I have a 12th level campaign I've been running for about a year, the group is 4 people each with 2 pc's. After considerable time thinking about it I've decided to cut the group to 4 characters, mainly because encounters take FOREVER with a large group.
One of the pc's has a cohort and wants to replace the current cohort with his second character, I don't think this would sit well with the other players. I think they would ask for the same privilege which will not help my main problem of reducing encounter time. Just looking for outside advice on this particular situation.
Also, how do most of you handle gear and other similar considerations with cohorts? Do you feel cohorts are a little strong for 1 feat which has the potential to add a permanent powerful ally to the party like a second character? I'm new to cohorts (we've rarely used them in the past) and just want some advice about them, I know I've heard that some games ban them and was wondering for what reasons.
I think most players (certainly most DMs that I've seen chime in on the subject) feel that the leadership feat is overpowered to the point of being broken. For many reasons, some of which you point out in your post.
No other feat in the book has anywhere near the potential for breaking game balance or action economy that the Leadership feat has.
Not only that, but a player should expect to gain the benefits of the feat immediately. After all, if he took Great Cleave instead of Leadership, he could use his feat in his very next encounter, so having similar expectations of the Leadership feat might be justified.
So, take this one feat and there is a sudden knock on the door. Open the door and there stands your new cohort and a whole throng of devoted followers ready to set up shop in your base of operations. Awkward, to say the least. But if the DM says "Great, now you have the feat, let's spend the next year or two recruiting your followers" then the player will feel like he's being deliberately punished because now he has a feat that he can't even use.
Also, maybe a DM decides to have a dragon raid the player's citadel and lay it to waste, killing the followers. Or maybe a plot device to kill the cohort through some nefarious assassination plan. But, doing so means the DM is breaking the PC's feat. It would be like taking away Cleave or Dodge or whatever - if those feats cannot be taken away, they why would it be fair to take away the Leadership feat by killing off the cohort/followers as a plot device?
Many GMs in my acquaintance simply ban the feat altogether. If you want to build an army of followers in their games, you do it through RP, not through a simple game mechanic with instant benefits and no consequences.
I tend to agree with this viewpoint. I prefer my players to roleplay their careers. Impress the locals. Build or otherwise acquire a home-base. Go to town and recruit (hire and pay for) the laborers, staff, and guards for the base. Find their own cohorts and entice them to join the group for whatever reasons (fame, glory, loot, training, whatever).
This has many advantages:
1. It takes time. No awkward knock on the door when your army of followers arrives overnight.
2. It rewards roleplaying rather than rewarding a simple feat selection.
3. It's now perfectly fair to use those cohorts and followers as plot devices.
4. The player can spend their feat selection on something more mechanically balanced.
To answer the other question in your post, if you tell your players "No, you can only have one character each, except for Dave who gets to keep both of his characters because of a mechanical loophole in the rules", I would fully expect the rest of the players to grumble about that.
And as for cohort gear, when a player acquires this feat you do the math to figure out the cohort's level (which cannot be higher than two levels below the PC). Then you provide appropriate gear based on the Wealth-by-Level table in the book (or if you prefer, just guesstimate, depending on your own DMing style). This becomes his starting equipment.
And that's it. He never gets any new gear directly from the DM. New gear comes from his boss, the PC with the Leadership feat. If the Cohort rises 10 levels, but the PC never gives him new gear, then he will still have his starting gear. Of course, a DM is very well within hi rights to have the cohort be reasonably upset about this, maybe even leave. Just because the PC has the Leadership feat doesn't mean he is immune to consequences of mistreating his cohort. I would also suggest that you don't increase the treasure hoards. Don't say "Oh, now that we have a cohort, the group will divide treasure 5 ways instead of 4, so I need to add more loot). Nope. Give the loot based on the number of PCs like you always have, and hopefully each PC gets 1/4 of the loot, and the guy with the cohort has to give up some of his loot to pass it on to the cohort. In other words, having a cohort should not be an excuse to get two shares of loot, one for the PC and then an extra share of loot because he took a clever feat.
