I'm kicking off a new game and invited an old-timer player to join. He's grudgingly jumping into a PF game. When I asked what his frustration was, he lamented that the character building process was such a joke.
Per this player there's only a few "correct" feats to take and everything else is a trap. His example was Power Attack for a fighter. If you're a fighter Power Attack is the "right" feat to take and everything else is either sub-par or a trap.
That's been really grating on me. It assumes that my game will be so combat heavy that most scenes will be melee. What if the game slides political, or all the villains are ranged attackers?
Yes, some rare feats are brutally ineffective (I'm looking at you Fleet) to buy with such a finite resource. But as a GM I'm more about player empowerment. If you WANT to play a grippli with an Agile Tongue that you use for the Steal maneuver, I want that ability to shine so your feat choices are validated.
So does that make me a wuss GM? Are there really certain feats that are a "must" for PCs and everything else is worthless? Who else out there is willing to modify their game if their players want to make some of these so called sub-par feat choices?
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There is a limited number of "high quality" feats. Even if you say the campaign isn't combat heavy, Power Attack is still a high quality choice though your player has made a mistake in wanting to play a Fighter in the campaign. Which is another example of trap options. Playing a Fighter in a non-combat heavy campaign is a "worse" decision then playing a different class, because Fighters while competent at the DPR game, are significantly less capable then other classes outside of combat.
I understand the idea of "wanting to make a player shine", but that kind of correction does not change the actual effectiveness of things. Stealing an item from a foe sounds well and good, but you could have just picked feats that will kill the enemy more efficiently and then take the item from the corpse.
Now what feats are a "must" changes depending on what "style" of character the player is playing. I'm going to say style instead of class because Power Attack can be great on any number of classes that can use two-handed weapons well. Obviously on such a character, taking feats that support different "Styles" would be inefficient. But there are limited number of feats that are "high quality" for a two hand weapon user.
I hope the explanation makes this less grating.
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I understand the idea of "wanting to make a player shine", but that kind of correction does not change the actual effectiveness of things. Stealing an item from a foe sounds well and good, but you could have just picked feats that will kill the enemy more efficiently and then take the item from the corpse.
Stealing that enemy cleric's holy symbol not only shuts down his spell casting, but also would be a very memorable moment!
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Depends on the players and GM. It sounds like you're one of the nice kind of GM that does care about the players, and its just this guy. Let him take what he wants and treat it how you normally would, unless he's causing other problems.
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Per this player there's only a few "correct" feats to take and everything else is a trap. His example was Power Attack for a fighter. If you're a fighter Power Attack is the "right" feat to take and everything else is either sub-par or a trap.
...
Are there really certain feats that are a "must" for PCs and everything else is worthless?
Like so many topics on the boards, this is a very false oversimplification of a very real phenomenon.
Think for a moment about the feats you've actually seen or used at the table more than once. In fact, let's narrow it down to just "Combat" feats, that get used more than once.
About how many would you say there are, among your group? Ten? Twenty? Thirty?
I just checked out the PRD's index of all the Combat feats just in the Core RPG hardcover line, and there are over 400 of them!
So even if there are a whopping 40 Combat feats that commonly see play at your table, that's only 10% of the selection!
So although "a few correct choices and everything else sucks" isn't quite true, it's also not wholly unfounded. It's hyperbolic, but it's an exaggeration of a very true reality.
I understand the idea of "wanting to make a player shine", but that kind of correction does not change the actual effectiveness of things. Stealing an item from a foe sounds well and good, but you could have just picked feats that will kill the enemy more efficiently and then take the item from the corpse.Stealing that enemy cleric's holy symbol not only shuts down his spell casting, but also would be a very memorable moment!
Making them dead is far more effective in this regard. Who makes a Cleric with only one holy symbol anyway?
@Jiggy - While you are correct that there are only a "few" viable feats is a massive oversimplification, I would say that 10%* of feats total being viable is probably correct. That means that 90%* of feats aren't really worth your time. Now, there are corner cases where otherwise unused feats become very valuable for particular characters, but even factoring those in 15%* of all feats total are worth using.
