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If people could take levels in wizard, then yes. Librarians would be commoners though, a really good one might be an expert.So, a level 1 character is supposed to be realistic. That's why a first level librarian should be able to blind, stun and knock people out with pretty colors, right?TWF is actually hard and should require a feat.
I think level 1 mundanes should be realistic.
Level 2 is the most advance special forces
Level 3 would be the greatest heroes who ever lived
Level 4 is beyond the scope of reality.So no TWF deserves to be a feat.
Lots of the wizards I have seen in-game were librarians when they weren't adventuring. Also I've seen quite a lot of NPC wizards who were Librarians part-time or full-time. Its a viable career for those who like reading.
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Lots of the wizards I have seen in-game were librarians when they weren't adventuring. Also I've seen quite a lot of NPC wizards who were Librarians part-time or full-time. Its a viable career for those who like reading.If people could take levels in wizard, then yes. Librarians would be commoners though, a really good one might be an expert.So, a level 1 character is supposed to be realistic. That's why a first level librarian should be able to blind, stun and knock people out with pretty colors, right?TWF is actually hard and should require a feat.
I think level 1 mundanes should be realistic.
Level 2 is the most advance special forces
Level 3 would be the greatest heroes who ever lived
Level 4 is beyond the scope of reality.So no TWF deserves to be a feat.
non-sequitur
Actual librarians aren't wizards. Wizards being able to be librarians doesn't make all librarians wizards.
What I want to see is more feats like lungeExcept with actual real reach that lasts until you turn it off.
Disagree.
It's not reach. It's a lunge. Which is strong enough.
It's a +2 to hit you don't need and a -2 to AC that you are going to feel when you eat a full attack.
Because it lets me hit an enemy first.
I don't like to charge when less than 20 or 30 feet away, but other than that, I'd rather be the first person to get a hit on the target, or at the bare minimum force yourself in melee before they have the option to reposition. My point isn't so much that Vital Strike wouldn't be better than a Charge (it is), it's that it comes up as a possibility in place of a charge very rarely.
If a character has a 30 ft. base speed, they must be between 10 and 30 feet away from an enemy, or 15 to 35 ft. away with a reach weapon. Otherwise, they simply can't move and attack in the same round without a charge, or are in a situation where they can use a full attack after a 5 ft. step. 20 ft. is a small window. A character with a 20 ft. base speed has a 10 ft. window.
I'm less bemoaning that Vital Strike isn't as good as a charge, again, it's better, but that the inability to apply it to a charge or spring attack makes it much more situational, and thus less useful as a feat overall. You would also lose any bonuses to attacks on a charge (from wielding a lance, Martial Adept maneuver bonuses, etc.). The lance bonus probably being most significant.
Cause commoners with TWF for free would be stupid?
Why?
Taking a -2/-2 AT BEST for a Commoner is still going to make them look like the inept non-combatant they are.
But it also allows a Commoner to use a fairly iconic Commoner weapon (the quarterstaff) to its proper effectiveness (for a Commoner).
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If we're talking about whether or not condensing feat chains is too powerful, I think a lot of it depends on which ones and how far we're condensing them.
Let's start with TWF. The most obvious condensement is that at BAB +6 and +11 you automatically get Improved and Greater TWF respectively. But where does Double Slice fit in? What about Two-Weapon Rend? Two-Weapon Defense? I could see TWF automatically giving you Double Slice and maybe even Two-Weapon Defense, but Two-Weapon Rend just feels like it ought to be an additional feat. Later books added several other feats that require both TWF and other feats not in the tree, like Break Guard (TWF and Imp. Disarm), Bashing Finish (TWF and Shield Master) and Two-Weapon Feint (TWF and... ugh... Combat Expertise).
And speaking of CE, I think most folks here agree that it ought to be axed completely, and you can just take Improved [Combat Maneuver]. Is there one feat per maneuver? Do you have to take multiple feats if you want a choice of maneuvers? If Improved Trip now grants the effect of Greater Trip at BAB +6, does it also grant Drag Down, Felling Escape, and Felling Smash? Does Butterfly's Sting still need a prereq, and if so, what? What about Gang Up and Team Up? Are all of these suddenly their own unconnected feat trees? What about Ki Throw?