If you do use the feat I advise to use npc classes and built them according to specific roles and have the players pick.
for example :
a bodyguard, a healer, squire, scribe, merchant, maybe even the family genie there might be a few others you will allow.
Bodyguard might be a warrior of appropriate CR that stays by the character and has appropriate feats you selected, build one from level 1 to 20 and deny your players say in the matter. This might be the most playable cohort.
Healer might be an adept or expert/cleric.
squire will be much like the warrior with a different feat selection using aid another actions much of the time.
scribe might be a bard/expert, helping you to become famous.
merchant might be an expert/rogue that specializes in getting the best prices and finding rare goods for sale.
family genie, doesnt grant wishes in the literal sense, mostly it is a highly priced and respected manservant creating food / water, mending clothes and such, calling upon the genie in combat should be rarely done, since the death of the genie brings disgrace to your family. This particular genie might be given expert levels as advancement.
I realize it is not really related to your problem, but thought it might give some fun ideas =)
I think most players (certainly most DMs that I've seen chime in on the subject) feel that the leadership feat is overpowered to the point of being broken. For many reasons, some of which you point out in your post...
I certainly see plenty of room for it to be abused but I dont think its gone that far in my own game yet. Gear certainly hasnt gotten out of hand because as you mentioned, I dont toss in an extra share for the cohort, it simply comes from the normal allotment of loot. The problem that I see however is that its a single tier feat that basically buys you up to a level-2 ally to follow you around. At 12th level that's a 10th level NPC following you around, that would seem to validate an APL adjustment to the character but there is no mention of that in the rules and a well geared one is an even bigger boost.
The problem of immediate followers didnt pop up as I started them at 12th, however, if someone got the feat at 7th I could certainly see how it would be an odd knock at the door.
I also agree heavily about the plot utilization point, I've considered the same thing but as you said, it penalizes taking the feat especially if the cohort dies and they take a penalty on the next one.
Everything else is pretty spot on as well. Xp is a function of the character's xp, 2 levels lower, below NPC WBL starting gear. I'm pretty sure I'll just say either pick the pc with the cohort and keep the current one or the one without as that seems the most fair and the least munchkiny. I really dont want to adjudicate that characters equipment as an npc cohort, it would not be pretty and the player would come out disappointed with it in the long run I think.
"No, you can only have one character each, except for Dave who gets to keep both of his characters because of a mechanical loophole in the rules"
Lol, either you've been spying on my group or this is a lucky guess.
OR for real fun have players tell you what feats they hope to gain in the future, or what feat combinations they want to use. I would hate to see a player three feats into a tree to a feat that is banned!
I wasnt planning to ban the feat just curious as to reasons or methods of abuse I have experienced/considered.
"No, you can only have one character each, except for Dave who gets to keep both of his characters because of a mechanical loophole in the rules"Lol, either you've been spying on my group or this is a lucky guess.
LOL, so I'm guessing the player's name is Dave then?
No syping here (I save that for the ninja threads), so it was just a lucky guess. Then again, Daves are as plentiful as sand in the Sahara - it's not like I correctly guessed that his name was Rumplestiltskin...
Talk to your players. Explain your concerns. Let their creative minds help you all find a solution that works well for everyone.
Or go back to first edition and let a fighter can only be granted land and build a keep at 9th level.
The keep and wages offered attract followers over time.
At 9th level the fighter becomes a "lord"
Hey don't blame me it was 1.0.......
OR for real fun have players tell you what feats they hope to gain in the future, or what feat combinations they want to use. I would hate to see a player three feats into a tree to a feat that is banned!
I miss 1.0 the GM was GOD and nobody dare question him!
My thoughts on leadership:
Now, with that out of the way:
I think the whole leadership/cohort thing has great potential. It allows you to have an extra character if you're short on heroes, and can take on jobs nobody else wants, like healer.