Even then though, within that 10%* of viable feats, any one particular style is only going to use a fraction of that. I don't think it would be an oversimplification to suggest that for any given style there are about 4-5%* feats out of the over total worth using. Which is still quite few feats, but not really as vast a selection as you would think.
*All statistics made up on the spot for the purpose of helping with the explanation.
Per this player there's only a few "correct" feats to take and everything else is a trap. His example was Power Attack for a fighter. If you're a fighter Power Attack is the "right" feat to take and everything else is either sub-par or a trap.
...
Are there really certain feats that are a "must" for PCs and everything else is worthless?
Like so many topics on the boards, this is a very false oversimplification of a very real phenomenon.
Think for a moment about the feats you've actually seen or used at the table more than once. In fact, let's narrow it down to just "Combat" feats, that get used more than once.
About how many would you say there are, among your group? Ten? Twenty? Thirty?
I just checked out the PRD's index of all the Combat feats just in the Core RPG hardcover line, and there are over 400 of them!
So even if there are a whopping 40 Combat feats that commonly see play at your table, that's only 10% of the selection!
So although "a few correct choices and everything else sucks" isn't quite true, it's also not wholly unfounded. It's hyperbolic, but it's an exaggeration of a very true reality.
Honestly, I think a large part of this comes from familiarity, and another large portion from prerequisites.
I know Power Attack. It's core rule book.It's a prerequisite for a number of combat maneuvers and a great number of those other 95% of combat feats.
Until a player decided to use it, I did not know of Piranha Strike.
It's in a splat book and a prerequisite for... um? Other feats in that splat book?
Honestly, I may make a character that would benefit from Piranha Strike over Power Attack but use Power Attack simply because I'm familiar with it.
I wouldn't say balance/optimization topics are myths, just that the reason for them is one of familiarity with the material.
I think what you are doing is great and i believe it is what we all strive for , making our players shine and have fun with us.
With this said , your player is correct and i dont think many will disagree here , some feats are just better , reason they are used often while others are forgotten or used rarely , which are a vast majority.
A PC cant be a beast at everything , in the end he ends up making choices and yes , if he wanted to play a melee fighter , he wont be great at ranged low lvl and wont be great at social tests probably also , but like you said once he made the choice , one expects the DM to allow his kind of PC to funtion and usually we want to , so we make it function.
An example , im playing a sorc right now on a table , i love having performance , so my sorc has a ridiculously high check there (i got 100+ on the skill check last time) , i got a completely useless feat (Magnum Opus) , this last adventure the DM allowed us to infiltrate an enemy city using bluff/diplo checks AND my excuse of being a great artist that wanted to play for the leaders of said town.
I got a chance to shine using my performance for a little bit and it helped us to advance , which made me quite happy.
Still , would this be as useful as a metamagic feat i could use every fight? No , yet my DM allows me to use it from to time and i have great fun with it.
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I just checked out the PRD's index of all the Combat feats just in the Core RPG hardcover line, and there are over 400 of them!
So even if there are a whopping 40 Combat feats that commonly see play at your table, that's only 10% of the selection!
I think even as low as 10% is an overstatment.
Some of the feats - Weapon Focus/Power Attack etc. - are more general feats which are useful for a lot of different builds. (Though I still think PA is overrated. :P)
Many feats are designed for niche builds. Are they used nearly as often? Of course not. But they're still quite useful in some builds and/or situationally. Ex: Ankle Biter / Blinding Sneak Attack / Claw Pounce / Cornugon Smash / Deathless Zealot / Dirty Trick Master / Disengaging Feint / etc. (that's just skimming into the D's :P)
Are are going to see any of those on the vast majority of builds? No. Definitely not. However, on certain character builds they can all be quite solid feat picks.
Are there feats which are just plain weak? Yes. But I'd argue that close to 50% are, at least on some character builds, solid feat picks.
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It also helps to keep in mind that Core Rulebook feats are generally MUCH more simplistic and general than expanded library feats, and thus are going to be picked WAY more often.
Toughness gives you bonus HP
Power Attack makes you hit harder.
Dodge and Shield Focus make you harder to hit.
Weapon Focus and Specialization make you better with one particular weapon.
Spell Penetration helps you overcome SR.
Combat Casting improves your concentration checks.