Then there's Point-Blank Shot. I'm seeing 5 feats that use it and it alone as a prereq (Far Shot, Precise Shot, Rapid Shot, Focused Shot, and Charging Hurler). Which one of those do you get at BAB +6? All of them?
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I think just condensing all of the Improved and Greater feats would be fine. Two-Weapon Rend is definitely it's own ability and can be left separate as something you take if you want to be really good at TWF or leave alone if you'd rather be just okay at TWF and be good at something else.
If we're talking about whether or not condensing feat chains is too powerful, I think a lot of it depends on which ones and how far we're condensing them.
Let's start with TWF. The most obvious condensement is that at BAB +6 and +11 you automatically get Improved and Greater TWF respectively. But where does Double Slice fit in? What about Two-Weapon Rend? Two-Weapon Defense? I could see TWF automatically giving you Double Slice and maybe even Two-Weapon Defense, but Two-Weapon Rend just feels like it ought to be an additional feat. Later books added several other feats that require both TWF and other feats not in the tree, like Break Guard (TWF and Imp. Disarm), Bashing Finish (TWF and Shield Master) and Two-Weapon Feint (TWF and... ugh... Combat Expertise).
And speaking of CE, I think most folks here agree that it ought to be axed completely, and you can just take Improved [Combat Maneuver]. Is there one feat per maneuver? Do you have to take multiple feats if you want a choice of maneuvers? If Improved Trip now grants the effect of Greater Trip at BAB +6, does it also grant Drag Down, Felling Escape, and Felling Smash? Does Butterfly's Sting still need a prereq, and if so, what? What about Gang Up and Team Up? Are all of these suddenly their own unconnected feat trees? What about Ki Throw?
Then there's Point-Blank Shot. I'm seeing 5 feats that use it and it alone as a prereq (Far Shot, Precise Shot, Rapid Shot, Focused Shot, and Charging Hurler). Which one of those do you get at BAB +6? All of them?
The big thing would be to condense down the "Greater-Improved" feats into singular feats. Feats like Two-Weapon Rend would still exist, you just use BAB as a pre-req
Cause commoners with TWF for free would be stupid?Why?
Taking a -2/-2 AT BEST for a Commoner is still going to make them look like the inept non-combatant they are.
But it also allows a Commoner to use a fairly iconic Commoner weapon (the quarterstaff) to its proper effectiveness (for a Commoner).
They could still do that with a feat. Which they have two of.
Is the dex requirement on TWF dumb? Maybe.
Random Joe though is not a bo staff master.
They could still do that with a feat. Which they have two of.
A Commoner is not going to have TWFing as a Feat, even if he somehow meets the stat prereqs.
And whether they COULD or not isn't the issue, you said it would be stupid if they DID.
Random Joe though is not a bo staff master.
Having a total attack bonus of -1/-1 (most likely) does not make you a bo staff master.
It might make you Star Wars Kid at best.
Not sure I am seeing the argument about no TWF feat. It certainly seems something like have to be trained in order to adquire.
They could still do that with a feat. Which they have two of.A Commoner is not going to have TWFing as a Feat, even if he somehow meets the stat prereqs.
And whether they COULD or not isn't the issue, you said it would be stupid if they DID.
Random Joe though is not a bo staff master.Having a total attack bonus of -1/-1 (most likely) does not make you a bo staff master.
It might make you Star Wars Kid at best.
A commoner with 15 dex could have TWF (3d6 each stat, very doable).
It's dumb that ever person ever have TWF. It takes investment.
If a level one character could do it without any sort of investment, then that means any actual person should be able to do it.
Realism doesn't have much place in the game, but at level 1 it should.
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Not sure I am seeing the argument about no TWF feat. It certainly seems something like have to be trained in order to adquire.
It's an appeal to mechanical balance rather than thematic sense.
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Not sure I am seeing the argument about no TWF feat. It certainly seems something like have to be trained in order to adquire.It's an appeal to mechanical balance rather than thematic sense.
