More than one combat feat a turn


Skills & Feats


The combat feats have grown on me im kinda starting to like them

But what about a high level bonus for the fighter types to be able to use more then one combat feat a turn

Like a bonus for a 15th level fighter, monk, ranger, paladin, barbarian

or maybe somthing based on base attack

Like at
+15 two combat feats a turn
+20 Three combat feats a turn

Liberty's Edge

Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Charter Superscriber; Pathfinder Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game, Starfinder Society Subscriber

I've been thinking about that too. Dodge + Sprint Attack isn't a bad combination but... Devastating Blow + Sprint Attack I dunno. :P


But if you are doing it at high levels I dont think it would matter

really how i have it at that high of base attack most people dont even like to play at that level

but really i think it should be tested out

(wish i could get my game group togther for some testing tobad my wife is giving birth to our second this weekend so it will be a while before i get to play again)


Perhaps you can use one additional combat feat per additional attack you may make. If you can make two attacks because you have at least a +6 BAB, then you can use two combat feats in a given round. This would reward the combat classes with the highest BAB, since they'll probably be the ones using these feats most. This might be too powerful though, as at 20th level you'll be able to use 4 per round. I haven't yet had a chance to play-test any of these feats, so I don't know how game changing they are.

Liberty's Edge

Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Charter Superscriber; Pathfinder Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game, Starfinder Society Subscriber
Joey Virtue wrote:
But if you are doing it at high levels I dont think it would matter

Devastating Blow is a crit my friend. I don't see how critical hitting something then running out of range is good at any level. ;)

Dark Archive

I like this idea, but maybe rather than give it to everyone at a certain point, maybe allow this as a class ability for fighters? Something more to make them stand out as being the pinacles of personal combat?


Perhaps you could link the combat feats to a combat points system (like the barbarian rage points). Might flesh out the fighter nicely.

Dark Archive

NJHowie wrote:
Perhaps you could link the combat feats to a combat points system (like the barbarian rage points). Might flesh out the fighter nicely.

Then again, all classes should be redesigned to work like this -- I like the idea, but I doubt Jason will have the time to start pretty much from scratch with all the classes.

I'd like to see fighters getting 'Adrenaline Surge' -- sort of like 4E's Action Points, i.e. he would get an extra action by spending the surge (and one surge only per round). That would be a huge boost for the fighter without being an overkill, I think.

Paizo Employee Director of Brand Strategy

I like the level of tactical planning that combat feats add to the game, and the variation to the otherwise boring full-round attack is great. I could see it becoming less tactical if you're able to use more than one a round, though, as one would develop a successful combo and repeat it over and over again until it became as routine as the full-round attack.

Perhaps at higher levels, lower level combat feats could be traded out for higher powered versions of themselves, or combo feats. Then the mechanic of only one feat per round remains, but higher level fighters can get a comparable benefit.

Then again, this might be a monk class feature we haven't seen yet. In some ways, combining multiple maneuvers in one is a monkish ability. The fighters get extra boosts through their armor and weapon mastery.


yoda8myhead wrote:

I like the level of tactical planning that combat feats add to the game, and the variation to the otherwise boring full-round attack is great. I could see it becoming less tactical if you're able to use more than one a round, though, as one would develop a successful combo and repeat it over and over again until it became as routine as the full-round attack.

Perhaps at higher levels, lower level combat feats could be traded out for higher powered versions of themselves, or combo feats. Then the mechanic of only one feat per round remains, but higher level fighters can get a comparable benefit.

Then again, this might be a monk class feature we haven't seen yet. In some ways, combining multiple maneuvers in one is a monkish ability. The fighters get extra boosts through their armor and weapon mastery.

How about a feat to allow combinations of combat feats? That makes Fighters more likely to develop combos, since they get more feats?

Liberty's Edge

A combo system would make me drool. Drool, I say! Of course, I might do that anyway...

I don't think feats or linking it to BAB is the way to go. I think that just giving fighters a combo class ability would be best, and let higher-level fighters chain more combos. A fighter's primary class ability is supposed to be that he's good at fighting, and giving fighters exclusivity over combo chains would be the perfect way to represent that.

Jeremy Puckett

RPG Superstar 2009 Top 16, 2012 Top 32

Uncle Monkey wrote:
How about a feat to allow combinations of combat feats? That makes Fighters more likely to develop combos, since they get more feats?

Or a handful of combat feats that say, "Benefit: You gain the benefits of both combat feat X and combat feat Y this round." That way, specific combos of combat feats can have specific names. And you can exclude combos that don't make sense (like Two-Weapon Rend plus Weapon Swap) by just not making feats for them.