Skill Focus makes you better at a given skill.
Etc.
These are all really obvious, simple to understand feats that benefit anyone who uses those kind of feats (caster feats for casters,weapon feats for martials, and so on).
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@Mark Hoover
Let me tell you what a player told me once I asked him why he took so many combat feats: "Because it all boils down to combat". I personally like combat as a GM, but I like it in a golden middle, not too much of it, not too little. Even after I specifically declared to my players that they may build any characters they wish to, they still built them for combat exclusively and took exclusively combat feats. I was and still am slightly disappointed with it, but it was their choice so I complied and moved on. My advice, let him take what he wants, but if he starts to complain about it, explain him politely what your campaign is about.
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Sounds like he's going to ruin your table from day one. He's coming into the campaign with a horrible attitude and it won't get any better.
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I just checked out the PRD's index of all the Combat feats just in the Core RPG hardcover line, and there are over 400 of them!
So even if there are a whopping 40 Combat feats that commonly see play at your table, that's only 10% of the selection!
I think even as low as 10% is an overstatment.
Some of the feats - Weapon Focus/Power Attack etc. - are more general feats which are useful for a lot of different builds. (Though I still think PA is overrated. :P)
Many feats are designed for niche builds. Are they used nearly as often? Of course not. But they're still quite useful in some builds and/or situationally. Ex: Ankle Biter / Blinding Sneak Attack / Claw Pounce / Cornugon Smash / Deathless Zealot / Dirty Trick Master / Disengaging Feint / etc. (that's just skimming into the D's :P)
Are are going to see any of those on the vast majority of builds? No. Definitely not. However, on certain character builds they can all be quite solid feat picks.
Are there feats which are just plain weak? Yes. But I'd argue that close to 50% are, at least on some character builds, solid feat picks.
I wasn't talking about "seen on the vast majority of builds", I said "seen at your table more than once".
My percentages were just guesses (hence why I framed them as questions I was asking of Mark Hoover), and could well be off.
But 50% are "solid picks" for the right builds? In Combat feats alone, that's well over 200 "solid pick" feats. Even for niche builds, that claim seems shaky to me.
Per this player there's only a few "correct" feats to take and everything else is a trap. His example was Power Attack for a fighter. If you're a fighter Power Attack is the "right" feat to take and everything else is either sub-par or a trap.
That's his mindset and there's nothing you can do to fix his dissatisfaction short of getting him to change his mindset. The problem isn't the Pathfinder system either, because he's running up against a reality that's nearly universal to all games: The more strongly you want to optimize toward any one goal, the narrower your choices are going to be.
In your friend's case picking fighter may be what's causing his consternation. For fighters there really are a set of feats (anyone ever play a fighter without weapon specialization) which more or less feel "mandatory", which flies in the face of the initial appearance of the class being the most open ended due to the multitude of feats they get.
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But 50% are "solid picks" for the right builds? In Combat feats alone, that's well over 200 "solid pick" feats. Even for niche builds, that claim seems shaky to me.
See - that just makes me want to count them up. But - where do you draw the line on 'solid' makes a big difference. And frankly - it'd take way too long to chew through.
(Of note - I said specifically 'solid' not top tier - and many only work on what is NOT a 'top tier' build.)
I'll go through the A's though.
Bad feats
Adder Strike
Ammo Drop
Anticipate Dodge
Arc Slinger
Armored Athlete
Artillery Team
Pinpoint Poisoner
Artful Dodge
Archon Style x3
All-Con Swing
Solid - at least in niche builds
Arcane Strike
Armor Prof x3
Awesome Blow
Imp Awesome Blow
Arcane Armor Training
Arcane Armor Mastery
Aquatic Combatant
Ankle Biter
Ances. Weapon Mastery
Ambush Squad
Amateur Swashbuckler
Amateur Gunslinger
Agile Maneuvers
Adv Def Com. Training
So - in the Combat Feats - under the letter A we have 12 duds (that I can't see a decent use for) and 16 which I see as potentially solid picks. Not commonly - most are either for niche builds or niche campaigns. (Ex: Aquatic Combatant would be solid in Skull & Shackles - but far too situational in most games)
So - in the A's - it looks like 57.14% are potentially solid. Though of course - it's possible that the letter A is an outlier... but I'm not going through the whole freakin' list. :P
(Of note - I meant close to 50% above in reference to the combat feats. There are a much higher % of junk feats outside of the combat ones.)