Well, I would say then that the good option to balance the feat is to actually balance the feat. TWF+ITWF+GTWF seems like a good deal for just one feat.
Not sure I am seeing the argument about no TWF feat. It certainly seems something like have to be trained in order to adquire.It's an appeal to mechanical balance rather than thematic sense.
There will be sacrifices! Ahaha!
More seriously, at -2 to each attack your still not doing too hot in the current system.
Not sure I am seeing the argument about no TWF feat. It certainly seems something like have to be trained in order to adquire.It's an appeal to mechanical balance rather than thematic sense.There will be sacrifices! Ahaha!
More seriously, at -2 to each attack your still not doing too hot in the current system.
I wouldn't mind the penalty going away and double strike being in the feat.
But then it should stay 3 feats.
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Generally a martial with those feats is still behind a 2HF, right? So, why pay?
Pathfinder has a strange idea that you should suffer for your flavor. Exotic weapon, TWF, crossbow, suffer! [/Conspiracytheory]
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I've put 2WF, I2WF and G2WF in one scaling feat, Double Slice + 2W Rend in another, and 2WFeint + I2WFeint in a third. In each of those scaling feats the first one tells you that you get the rest for free as soon as you meet the prerequisites.
I specifically didn't add anything else to the way the feats work during play. That way you only need to look this up when you go up a level; you note down all the feats you get extra, and the rest of the time you can just keep using the RAW that you already know.
This is my collection of scaling/consolidated feats, based on CRB, APG and Ultimate Combat. It also axes Combat Expertise, Weapon Finesse and Power Attack feat taxes.
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Haven't read more than just the OP, don't have the time, but here's my 2 cents. (A more up-to-date 2 cents shall come later when I've read the entire thread). So, yeah, sorry if i'm totally late to the party with the following.
It sounds like you're kind of misunderstanding how terribly badass the fighter's bonus feats are, and the whole point (far as I'm concerned/aware), is being totally fraggin' awesome in combat. Specifically, close-quarters combat.
In my games, I've done a bit of consolidating on feats. Power Attack, Combat Expertise, Combat Reflexes, and Weapon Finesse are now inherent to the system themselves (with CR getting replaced with some other feat that does effectively the same thing). This opens up a TON of feats for the fighter to get to do their thing.
From there, I've also determined that any Improved or Greater feat chains get rolled up into their basic feats. TWF being the prime example, soon as you meet the requirements for ITWF, you're runnin' with that instead. Meet GTWF? Bust out those three extra attacks baby.
This basically allows fighters to do their fighter thing, by getting excessive amounts of feats. To me, there is nothing more beautiful than watching a Fighter perform his ridiculous feat dance of death through a battlefield, utilizing every choice and actually being effective at it. I know my players absolutely love it, and actually play and do well with fighters.
Effective is the key word here. In my experience, Fighters sort of sag at higher levels if they want to do anything particularly cool with their feats that doesn't require two or less. Yeah, sure, I finally got exotic proficiency katana with greater two wep fighting and improved critical /focus/some strike! Big bloody whoop when the dragon just eats me since I had to put all my feats toward that set up! Meanwhile, Mr. Wizard over there blasts the dragons to smithereenies with Mr. Fighter still inside of it.
If the fighter's big thing is supposed to be his bonus feats (which it seems like to me), then the simple fact that he has to WASTE so many of them on silly feat taxes doesn't constitute means he's being held back from what he was meant to do.
1) The fighter's extra feats don't mean less now, it means they get more feats with which to hit things.
2) What is he gonna do with em? Actually get some defensive feats as well as his offensive feats, or maybe some control feats like Spell Breaker or something!
IME, it's not that fighter's design around feats is hurting the game, it's that the way the feats are designed are hurting the fighter.
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I took the approach that Power Attack, Combat Expertise, Combat Reflexes, Blind Fighting, Endurance/Toughness, and Leadership were Key Feats; Feats that heavily modified other feats and made them more effective. They mapped nicely to each of the stats, and allowed a character to either take advantage of a high Stat...or to effectively replace it with skill.
