SRD Question: Knock-Down Feat


RPG Superstar™ 2008 General Discussion


Ok, I have my submission all done.... except for one issue raised by one of my players who was proof-reading it.

I referenced the Knock-Down feat in the requirements, but we had differing interpretations of its "legality"

1. He said it wasn't open to normal characters to take, as it is listed in the Divine Section. However, as it is listed as a General Feat and has no mention of divine rank in the pre-requisites, I think he is interpreting that wrong. (Besides, by that definition, you'd need divine rank to take other feats in that section, like sharpshooting or power critical. And the orignal 3.0 version of Knock-Down was in Sword and Fist.)

2. Is the feat even eligible for use in the contest? I say yes, because it is OGL content and is on the www.d20srd.org site that is referenced in the rules for RPG Superstar. My proof-reader says no, but I think he is interpreting OGL as only the core books, and not other open content.

Any opinions before I hit the submit button?

Contributor, RPG Superstar 2009, RPG Superstar Judgernaut

Talion09 wrote:
1. He said it wasn't open to normal characters to take, as it is listed in the Divine Section.

My opinion would be that it's listed as a General feat, so it's open to all characters, divinely-inspired or not...

Talion09 wrote:
2. Is the feat even eligible for use in the contest? I say yes, because it is OGL content...

I believe it's eligible, but you might want to ask yourself how compelling your submission will be if it raises this many questions and includes a rather obscure feat like Knock-Down...

Just my two-cents,
--Neil

RPG Superstar 2013 Top 16 , Marathon Voter Season 6, Marathon Voter Season 7, Marathon Voter Season 8, Dedicated Voter Season 9 aka Darkjoy

NSpicer wrote:


Talion09 wrote:
2. Is the feat even eligible for use in the contest? I say yes, because it is OGL content...

I believe it's eligible, but you might want to ask yourself how compelling your submission will be if it raises this many questions and includes a rather obscure feat like Knock-Down...

Just my two-cents,
--Neil

If the feat is part of the SRD I think that Talion is using the SRD to it's fullest (and that should count for something too).

Contributor, RPG Superstar 2009, RPG Superstar Judgernaut

Darkjoy wrote:
If the feat is part of the SRD I think that Talion is using the SRD to it's fullest (and that should count for something too).

Really, I think the only that's going to count is how well a particular entry "knocks the socks off" the judges. And, if that can be accomplished by incorporating the Knock-Down feat, more power to Talion...

Best of luck,
--Neil

RPG Superstar 2013 Top 16 , Marathon Voter Season 6, Marathon Voter Season 7, Marathon Voter Season 8, Dedicated Voter Season 9 aka Darkjoy

NSpicer wrote:
Darkjoy wrote:
If the feat is part of the SRD I think that Talion is using the SRD to it's fullest (and that should count for something too).

Really, I think the only that's going to count is how well a particular entry "knocks the socks off" the judges. And, if that can be accomplished by incorporating the Knock-Down feat, more power to Talion...

Best of luck,
--Neil

I kind of assumed that Talion would enter something cool and by using "knockdown" would gain an edge. In the future I will state my assumptions more explicitly.


Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber
Talion09 wrote:

Ok, I have my submission all done.... except for one issue raised by one of my players who was proof-reading it.

I referenced the Knock-Down feat in the requirements, but we had differing interpretations of its "legality"
...
Any opinions before I hit the submit button?

My only comment is that the feat is rather broken, as somewhat indicated by the fact that it is good enough for GODS to take it.

Other than that, go for it.


It's clearly OGL (and thus, eligible for use in the contest). But the beginning of that section contains the phrase "Deities can obtain the feats described here, in addition to any standard feats", which strongly implies mere mortals cannot.

You could, of course, reference the OGL-version of that feat knowing it's available to PCs in a non-OGL product. But that seems a little convoluted. I'd see if I couldn't come up with a better way to express the item requirements.

Liberty's Edge

It's completely legal, in both senses of the term.

(You might point out to your reader that already-extant Paizo materials include domains that are in the Divine section of the SRD, so "core only" isn't an accurate description of OGL-legal material.)


Thanks for the replies everyone.

While most people agree with my interpretation... as some of you said, if it causes questions to be raised and differing interpetations of its "legality" for the contest... well, I might as well re-word the description to reference something else, since it wasn't exactly integral to the item's concept.

Once again, thanks for the replies. I'll be firing off the submission and joining the contest soon ;-)

Legendary Games, Necromancer Games

If its in the SRD, its in the SRD and thus legal. Now, we may discuss whether a designer should make an item that takes a demigod to create, for example (and in fact we have had just such a discussion, though not about the knockdown feat; and I will not say which way we came out on that either), but it is in the SRD so it is fair game.

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