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I'd be more worried about someone playing a fighter in a political intrigue game than their feat choices.
It's not true, but ...
There is something hidden in there. What you say is absolutely true. It's easy to come up with a roleplay justification for whatever mechanically sound build you've come up with. Many who talk roleplay and optimization being compatible stop there, with the Stormwind Fallacy. There is no conflict. If you start with optimized mechanics.
What that overlooks is that if you start building your character from the other end, there is a conflict. Not all interesting character concepts are mechanically sound. The farther you ramp up the power level/challenge for the game, the more you'll run into this.
This is much better said that my messy wall of text. Agreed 100%
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Though of course - it's possible that the letter A is an outlier...
Especially since you counted the armor proficiency feats as "solid" (we're talking about actually spending feats, right?) and counted Improved Awesome Blow as an "A".
But even if we accept those inclusions, then we've proven demonstrated that maybe half-ish of the feats are worth using? That still shows that "bad" feats are a very real presence, as opposed to some kind of outlier.
Which, in turn, I think ultimately supports my earlier statement that Mark Hoover's player's assessment is what you might call "an exaggeration with a foundation in truth".
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There is something hidden in there. What you say is absolutely true. It's easy to come up with a roleplay justification for whatever mechanically sound build you've come up with. Many who talk roleplay and optimization being compatible stop there, with the Stormwind Fallacy. There is no conflict. If you start with optimized mechanics.
What that overlooks is that if you start building your character from the other end, there is a conflict. Not all interesting character concepts are mechanically sound. The farther you ramp up the power level/challenge for the game, the more you'll run into this.
Its really only a problem if you have your character set in stone with a novel of a backstory that you think is the platonic ideal of perfection from which any deviation is ruining your creation. Yes, optimiation will effect your role playing but that doesn't mean that it will make it worse. They're not the same thing.
Usually when people say this the mistake they're making is trying to add personality depth with their mechanics. They have to have skill focus profession: farmer instead of being satisfied with 1 rank. This works for something in someone's head but doesn't really translate for the table who don't get to see your character sheet. If your character concept is farmboy the rank is probably fine. The player adds personality and depth, not the mechanics.
Sometimes mechanics can help you spark ideas or give you a frame work to play off of. I have a faux rogue druid and (in the ancient days before there was a trait for everything) took a feat to give him stealth and disable device as class skills. The feat Hermean blood gave me the idea for a druid who'd been voted off the island. it added a lot of self depreciating personality that went well with the 7 charisma and an animal companion that tended to push him around.
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Sorry - I'm not seeing how you're empowering your players given what you've shared.
He wants to build a fighter. Great! Empower him to do so!
You admit that there are sub-optimal (or even Bad/trap) feats, right?
And if your campaign is going to "slide political," you can certainly advise him of that and recommend feats/traits that would support him as a fighter in that world.
I really don't see what should be grating on your nerves based on your original post. Which suggests that the problem truly lies elsewhere. Maybe you sense he's not going to be a good match for your table?
It doesn't require a novel or platonic ideal. And it's not necessarily even the backstory. Maybe, like Snow_Tiger's example above, you're starting with a visual image or something. There are basic mechanical concepts that are really second rate.
There are. But whats the other option? Go 4e and have every option be the same?
If your image of the character, as a person, is RUIINED! switching from a crossbow to a longbow then yes, you are setting things in stone. It doesn't affect your characterization or the person. Not being able to adapt your character in the least bit isn't really the fault of a system.
Again it depends on the level of optimization needed. In some cases, you're screwed if you want anything that doesn't cast spells. In easier games, you can make anything work.
In almost any game you can make any character concept work (even if some are going to require a trip to the optimization boards) Who cares if the golarion nuclear death match has nothing but the same carbon copy wizard. If you don't like that campaign, don't play in it.
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Though of course - it's possible that the letter A is an outlier...Especially since you counted the armor proficiency feats as "solid" (we're talking about actually spending feats, right?) and counted Improved Awesome Blow as an "A".
