Great Cleave - pg 37

[David Rowe]

As it is now written, Great Cleave just becomes a poor man's Whirlwind, except you only get an additional attack if you hit with the previous attack.
You would do better to drop this feat and modify Whirlwind.

[Jadeite]

How about making Whirlwind Attack a Combat Feat and limiting the total number of opponents attacked to the character's dexterity modifier +1 (like Combat Reflexes). It would still be a bit more powerful than Great Cleave, but it has a lot more prerequesits.

[Plognark]

I like the new cleave rules. I've never liked the "drop a foe" clause of the old one; makes the feat almost pointless at high levels.

It may be different enough from whirlwind to be ok. Whirlwind attacks everything, regardless of any previous hits, and is more of a DEX based feat. Cleave is more for strength based characters.

I'm curious to see what whirlwind changes people come up with.

[Thomas Mack 727]

I would prefer if they made it a standard action at least. As it is once your BAB hits +6 this feat becomes pointless as you are GIVING UP your second attack in order to have a chance of getting one if you hit the first foe.

Great Cleave was always a handy feat for me, it was fantastic for dealing with the huge mobs of small creature some DMs love to throw at you. You go in, attack the first with max power attack and kill him and then hit the second, dead. If you don't manage to kill the third no fear, you just try again with your next attack!

As it is you are screwed if you miss your first foe! At 16th level you are giving up 3 attacks on the hope that your attacks will hit at least three people...

True, it was a little cheese if you built toward it. I remember one horror story of an Ogre barbarian with a spiked chain and great cleave. He was hitting very hard and at one point managed to take out 32 opponents in a single round with him, by having another player port him into the middle of a pack of them...

Outside of abuse like that however I liked the feat as it was.

[Thomas Mack 727]

If you had to replace it I like Jadietes idea, though with a twist.

Great Cleave:
Your weapon tears around in a circle, leaving bloody rends in your foes
Prerequisites: Power Attack, Cleave
As a full attack make a single attack at your highest bonus against a number of opponents equal to your STR bonus.

Also, make Whirlwind attack a standard action. I always said it should be: it needs something more for all the feats you pour into it...

[Plognark]

Thomas Mack 727 wrote:

If you had to replace it I like Jadietes idea, though with a twist.

Great Cleave:
Your weapon tears around in a circle, leaving bloody rends in your foes
Prerequisites: Power Attack, Cleave
As a full attack make a single attack at your highest bonus against a number of opponents equal to your STR bonus.

Also, make Whirlwind attack a standard action. I always said it should be: it needs something more for all the feats you pour into it...

Meh, I like the new great cleave as is, but I do kind of like the idea of whirlwind being a standard action, so it can compete. It's always been a bit of a lame feat. Not enough payoff for the feat chain needed to get there.

[Acturios]

Actually, Cleave works the same way... If you miss with the first shot you don't get the second shot.

These feats work fairly well for any level characters, you get up to many attacks at you best attack score.

Which would you rather:

Great Cleave: +20/+20/+20/+20...
Single Sword: +20/+15/+10/+5

I would leave the extra attack on cleave conditional on hitting the first target, because you're not going to use cleave once you get great cleave anyway.

Try this for for Great Cleave (Copied and tweaked):

Benefit: As a full-round action, make a one melee attack against each of two foes within reach at your highest attack bonus. If you hit, you deal damage normally. If you hit both you can make an additional attack (at the same bonus) against another foe that is adjacent to the previous foe and within reach. If you hit, you can continue to make attacks against foes adjacent to the previous foe, so long as they are within your reach. You cannot attack an individual foe more than once in a round with this feat.

That way you get a second swing wether you hit with the first or not, but you only get the third and subsequent attacks if you hit with all the previous strikes.

[Maestr0]

Except with your 4 attacks if your first one misses you still get a second shot. With Great Cleave if you miss you are done.