At 4th level (or 8th, 12th, 16th, 20th), can a fighter swap out his Heavy Armor Proficiency or any other bonus weapon or armor proficiency feat he starts out with for a different bonus feat?
At 4th level (or 8th, 12th, 16th, 20th), can a fighter swap out his Heavy Armor Proficiency or any other bonus weapon or armor proficiency feat he starts out with for a different bonus feat?
No, those are part of his class abilities. The fighter already gets a TON of extra feats, why would one need to swap one out? Part of what makes a fighter a fighter is their training with all non-exotic types of weapons and armor.
There's an ACF in Complete Mage or CArcane that allows you to cast spells in light armour, but you don't have medium or heavy arm. prof.
I'm really just curious if it is plausible is all. I am the GM ;-) and I highly doubt it's RIA. But it seems reasonable to at a glance.
It is not RAI or RAW, and those feats are hard wired not brought. However as GM you are always free to allow any change you like. A few folks allow trade in at level 1 for other things in place of those feats. I have allowed trading med and heavy armors for a monks AC boost but INT based not wis based.
I'm really just curious if it is plausible is all. I am the GM ;-) and I highly doubt it's RIA. But it seems reasonable to at a glance.
It's very reasonable. One of the fighter's advantages over other classes is the heavy armor proficiency. Trading that out for a feat, which the fighter already has plenty of, is hardly gamebreaking.
Just letting you know, that's wide open to abuse. Say if they multi-classed they're not gonna' lose anything but gain another feat (which are good as).
All i'm saying is all of a sudden you've got a 1/1 lvl human fighter/barb. with 4 feats/rage/etc.
up to you tho.
I agree I would not let him change the built in feats he did not select.
Just letting you know, that's wide open to abuse. Say if they multi-classed they're not gonna' lose anything but gain another feat (which are good as).
All i'm saying is all of a sudden you've got a 1/1 lvl human fighter/barb. with 4 feats/rage/etc.
up to you tho.
You're forgetting that the fighter can only trade out a bonus feat at 4th level and only 4 levels thereafter, so dipping wouldn't work.
Anyways, yeah, I'd let him even though it's not in the rules.
You're forgetting that the fighter can only trade out a bonus feat at 4th level and only 4 levels thereafter, so dipping wouldn't work.
Anyways, yeah, I'd let him even though it's not in the rules.
4th lvl...like when you get weapon specialisation? yeh, i've never heard of Fighter 4/Barb X builds.
I thought you could only switch out the bonus combat feats--which armor proficiencies are not.
|
IMO relative power is more important that total power. This is definitely giving the fighter a leg up on the rest of the classes. Are you letting the rest of your group do similar things?
The fact that fighters can change out their bonus feats is really nice but giving them the ability to cash in class abilities is a good bit beyond that. So if you are going to let him do that then consider giving the rest of your group a concession as well.
You're forgetting that the fighter can only trade out a bonus feat at 4th level and only 4 levels thereafter, so dipping wouldn't work.
Anyways, yeah, I'd let him even though it's not in the rules.
4th lvl...like when you get weapon specialisation? yeh, i've never heard of Fighter 4/Barb X builds.
Yes, but if you're taking 4 levels of another class you can't argue that you're not losing anything. You'll get fewer rage powers and gain barbarian abilities and improvements to your rage much later.
not true. If i took 4 lvls of cleric/paladin/druid (with dragonscale fullplate) i'm not losing anything.
I thought you could only switch out the bonus combat feats--which armor proficiencies are not.
That's true. I was looking to see if there was anything in the rules that would technically allow you to do this, but I was getting "bonus feat" confused with "combat bonus feat". Problem solved.
In the end it really sounds to me like an alternative fighter class feature, legal or not.
|
If you want to see how it could be done, here's the Fighter option we have in our PF game.
Weapon and Armor Proficiency: A fighter is proficient with all simple and martial weapons and with all armor (heavy, medium, and light) and light and heavy shields. Additionally, you gain proficiency in one exotic shield (e.g., tower shield or vambraces).
You can choose to give up your exotic shield proficiency to gain Dodge as a bonus feat instead. You can also elect to give up your light and heavy shield proficiencies to gain Combat Expertise as a bonus feat instead. If you take either or both of these options, gaining levels in a class that normally offers proficiency in shields does not grant you those proficiencies unless you choose to “trade in” the corresponding bonus feats in order to receive them.
Canny Defense (Ex): You can choose to trade your medium and heavy armor proficiencies for the Canny Defense class feature. When wearing light or no armor, you add 1 point of your Intelligence bonus (if any) per fighter level as an insight bonus to Armor Class and CMD. If you are caught flat-footed or otherwise denied your Dexterity bonus, you also lose this bonus. This supercedes the duelist prestige class feature of the same name.
You may substitute your Wisdom bonus instead of your Intelligence bonus; once this choice is made, it cannot be changed.
|
"Dang it! ANOTHER suit of +4 Full plate? Sheesh, doesn't anyone wear chainmail anymore? *sob*"
Because I'm mean.
"The rust monster attacks you and dissolves your medium armor. Your only remaining options are to fight without armor, or to wear that fullplate you just found. You do have the proficiency, right?" lol
my players love to hate the things I do to them :D
|
"Dang it! ANOTHER suit of +4 Full plate? Sheesh, doesn't anyone wear chainmail anymore? *sob*"
Because I'm mean.
"The rust monster attacks you and dissolves your medium armor. Your only remaining options are to fight without armor, or to wear that fullplate you just found. You do have the proficiency, right?" lol
my players love to hate the things I do to them :D
I only allow that sort of thing to happen if I randomly determined loot ahead of time. In which case, fate just hates them and I tell them so. In other words, I don't like going out of my way to screw a player :)
Though on a related note I did once play a character who wore fullplate for a full level before gaining proficiency. That made for some interesting "clumsy" moments.