But even if we accept those inclusions, then we've
provendemonstrated that maybe half-ish of the feats are worth using? That still shows that "bad" feats are a very real presence, as opposed to some kind of outlier.Which, in turn, I think ultimately supports my earlier statement that Mark Hoover's player's assessment is what you might call "an exaggeration with a foundation in truth".
I'm totally with you. In my initial assessment above I guessed that a bit over 50% of combat feats were straight up bad. But even excluding the 3 armor prof. feats - over half of the A's were potentially solid choices.
(I also included Pinpoint Poisoner in the A's since that's how it's organized in the SRD. Removing both it and Imp Awesome Blow would actually slightly increase the % of solid feats.)
Sorry - I'm not seeing how you're empowering your players given what you've shared.
He wants to build a fighter. Great! Empower him to do so!
You admit that there are sub-optimal (or even Bad/trap) feats, right?
And if your campaign is going to "slide political," you can certainly advise him of that and recommend feats/traits that would support him as a fighter in that world.
I really don't see what should be grating on your nerves based on your original post. Which suggests that the problem truly lies elsewhere. Maybe you sense he's not going to be a good match for your table?
Power Attack is a good feat that is a prerequisite for many other feats. It is well suited for a Fighter, so there is nothing wrong with the old-timer's choice of Power Attack. However, Paizo has published many other good feats. Taking Power Attack every time and complaining that other feats are traps is like ordering vanilla ice cream every time at Baskin-Robbins 31 Flavors and then complaining that Baskin-Robbins does not have any other good flavors! A player has to deliberately turn a blind eye on the outstanding skills of Paizo's designers to suggest that most published source material on Pathfinder character creation is useless.
Let me tell you what a player told me once I asked him why he took so many combat feats: "Because it all boils down to combat". I personally like combat as a GM, but I like it in a golden middle, not too much of it, not too little. Even after I specifically declared to my players that they may build any characters they wish to, they still built them for combat exclusively and took exclusively combat feats. I was and still am slightly disappointed with it, but it was their choice so I complied and moved on. My advice, let him take what he wants, but if he starts to complain about it, explain him politely what your campaign is about.
In my campaigns it all boils down to information gathering.
Combat seems like the most important element of the game, since if the players lose at combat they could all die. Yet when I run Paizo's Pathfinder Adventure Paths, the key is exploring the setting, finding allies and information, scouting the danger, and hitting that danger at its weak point. Going into battle without advance information means that the party has to be twice as good at combat to survive. It means retreating to lick wounds, and even then, retreating well requires information on safe places to camp. I have played in combat-only parties and they scramble for marginal successes. They never seem on top of the situation.
Therefore, some of my players build characters who mastered social skills or stealth or charm spells to gather information. Others build characters that mastered combat. We have variety. And we have more fun.
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t when I run Paizo's Pathfinder Adventure Paths, the key is exploring the setting, finding allies and information, scouting the danger, and hitting that danger at its weak point. Going into battle without advance information means that the party has to be twice as good at combat to survive.
I hear about this often, but have no idea how it could actually be done in pathfiner.
The wizard picked his spells this morning, the sorcerer picked his spells when he leveled, and the fighter has a beat stick to hit things with.
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Bad featsArtful Dodge
Artful Dodge is a great feat. It allows you to use Intelligence in place of Dexterity for qualifying for feats, and it's not useless on it's own.
It's awesome for any high intelligence (or high CHA for swashbucklers) class that wants to gain TWF or Archery feats.
Fair enough - I'm sure that there are many feats which I would write off at first glance which have solid niche uses.
I'm in agreement that if roleplaying is the emphasis of the game, then picking the perfect 10 feats to maximize optimization of your character is much less of an issue.
That doesn't mean that combat and other encounter challenges are ignored or minimized. I just mean to suggest a game where the players are well-rewarded for exploration and building relationships with NPCs and being involved with the game world in ways that don't always require killing everything that moves - in addition to killing some things that move.
In a game like that, some players might just settle for a 2nd-best, or 3rd-best feat. Sometimes. When it's cool and fits their play style.
