanks!

Thanks to all our reviewers for the outpouring of positive reviews this one has received so far.

You're welcome! Now to the other recently released files...

Owen K. C. Stephens wrote:

Frerezar wrote:

Now I am curious, does being a synthetist/wizard allow you to take the Ajuoga feat?

Picky RAW I'd say you can take the feat... but it does you no good.

A little confusing

Feel free to fall back on "No, being a synthetist/wizard does not allow you to take the Ajuoga feat" :D

You're welcome! Now to the other recently released files...

I look forward to those, too!

How about feats to allow people to make extracts? What would be required since there are no 0 level extracts? Having metamorph?

How about feats to allow people to make extracts? What would be required since there are no 0 level extracts? Having metamorph?

Interesting question. I suspect that'd actually take its own line of multiclass feats.

I see the merits in alphabetizing the feats table as well as listing chains. I like both methods for convenience. That said, I would ask: will this product will ever see print? If not, I don't think it would be detrimental to simply add a new table with feat chains to the PDF alongside the alphabetized one, as it adds no cost to printing (though I suppose there might be some data limit on uploads I'm not aware of).

I also wanted to make a comment about the product without actually reviewing it. Because I have such mixed feelings, I don't feel that I could write it properly. I really, really like a lot of what is in this product, but at the same time I feel like the amount of dedication required to attain some of these feats is disproportional to the benefit to be gained, especially in the case of the Nagual feat. Not only do the prereqs outweigh the benefits of that feat, but it also makes it so that casters with the feat have a more powerful version (using caster level -2, minimum of 13, or 1/2 BAB, minimum of 7 for a martial character). That's a pretty big disparity given what a martial character will already be sacrificing to meet the prereqs (Wis 17, 15 ranks in Knowledge [nature], and 3 other feats). A fighter might be able to spare the feats.

I understand the fear of giving iconic class abilities as feats, but I think that notion kind of goes hand-in-hand with what this product is supposed to accomplish, or at least what I would expect of it.

I understand the fear of giving iconic class abilities as feats, but I think that notion kind of goes hand-in-hand with what this product is supposed to accomplish, or at least what I would expect of it.

Since I was using the Eldritch heritage line of feats as one of my basis, I felt the need to follow it in prerequisite style. That, combine with some amazing power-game moves done in playtesting when feats were easier to obtain, led the the higher prerequisites for most things.

I wasn't entirely satisfied with that, for exactly the reasons you mention.

That imbalance is one of the big reasons I included the Favored Multiclass
(Optional Rule) section. Yes, it requires a GM to decide to make gaining multiclass feats easier. But if players and GM do agree, it can allow for a lot of fun. If they don't, it's best to include the more conservative rules as the "standard."

I have never heard of a player getting annoyed a GM made something easier for him to gain. I have often heard of bad blood developing when a GM choose a more restrictive alternate or house rule. I'm happy to :Err on the Side of Awesome," but unwilling to :Err on the side of horrifically overpowered."

(Except of course for The Genius Guide to Horrifically Overpowered Feats, coming soon, where I figure I've given enough warning in the title.)

I'm not sure whether I hope that's a real product or not. April Fool's joke maybe?

I love this guide! It'll definetly make my winter witch icier.

On the table issue, I'd prefer that the feats where in feat chains, as we already have them alphabetically in the descriptions and in feat chains we can easily see how many feats there are in a chain and it's prerequisites.

I'm not sure whether I hope that's a real product or not. April Fool's joke maybe?

Manuscript is nearly done. I hope to have it out by Sunday. I'm putting as much time and care into this as I do all our products. :)

On the table issue, I'd prefer that the feats where in feat chains, as we already have them alphabetically in the descriptions and in feat chains we can easily see how many feats there are in a chain and it's prerequisites.

Your feedback is appreciated! I think I may try that with our next feat-heavy product (which I guess is going to be The Genius Guide to Horrifically Overpowered Feats) and see if anyone complains.

My main concern was that since a sorcerer gains his familiar through a bloodline, and Eldritch Heritage lets anyone gain that bloodline, expanding Ajuoga to anyone with a familiar meant anyone could get an eidolon with a single level of summoner, and I wasn't sure I could balance ever possible combination.

It's possible I was over-cautious in this case. Certainly I'd allow the feat to an actual sorcerer with the arcane bloodline.

Given this, would it prehaps be wise to read it as something like, 'Any Class that gains a Familiar as a Class Ability; if a Familiar is gained via a Feats it does not qualify' or something similar? That way it would be opened up to Arcane Bloodline Sorcerers or your own Magus/Magister if they chose the Arcane Bloodline. At the same time it would stop other classes from abusing Eldritch Heritage to get it and the Eidolon.

Given this, would it prehaps be wise to read it as something like, 'Any Class that gains a Familiar as a Class Ability; if a Familiar is gained via a Feats it does not qualify' or something similar? That way it would be opened up to Arcane Bloodline Sorcerers or your own Magus/Magister if they chose the Arcane Bloodline. At the same time it would stop other classes from abusing Eldritch Heritage to get it and the Eidolon.

I'm fine with people reading it that way, but I'd have to do a lot more playtesting before I'd be comfortable with it. I don't know that a magister should get it for example.

I was showing this to a friend and we noticed that the Mage-at-Arms feat requires you to have a Multiclass Magus feat. The only one I can find is Mage-at-Arms. I've read it over a few times and I'm sure I must have missed something. How do you qualify for this feat?

Magus spellcaster training.

I knew I had missed something. Thanks. I think I should take the next week or so and see if I can get these into Hero Lab.

I have a question about the wild shape tree of feats. They have woodwose as a prerequisite, which gives wild empathy. This would be a wasted feat for rangers as they already have wild empathy. Is it a deliberate piece of design to make rangers take the same number of feats? Or is it reasonable to take wild empathy as a substitute for woodwose?

Or is it reasonable to take wild empathy as a substitute for woodwose?

Yes, I think that's reasonable.

Was checking out Touch of Fate feat last night for my new character and I have a question: The prerequisites say that you need 'Skill Focus with the class skill of the mystery selected for this feat (see below)'. It gives Intimidate for the Battle mystery as an example.

The problem: each mystery gives at least three skills at first level. Which one do I choose for the Skill Focus feat?