For instance, Expertise means you are an Expert in the art of combat. In other words, a Smart Fighter. A Weapon Finesse user+ Expertise adds his Expertise bonus in precision damage to all finessable weapons he has Weapon Focus in. There's no need to add Dex to damage...Expertise does it for you, and doesn't get out of control with stacking Dex mods, but also continues to scale.
Combat Reflexes allows you to spend AoO on non-attack actions. In short, AoO's become fuel for different things.
There are feats that should be consolidated. There are others that are just oozing flavor that should be expanded.
What if having COmbat Reflexes + Expertise gave you your expertise bonus against AoO's all the time?
What if you could expend AoO's using Deflect Missile/Missile Shield to attempt to parry extra missiles?
What if you got your Expertise bonus against ranged attacks all the time?
Remember, Linear Warriors is built on the fact that most feats don't scale, and most feats don't broaden in utility, while spells do both. Well, if you keep adding feats, and those feats keep stacking with other feats in new ways and there is synergy, warriors become quadratic in new and interesting ways.
You just have to be careful not to overpower the numbers.
===Aelryinth
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The biggest problem with condensing down all the feat chains is that at this point, all the best chains have been added to several times by later books. Sure, there's a ton of stuff that uses Power Attack as a prereq, but very little of it actually came out in the CRB. A lot of this condensation, then, is going to be revisionist history. It also explains why Paizo isn't doing it-- they need to be able to add onto feat chains in order to introduce new feats.
In fact, that was my biggest problem with the APG-- I rolled up an Inquisitor, then went to pick a feat for hima dn realized nearly all of the APG feats were extensions of the feat chains in the CRB. There's very little in there you can take right out of the gate. Building onto pre-existing feat chains seems to be Paizo's preferred method of writing new feats for new books, and proposing a condensation as house rules is going to get thorny if a new book comes out during a campaign that uses those house rules, since it's a safe bet that any splatbook that comes out is going to have feats like that.
There's also the feats that act as bridges from one tree to another. Several feats as I mentioned have prereqs from two-different trees. Dodge, Weapon Focus, and Expertise are the most common prereq feats to add onto a late-game feat that pretty clearly belongs in another tree. Was this intended to give fighters a reason to split their focus? Do these feats become OP if their prereqs are relaxed like this? Do fighters become OP if they suddenly have room for all of them?
Feat:
The Genius of Combat (Technique, Training)
Req: Expertise (Technique), Bravery +2
YOu gain a number of Combat Feats (not Techniques) equal to your Expertise Modifier. These feats are immediately added to your Pool of COmbat Feats and can be chosen as part of your daily feat allotment.
This feat may be taken twice (True Genius!).
Techniques can only be chosen by Fighter bonus feat slots. You may not use General feat slots to choose Techniques (i.e. they are akin to Rage Powers as a class benefit).
Arrow Deflection (Technique, Profound)
Req: Unarmed Strike or Expertise or Combat Reflexes
(Core feat)You may deflect the first physical missile attack launched at you per round as a Dodge action. You must have a weapon or shield in hand to do so.
If you have Unarmed Strike, you may do this unarmed.
If you have Expertise, your Expertise bonus applies to successive ranged attacks against you as a Dodge bonus to AC if you so desire, even if you are not in melee.
If you have Combat Reflexes, you can attempt DC 20+enhancement of the missile Reflex saves to avoid the missiles, burning 1 AoO per save. This also allows you to potentially deflect missiles even if flat-footed.
If you have all three feats, a successful deflection allows you to catch the missile and potentially hurl/shoot it back by spending another AoO.
Profound Techniques may be chosen as monk bonus feats.
==Aelryinth
Extraordinary Weapon Proficiency (Technique, Combat):
YOu can make a martial weapon perform like an exotic.
Required: Weapon Focus in the affected weapons.
19-20/x2 martial weapons and 20/x3 martial weapons you have Weapon Focus in become 19-20/x3 weapons.
18-20/x2 weapons increase their damage dice by one size (d6 to d8, d8 to d10, d10 to d12, etc).