Paizo Employee Director of Games

Epic Meepo wrote:
Uncle Monkey wrote:
How about a feat to allow combinations of combat feats? That makes Fighters more likely to develop combos, since they get more feats?
Or a handful of combat feats that say, "Benefit: You gain the benefits of both combat feat X and combat feat Y this round." That way, specific combos of combat feats can have specific names. And you can exclude combos that don't make sense (like Two-Weapon Rend plus Weapon Swap) by just not making feats for them.

Epic, you and I seem to be on the same page quite often. I would much prefer to add combat feats that allow you to combo specific feats, than just simply open it up. Some of these feats do not play well with others and are designed for a specific effect. Allowing them to mix freely might be troublesome.

Jason Bulmahn
Lead Designer
Paizo Publishing


Jason Bulmahn wrote:
Epic Meepo wrote:
Uncle Monkey wrote:
How about a feat to allow combinations of combat feats? That makes Fighters more likely to develop combos, since they get more feats?
Or a handful of combat feats that say, "Benefit: You gain the benefits of both combat feat X and combat feat Y this round." That way, specific combos of combat feats can have specific names. And you can exclude combos that don't make sense (like Two-Weapon Rend plus Weapon Swap) by just not making feats for them.

Epic, you and I seem to be on the same page quite often. I would much prefer to add combat feats that allow you to combo specific feats, than just simply open it up. Some of these feats do not play well with others and are designed for a specific effect. Allowing them to mix freely might be troublesome.

Jason Bulmahn
Lead Designer
Paizo Publishing

Like Dodge Mobility and Spring attack =)


Joey Virtue wrote:
Jason Bulmahn wrote:
Epic Meepo wrote:
Uncle Monkey wrote:
How about a feat to allow combinations of combat feats? That makes Fighters more likely to develop combos, since they get more feats?
Or a handful of combat feats that say, "Benefit: You gain the benefits of both combat feat X and combat feat Y this round." That way, specific combos of combat feats can have specific names. And you can exclude combos that don't make sense (like Two-Weapon Rend plus Weapon Swap) by just not making feats for them.

Epic, you and I seem to be on the same page quite often. I would much prefer to add combat feats that allow you to combo specific feats, than just simply open it up. Some of these feats do not play well with others and are designed for a specific effect. Allowing them to mix freely might be troublesome.

Jason Bulmahn
Lead Designer
Paizo Publishing

Like Dodge Mobility and Spring attack =)

They'd work fine if Mobility didn't totally thwart attacks of op. Personally, the Combat Feat system is, to me, one of the warts. I really dislike this. It's fine to limit actions in other ways (require swift or immediate actions to activate certain Feats, force certain limitations as to when you can use a Feat, make it a full round action during which you can move, etc.), but the one-a-time thing is really getting on my nerves. The whole point of the combat Feat bonus on a Fighter is to give the Fighter the ability to lay down holy Hell on the bad guys. Restricting their ability to access the Feats that they gain in spades to one-a-round is almost abusive.

Scarab Sages

I would like to see the ability to combine combat feats in the same round unless specifically prohibited. Dodge, for example, is a weak enough feat that it should always be considered active. My concern is that fighters (who accumulate lots of combat feats) will find themselves hindered in actually being able to use them.


To me, restricting combat feats are one of the best basic ideas that are in Pathfinder.

Restricting feats to one a round allows characters to do really cool things, but not get game breaking combos.

I think at this point it is more of a matter of fine tuning than anything else.


I think that combat feats really feel like an artificial break on players who like to tweak everything until they get monsterous characters. While I don't think that's a bad goal, I think the current list of combat feats has a lot of entries that really shouldn't be there, and a lot of them don't justify their status as 'this and nothing but this for one turn.'

I've also noticed that (at least in play up until level 5) it tends to either A) make players pick 'regular' feats to use in battle beyond one combat feat that they like and B) encourage players to fight the same way all the time. A little testing at levels where multiple attacks came into play shows that there's some switch up between multiple attacks/full round combat feats...but you can do that -anyway- with feats that count as full round actions.

In fact, I suggest that feats that are Full Round Actions are already so limited that making them combat feats makes them quite lackluster at higher levels, since they both A) can't be used in conjunction with full round actions and B) can't benefit from defensive Combat Feats.

I think that the current list needs to be reevaluated, and feats be weeded out/upgraded to make sure they're worth A) not using another Combat Feat with/in place of, and B) Not full round actions unless they have some unholy combination with a defensive combat feat.


Where is this limit written at? I'm not seeing in the latest Alpha release.


Commodore Jones wrote:
Where is this limit written at? I'm not seeing in the latest Alpha release.

Page 52:

"Combat feats represent various maneuvers and tricks that
characters can attempt to perform in combat. Although
these feats can be utilized any number of times per day,
you cannot utilize more than one combat feat in any
given round."


I'd be annoyed to have to spend another feat just to use ones I already have; even with the increased feat progression. why not add a special tag to the feat or an allowable list of combos?