Also, if every encounter is a nail-biter that comes down to the last HP that decides if the party goes up a level or suffers a TPK, then of course players are going to optimize for that. It's the only way to survive. But if the game has many fight, most fights, where the PCs breeze through unscathed and rarely, if ever, have fights so hard that the outcome is gravely in doubt, then players are less worried about picking that perfect feat to survive their next battle.
It all comes down to the tone, the difficulty, and the pace of the game set by the GM. And if the players are clear from the start, it is often not an issue.
At least it hasn't been for me, across essentially 15 years of this optimizable game and across at least that many groups of players during that time in many gaming groups. There's always an exception, but they can learn.
Lol @ guy complaining about needing to make optimal choices choosing to roll up a FIGHTER.
The irony wasn't lost on me either. ;)
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Lol @ guy complaining about needing to make optimal choices choosing to roll up a FIGHTER.The irony wasn't lost on me either. ;)
While the irony is rich, it's still a valid concern on multiple levels:
1. Playing a fighter (or any class) should never be ironic or sub-optimal. All classes should be viable.
2. Fighter or not, the point that so much content (previous posts in this thread suggested as much as 95%) is ignorable and likely ignored by nearly all players is a really big concern.
Both of those problems should have never been allowed to exist, and should be fixed. But they won't be. So we all just live with it. I don't blame some players for being jaded by this.
Lol @ guy complaining about needing to make optimal choices choosing to roll up a FIGHTER.The irony wasn't lost on me either. ;)While the irony is rich, it's still a valid concern on multiple levels:
1. Playing a fighter (or any class) should never be ironic or sub-optimal. All classes should be viable.
2. Fighter or not, the point that so much content (previous posts in this thread suggested as much as 95%) is ignorable and likely ignored by nearly all players is a really big concern.Both of those problems should have never been allowed to exist, and should be fixed. But they won't be. So we all just live with it. I don't blame some players for being jaded by this.
It's part of the sales model for the game.
Every player companion has at most 1-2 worthwhile feats, maybe one good archetype, and maybe something else. It makes them so much money due to PFS since you end up with a character needing about 10 purchases.
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t when I run Paizo's Pathfinder Adventure Paths, the key is exploring the setting, finding allies and information, scouting the danger, and hitting that danger at its weak point. Going into battle without advance information means that the party has to be twice as good at combat to survive.I hear about this often, but have no idea how it could actually be done in pathfiner.
The wizard picked his spells this morning, the sorcerer picked his spells when he leveled, and the fighter has a beat stick to hit things with.
Advance intelligence is pretty much the ultimate in battlefield control. The party picks the battlefield that favors their tactics, rather than optimizing battlefield skills to make them work against everything. Here's some examples from games I ran:
In my game, the party captured the leader of the invading band alive, and the party's enchanter sorcerer interrogated him under a Charm Person spell. They learned that Jorgenfist was built around the Black Tower, sufficiently familiar to the party's wizard loremaster's very high Knowledge(History) to be able to teleport into the vicinity. The party's lyrakien bard flew over the fortress to scout, for she was tiny with a maxed Stealth and essentially undetectible at a distance. They knew better than to wade into the army for combat, though for a few days they tried skirmishing at the edges and teleporting away to a comfortable inn in Magnimar.
Xanesha, the BBEG from two modules before, had turned double agent, hoping to get the party to kill Mokmurian so that she could take charge. Mokmurian scryed the skirmishers harassing his army and gave Xanesha a teleport scroll to lead a band of commandos to defeat the party early in the morning at the inn in Magnimar. The party won, but Xanesha follwed up with Mokmurian's backup plan of trying to hire the party. That gave her a chance to covertly pass information to the party despite Mokmurian scrying on her. (This paragraph was me improvising because the skirmishes had gotten boring.)
After that the party used the secret escape tunnel into the underground rooms. The party's rogue disabled the traps on the tunnel. The party fought in the occupied section, quietly one room at a time. However, the loremaster knew enough due to Mokmurian's job offer to bluff several encounters. Eventually the alarm went up, they had to escape, and the tunnel became heavily guarded, but they had found the other entrance and used that one invisibly the next day. They encountered Conna, the ally put there by the module, who directed them toward Mokmurian's lab.