20/x4 weapons are not affected by EWP.
Reason: The falcata is an idiotic weapon. There's a reason nobody used them in warfare past the early centuries in Europe.
With this feat, every standard martial weapon becomes a falcata for the cost of a feat. Furthermore, it absolutely balances the net crit effect for martial weapons.
YOU have a d8 19-20/x2 longsword. I am a fighter, and have a 19-20/x3 longsword, because I am the master of weapons. Suck it and grab a falcata.
x4 weapons operate outside the paradigm and I didn't see any reason or logical way to include them in this effect for mathematical balance.
==Aelryinth
Mobility (Technique, Combat, Talented)
Attacks of Opportunity find it hard to hit you.
Required: Dodge
(Core) You gain a +4 Dodge bonus against AoO's triggered by movement.
Fighter: Your Mobility bonus is increased by your Armor Training bonus.
Rogues: You may add your Mobility bonus to your Acrobatics checks when moving through a threatened space or difficult terrain.
If you have Expertise and Combat Reflexes, your Mobility bonus applies against all AoO's if you spend an AoO in counter.
Talented Techniques may be taken as Rogue Talents.
Reason: Superb Mobility should have more effects on movement, and a bonus against specific AoO's should be upgradeable to all AoOs. Also, Rogues should be able to use it to modify a skill.
==Aelryinth
Exotic Weapon Proficiency (Combat, Profound)
You are familiar with strange weapons.
(Core) Choose an exotic weapon to be proficient in.
Fighter: Pick a number of weapons you were not proficient with (i.e. equal to your Bravery bonus. You add those weapons to your primary Weapon Group.
Monk: You may add a number of weapons equal to 1+ your Monk class AC bonus to your Monk weapons.
As your bonuses increase, you may add additional weapons.
Reason: Fighters, master of weapons...ALL weapons. Duh. Monks, learn all kinds of odd weapons, not just monk...including martial weapons.
Note: I consider 'Improved Grapple' a weapon, just like 'Improved Unarmed Strike' is.
==Aelryinth
I feel there's been far too many attempts to make the fighter the Master of Few (the base fighter's weapon groups, virtually all the archetypes, etc.) - when the barbarian, paladin and cavalier are all built around that concept. (The ranger, to my frustration, manages to be a jack of all trades and master of one.)
The jack of all trades, now, that's a category where the fighter should be to combat what the bard is to skills/spellcasting. I liked EntrerisShadow's way of expressing what a fighter should be - scary in all aspects of all weapons. Weapon Specialization and Weapon Training should probably go the way of the dodo in favor of general bonuses with all weapons - or at least huge sweeping categories such as "two-handed weapons," "ranged weapons," etc. (I like Armor Training very much as a jack-of-all-trades ability.)
+1
Though I prefer removing weapon training with an ability that modifies the penalties from feats like power attack. The fighter is all about being the best with feats, so let the fighter use feats like combat expertise without sacrificing his chance to hit (if that is the feat chosen to train up).
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The biggest problem with condensing down all the feat chains is that at this point, all the best chains have been added to several times by later books.
Actually, they could power up feats and reduce wordspace all in one go.
Let's take combat maneuver stuff as an example:
Baseline: Perform the maneuver with a penalty of some kind (AoO, etc).
CoreBook Feat (1 for each maneuver): Perform the maneuver without penalty (no AoO), bonus to success, and at a later level, extra benefit.
AdvancedBook Feat (1 total feat): Maneuver Strike - If you crit you can perform a maneuver (for any maneuver that you have the CoreBook feat).
CombatBook Feat (1 total feat): Quick Maneuver - Perform a maneuver faster (for any maneuver that you have the CoreBook feat).
Now Combat Maneuvers have been reduced to less than half the feats before (33 before, 13 after condensing).
I'd actually prefer condensing it even further into more like themes. So instead of buying the individual CoreBook feats, you have a single feat that does something like this:
MANEUVER TRAINING
Your combat style includes a particular set of combat maneuvers at which you excel.
