"I let people swap stuff they never really used, so they don't "waste" character resources, but they don't get to recreate their character to be optimal at every given level."
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I think this gets the point and I completely agree to this statement on all levels.
"I let people swap stuff they never really used, so they don't "waste" character resources, but they don't get to recreate their character to be optimal at every given level."
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I think this gets the point and I completely agree to this statement on all levels.
Exactly.
However, I'm now running a Pathfinder game, and one of the things I stated up front was that by default I was not going to allow retraining. The reason is simply because players earn more feats over their character's career in Pathfinder. You don't like that feat? Wait a level or two and get a new one. I figure the trade-off for so many feats is that you might well wind up with a few that just don't get used that often, but then who knows what will come in handy one day? Especially if Fighters get feat retraining as a stated class feature, which would take away from that class's unique power and versatility if just any Ranger or Rogue could do it.
I agree. That doesn't mean I wouldn't allow swapping out of feats that a player chose poorly, but wholesale swapping out of every single feat because a player decides that he wants to change his characters entire focus to something more 'optimal' at his given level ... that just makes no sense to me. Pathfinder has enough feats that you can afford a few sub-optimal choices here and there.
Personnaly, as a GM I don't want to force a player to play a character he/she doesn't enjoy, so I am pretty liberal about revising characters. I usually allow three types:
First, after the first few game session (or the first chapter if I'm running an AP) I allow a complete re-spec. Change anything you want. No cost, no penalties. No questions asked. I often have players who come to the table with creative character concepts that don't always work out. So, I let them change their mind if they want to.
Second, at any time during play, when you would get a new general feat, you may retrain one existing feat. You must swap it out for something you would have been qualified for at the time you took the feat you want to lose. That does mean players have to keep track of when they took what feat. I use a similar rule for skills. When you level, you can retrain a few skill points (GM's discretion how many).
Lastly, you can always retire a character and bring in a new one. Standard XP penalties as if you had been killed and raised from the dead (lose one level).
Of course, it helps that I have been very lucky with my gaming groups. I game with adults, and have no obnoxious munchkins.
When 3.0 first appeared, I found several GMs played away from players' feats. I had Combat Reflexes and all the baddies, after the first bunch, ran past well clear of my AoO zone. Another player could never get the down time needed to craft items she wanted or needed. A third went 5 levels without being able to use any of her Metamagic feats.
In my own campaign, I torqued off all the local, so-called GMs by ruling that any feat not used in 3 levels could be swapped with party consent, 5 without even GM consent. I experienced my first in-game deaths in those "GMs'" games within the next 2 sessions in each.
Uncle Monkey has a good idea with this one: "Lastly, you can always retire a character and bring in a new one. Standard XP penalties as if you had been killed and raised from the dead (lose one level)."
I don't think anyone is saying that player should be stuck with whatever they selected in the heat of the moment, no 'taksies backsies' - merely that rearranging all one's feats on a whim every few levels is not in tune with the concept of feats.
I'm going to ask people in this thread to take a deep breath and calm down before posting. It's geting a bit heated. You want a debate, fine. But if you want a flamewar, take it outside.
'Flame war'? Did I miss a post or 4? IMHO, Pazio posters are some of the nicest folks I've ever posted with!
I think I just have a different mindset, or maybe the groups I played with back in the day were more up for long term consequences (rolling HPs, sticking with your choices and growing/adapting the character along the way, warts and all etc.), so I would generally default to the feats are forever category.
However, a good number of cases can and have been made for the ability to swap feats, at least in a limited sense. In general, I could see it working fairly well with limits, DM approval and certainly if it makes sense from a role play perspective.
Your idea sucks. It's terrible, because it's hammering the weakest classes in the game for little gain, and your stated reasoning has something to do with game balance.
You don't seem to get the hang of what I'm suggesting at all.
The fact is that prerequisites are intentional, some feats aren't "awesome power" but serve as flavour and/or first step for something better, and not every feat is meant to be good at every level.
And that's all intentional.
Now, if you think that this makes some classes weak, change the classes to bring them back in line.
But a carte blanche for unlimited remaking of characters is not the way, as it leaves things wide open for abuse because people can pull off stuff like characters that wouldn't have survived getting to that level with their history of abilities.
If there's a problem with something, fix that something. Don't increase the general power level, because that won't help - those weakest classes remain the weakest classes.
And blind generalisations are seldom the solution for problems like this - not when we have an actual, thinking person with complete control over the rules, being able to adjudicate however they want to make things fair.
My idea is actually awesome because it builds on the RPGs strengths. This is not WoW where every patch will render something else overpowered because they wanted to fix something but didn't think things through (I don't know if it's still that way, but I've heard several of WoW fanatics I know complain of stuff like that).
First, after the first few game session (or the first chapter if I'm running an AP) I allow a complete re-spec. Change anything you want. No cost, no penalties. No questions asked. I often have players who come to the table with creative character concepts that don't always work out. So, I let them change their mind if they want to.
I have something similar. I call it the "joker". You can use your joker to either reinvent the character from scratch or ret-con in another character.
Beyond that, you can always ask for changes if stuff really didn't work out, or you found you never used something, and so on. I'll look it over, and if I think it's not just a way to keep the character optimal at all levels, and makes sense for the character, I'll usually allow it.
I generally don't allow more changes, because I do like a consistent story behind the game and like to incorporate the characters and their backgrounds into the plot, and have seen (both in my own games and others) several stories been "sabotaged" (not that I imply any malice behind it) by characters changing in-game or being switched out, rendering many nice plot hooks and tie-ins useless.
I especially have one player who would probably change his character once a month or more often if I let him (hi Treyu!), and since I usually run story-based campaigns, that can mess things up a lot. Plus, I always try to encourage people to get into their characters instead of trying out new "killer builds".
Lastly, you can always retire a character and bring in a new one. Standard XP penalties as if you had been killed and raised from the dead (lose one level).
That wouldn't work for me because I keep XP synchronised. Pathfinder has done away with the losing a level at death part (something I welcome), and I expect my players to have a good reason for being absent from the table (and giving me ample warning of any cancellations), so there's no need to "punish" anyone. (Which is the main reason for docking XP for absent players, at least in the games I've been in.)
I though you could take feats without meeting their prereqs. You just can't use them? I've never known anyone to try that, so it's never come up. You certainly don't lose a feat if you stop qualifying for it, just the use of it until you once again qualify. On the surface, that sounds like it could be subject to abuse by taking a bunch of feats that you'll be able to use later, but that would leave you with none in the short term; which would probably get you killed.
OP:
My groups typically discuss player feats that haven't been used in four or five games. The rest of the table can usually figure out a way to make it workable. If not, we (nearly everyone I game with runs) generally just ask them to trade it for another feat they would have had access to at the appropriate level. It works well and prevents random character changes when people are frustrated.
I should point out that we consider qualifying for prestige classes and other feats a form of "use".
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Nope, and yes. You do need to meet the prereqs to take a feat. Lets take Two Weapon Fighting (prereq. = Dex 15). Before you take Two Weapon Fighting, you need a Dex of at least 15.
If you take the feat, and later get your Dex drained or something so that it is 14 or lower, you still have Two Weapon Fighter, but you can not use it, in any way, other than still having that feat slot filled. This is important, beause any other feat that has To Weapon Fighting as a prereq, you keep, and might still be able to use. If, however, the feat uses Two Weapon Fighting, (as in builds off of it), you are out of luck.