Pneumonica wrote:
Personally, the Combat Feat system is, to me, one of the warts. I really dislike this. It's fine to limit actions in other ways (require swift or immediate actions to activate certain Feats, force certain limitations as to when you can use a Feat, make it a full round action during which you can move, etc.), but the one-a-time thing is really getting on my nerves. The whole point of the combat Feat bonus on a Fighter is to give the Fighter the ability to lay down holy Hell on the bad guys. Restricting their ability to access the Feats that they gain in spades to one-a-round is almost abusive.

I am in total agreement. Except I think it flat out is abusive. I don't even see the point for limiting combat feats. Admittedly I've only played one fighter class character in all the years I've played since 3rd edition was released. But I'm curious as to what was so gawd-awful broken that made it felt that a one per round limit was needed?


Commodore Jones wrote:
Pneumonica wrote:
Personally, the Combat Feat system is, to me, one of the warts. I really dislike this. It's fine to limit actions in other ways (require swift or immediate actions to activate certain Feats, force certain limitations as to when you can use a Feat, make it a full round action during which you can move, etc.), but the one-a-time thing is really getting on my nerves. The whole point of the combat Feat bonus on a Fighter is to give the Fighter the ability to lay down holy Hell on the bad guys. Restricting their ability to access the Feats that they gain in spades to one-a-round is almost abusive.
I am in total agreement. Except I think it flat out is abusive. I don't even see the point for limiting combat feats. Admittedly I've only played one fighter class character in all the years I've played since 3rd edition was released. But I'm curious as to what was so gawd-awful broken that made it felt that a one per round limit was needed?

I agree with this assessment. Remove the abusive combinations, not ALL combinations.

Liberty's Edge

There is no need for the 'combat' designation. Feats that don't play well with others should be made a standard action. Since you can no longer have more than 1 standard action per turn (3.5 haste), there is no worry.

Allow a fighter the opportunity to 'quicken' a combat feat as a 'fighter only' feat and you've got the combos for the fighter, you don't have a whole new set of rules governing how this mechanic works, you keep more compatability with 3.5 and you make DeadDMWalking very happy.

What more could you want?


DeadDMWalking wrote:
Allow a fighter the opportunity to 'quicken' a combat feat as a 'fighter only' feat and you've got the combos for the fighter,

Now there is a truly interesting idea. Meta-combat feats...

1) Empower Maneuver = +1/2 effects

2) Extend Maneuver = duration effects doubled

3) Heighten Manevuer = resist effects harder (hmm... my DM sense is tingling on this one)

4) Maximumize Maneuver = max damage

5) Quicken Maneuver = more than one maneuver in a round (assuming everything is a standard action and not some sort of reaction event or prerequisite event)

Obviously some of the metamagic feats don't translate well. I'm sure others can be thought up though that would work for magic spells. Also, how could you insrease "casting level"? Impose a BAB penalty I guess.

Liberty's Edge

raven1272 wrote:

Obviously some of the metamagic feats don't translate well. I'm sure others can be thought up though that would work for magic spells. Also, how could you insrease "casting level"? Impose a BAB penalty I guess.

What may work is allowing the 'sacrifice' of ititerative attacks. If you normally have 3 attacks and must give up two of them while performing a full attack action to get the 'desired effect' it would have a cost, but one that many fighters would gladly pay. When you have 4 attacks and you always hit on the 1st, but seldom on the 3rd or 4th, trading those two in for a 'bonus' on the first is well worth it. Maybe even trading in the 2nd attack that has a reasonable chance of hitting.... Fewer crits, fewer dice, more options... Good stuff.


DeadDMWalking wrote:
What may work is allowing the 'sacrifice' of ititerative attacks.

That would make the vital strike chain an example of the "new metacombat" maneuvers (in this case Empower maneuver). =)Improved vital strike trades your last 2 iterative attacks for an additional two dice worth of damage each on your first two attacks.

That would make something like quicken maneuver... trade an iterative attack for the ability to do two maneuvers? and improved quicken maneuver (quick quicken? hehe) is trade two iterative attacks for three combat maneuvers in a round? Could you even do three maneuvers with only two attacks?

hmm.. I may have to play with something like this on the side since it's no longer a playtesting of the alpha rules but a playing with new variant rule ideas.

Liberty's Edge

The idea of using iterative attacks for extra combat maneuvers and combo feats both appeal to me.

I do like the combat feat limitation though; I've found my players being far more tactical in their fights. Lets them put a little more thought and planning into battles, rather than just "I wade in and power attack and cleave stuff".


Perhaps a person can use a number of combat feats equal to (total combat feats /2) or by 3, or 4, or whatnot.

(i.e. 1 extra use for every 2, 3, or 4 combat feats you have)

Thus, no extra feats are needed- but the more of the combat feats you have the more you are able to use them.

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