Benefit: Upon selecting this feat, you may choose a single combat style below, gaining improved ability with the listed maneuvers. You no longer provoke an Attack of Opportunity when performing these maneuvers. Feinting can be performed as a move action, and opponents cannot avoid your Overrun attempt.
Additionally, you gain a +2 bonus when performing or defending against these maneuvers. Upon reaching 6th level, this bonus increases to +4 and you gain an additional improvement.
Acrobatic - Bull Rush, Drag, Overrun, Reposition, and Trip.
Swashbuckling - Disarm, Feint, Reposition, Sunder, and Trip.
Powerhouse - Bull Rush, Drag, Grapple, Overrun, and Sunder.
Tactical - Pick any 4.
Underhanded - Dirty Trick, Disarm, Feint, Steal, and Trip.
Improvements
Bull Rush - Your victim's movement from bull rush provokes attacks of opportunity from your allies (but not you).
Dirty Trick - The penalty lasts for 1d4 rounds, plus 1 round for every 5 points you exceed the check. It takes a standard action to remove the penalty.
Disarm - Your victim's disarmed item lands 15 feet away in a random direction.
Drag - Your victim's movement from drag provokes attacks of opportunity from your allies (but not you).
Feint - Whenever you use feint to cause an opponent to lose his Dexterity bonus, he loses that bonus until the beginning of your next turn.
Grapple - Maintaining a grapple is now a move action, allowing you to make two grapple checks a round (although you only need to succeed at one to maintain the grapple).
Overrun - If your victim is knocked prone by your overrun, they provoke an attack of opportunity.
Reposition - Your victim's movement from reposition provokes attacks of opportunity from your allies (but not you).
Steal - A stolen item is not discovered until the end of combat, or until the victim attempts to use it.
Sunder - When destroying an item, you may transfer any remaining damage to the wielder. This does not apply if you leave the item at 1 hitpoint.
Trip - You victim provokes an attack of opportunity on a successful trip.
Special: You may select Maneuver Training multiple times, selecting a different combat style each time. Bonuses from different styles overlap, they do not stack.
Now "being great at a theme of maneuvers" costs about 3 feats (not counting the occasional quirk, like doing some with a particular weapon/at range, etc.
That's devoting about 1/3rd of your character's feats to Combat maneuvers (or 1/6th as a Fighter). It might make maneuvers a little more used in game, making combat a little more livelier.
And later splatbooks could release power-up feats like:
- Deal damage on a successful maneuver.
- (Teamwork) Gain an immediate attempt when someone else does something to your victim.
- Perform maneuvers with a ranged weapon.
- Etc.
You can still bloat this up to a dozen or more feats, but at least you would be doing this with a bunch of maneuvers at once, and by the higher levels you'll be far more versatile.
Maneuver Mastery (Technique, Combat, Cunning)
You excel at combat maneuvers
Req: Expertise
Pick a number of combat maneuvers equal to your Expertise bonus. YOu do not provoke AoO when using those maneuvers.
You gain a bonus on all these combat maneuvers equal to your Expertise bonus, if you are not using Expertise actively for another purpose. This bonus stacks with other feats that increase Maneuvers ability only for purposes of your CMD against those maneuvers.
Reasoning: An Expert combatant should have his pick of what special maneuvers he's good at, and his skill with them should scale with level. Tying this to Expertise means he gets more as he levels and his bonus scales freely with it. However, double stacking this with feats to be a literally unbeatable master is no fun for anyone, but being nigh-impossible to use such a maneuver against is actually thematic and appropriate.
==Aerlyinth
@ Kaisoku
I like it. Except I think the Swashbuckling tree should get dirty trick instead of sunder. Knee to the groin was more common than breaking a sword.
Also, instead of 6th level, keep the improvements at BAB 6.
Yeah, I was thinking dirty trick, but it felt like it was getting close to Underhanded.
In rethinking it, I might even just write it up with 4 specific options and one chosen for each of those (and the one 4x chosen with Tactical).As for the 6th level vs 6+ BAB, that was what I meant. I typed it up kind of quick on the spot, lol. Too late to edit now, but just imagine I meant "Upon gaining 6 BAB" instead. =)