Hence, they did not have to fight an army on the surface. I could afford to make the guards act competently, because the party was prepared to hide or bluff or escape. The strike against Mokmurian himself was almost surgical.
It was easy to tweak this to make it more political. The lamia ruled the city, but I split them into four factions. Most were evil opportunists with no loyalty. Some faithfully worshipped Lamashtu, goddess of monsters. Others harked back to Runelord Karzoug, the master of the city who would return. And the smallest faction followed Pharasma, the goddess who had originally cursed her fallen priestesses to become lamia, in hope that faithful service would earn redemption. The skulks directed the party to a lamia cleric of Pharasma, who happened to be Xanesha's daughter. Xanesha was an opportunist, but she finally had to pick a side and she decided the party was the better opportunity. In Xin-Shalast she was only a lowly agent to be send on errands to the outside world, but she knew things that could aid the party, such as which reclusive residents had Sihedron rings necessary to enter Karzoug's stronghold.
The party's allies directed them away from unnecessary encounters that would alert the leaders of Xin-Shalast. For the necessary encounters, the party pulled a few tricks. For example, they had to retreat after a battle with rune giants. But they had battled yeti before the rune giants, so they faked a battle between yeti and rune giants with the corpses to hide their presence in the city. For the final battle, a few false orders to gullible commanders started a civil war.
This was the 3.5 version of Rise of the Runelords, an adventure path known as a combat grind. Yet against players with the skill to pick their battles, I had to increase the CR of the key battles to make them sufficiently challenging. And that made them more satisfying to the players, who had earned those victories with both brain and brawn.
So does that make me a wuss GM? Are there really certain feats that are a "must" for PCs and everything else is worthless? Who else out there is willing to modify their game if their players want to make some of these so called sub-par feat choices?
A particular style of combat-based play greatly favors certain feats. With a greater variety of paths to victory than pure combat, such as information or subterfuge, the players have greater variety in roles. Those other roles favor other feats.
I understand the idea of "wanting to make a player shine", but that kind of correction does not change the actual effectiveness of things. Stealing an item from a foe sounds well and good, but you could have just picked feats that will kill the enemy more efficiently and then take the item from the corpse.
Let's use this as an example. Why steal an item mid-combat instead of killing the wielder? First, it could be an in-town adventure where the city guard wants the party to stand trial for any killing. Capturing enemies alive would be more convenient. Second, Mark Hoover mentioned it was stealing with a grippli Agile Tongue. That has a 10-foot reach, which can be used while protected by a heavy shield or climbing on the wall. That gives a chance to debuff the opponent before engaging in full-attack melee combat.
If the GM challenges the party with magical animals that have nothing to steal, the grippli would find few opportunities to use that specialized attack. If the GM challenges the party with wand-wielding wizards, the grippli will rule. The GM can control the effectiveness of that particular build.
Let's use this as an example. Why steal an item mid-combat instead of killing the wielder? First, it could be an in-town adventure where the city guard wants the party to stand trial for any killing. Capturing enemies alive would be more convenient. Second, Mark Hoover mentioned it was stealing with a grippli Agile Tongue. That has a 10-foot reach, which can be used while protected by a heavy shield or climbing on the wall. That gives a chance to debuff the opponent before engaging in full-attack melee combat.
Let's go over the problems:
1. So the city guards are fine with stealing, but not murder? I mean if that person is going to fight with you, self-defense them to death.
2. I mean you can use steal in both those situations anyway. The only benefit is the reach, which while fine, is kind of a waste of a feat.
3. There are much much better debuffs. Consider your choice of intimidation application and the Hurtful feat for example. Add the Cruel enhancement to your weapon for kicks.
4. Wand wielding Wizard? All that did was take away those Wizards *least* effective attack option.
Due the above issues, I recommend either revising your argument or conceding the point.
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Yes, some rare feats are brutally ineffective (I'm looking at you Fleet) to buy with such a finite resource. But as a GM I'm more about player empowerment. If you WANT to play a grippli with an Agile Tongue that you use for the Steal maneuver, I want that ability to shine so your feat choices are validated.
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Now I've got this image stuck in my head of an empowered Jar Jar Binks . . . .