I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one that had this or other similar thoughts about ancestry feats, but since its usually either skill feats or general geats who receive most of the criticism and this topic was brought with a friend today I decided that making a post about it to see what people think could make an interesting discussion, so here I go.
I'll preface this by saying that I don't think ancestry feats are bad, in fact, I'd say that in some casws ancestry feats are the only ones that can really compete with class feats (which are budgeted to be the strongest type or feat), but I feel that in average most ancestry feats are...okay? For example, Natural Ambition and General Training are ancestry feats which some think should be available to all ancestries and not just humans, but if that were to be the case, what feats are humans going to take? I don't think its even a case of these two feats being soo god that make all the other feats look bad, but with the exception of Unconventional Weaponry which you aren't going to take if you are a caster or a martial that plans to use a martial weapon (effectively 90% of characters if not more?, Clever Improviser which is situational but really good when it comes up, and Multitalented which is a good send for FA games since most regular archetypes usually end at 10th level or so, all the other human feats are really lackluster.
A type of ancestry feat that's really common are the type of ancestry feats which give you innate spells, which have the problem of either not scaling at all either in terms of their effects and DCs making them obsolete really fast, if not from the get go, or that for flavor or mechanical reasons you'll not even consider taking them. For example, if you are playing the classic sword-and-board fighter its very likely you don't envision your character having magic out of nowhere, but much worse is that you likely already have an action routine with your character so it would be near impossible for you to use that spell anyways, which as I already said before, since they aren't that strong it would mean that to use it you'll likely be wasting actions that could have been spent doing something more effective like a Aid which is one action unlike most spells.
Another type of feat that's really common to see in most ancestries are the "You become trained in X skill" type of feats. Like, did someone ever took one of these? Skill proficiences aren't exactly scarce but even if you really wanted to squeeze that extra trained skill you could take the Skill Training feat and instead use that ancestry feat for something arguably more useful. I welcome the change that all the ancestry lore feats now scale with Additional Lore but, like in the previous example, you could already take Additional Lore and use that ancestry feat for something else. I feel most people like the quirky neat little effects that some ancestry feats give you that hammer down the flavor of their chosen ancestry, hence why I think taking a feat that gives you something that's so mundane like training in a skill or auto-scaling in a Lore not only are suboptimal choices by themselves but also boring because they don't feel unique.
This problem is arguably not unique to ancestry feats but feats in general in PF2e, but while both classes feats and general feats have ways around them ancestry feats don't. This is that, in some circumstances and with certain characters, that its possible for you to run into a situation in which none of the ancestry feats you have available really suits with your character or playstyle. As I said before, this is arguably a problem that its not unique to ancestry feats, but in the case of class feats if there really isn't a single feat from your class that you would want to take you can take an archetype dedication or an archetype feat if you have the dedication already, or in the case of general feats take a skill feat, which is likely going to happen since there's so few general feats and the fact that you get general feats exactly at the levels in which you become expert / master / legendary with a skill kind of make that a viable choice. Even with skill feats themselves, which I don't like their implementation in PF2e, just by the sheer amount of them its very likely there would be at least one you'll want to take, but ancestry feats on top of all the problems I said also have the problem of being limited in numbers. Each ancestry has like 12 or so feats, so its very likely that at some point you'll run into a level in which there isn't a single feat that you like, but unlike class feats or general feats, there's no ways around it and you'll have to take a feat you don't want.
With all the discussions that always bring up possible changes to an hypothetical PF3e, I would be really happy if in this hypothetical future edition we took a step back and we simply had general feats at odd levels and class feats at 1st level and at each even level afterwards. General feats, in this system, would encompass ancestry feats too which would IMO solve problems for both sides (since general feats also have a problem of being too few, even more than ancestry feats, not to mention much more restricted with prerequisites gor some reason). Skill feats could also be thrown into the mix based on how skills work in that system. I would personally prefer fewer but more impactful skill feats, but that's a whole different discussion.
I'm writting this at 6AM so sorry if this feels a little all over the place.
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There are quite a few ancestry feats that, while only applicable to a very small number of characters, are incredibly important to those characters. Either mechanically or for roleplaying reasons.
For example, the gnome Animal Elocutionist is absolutely central to one of my characters. Various racial flight abilities (especially Strix) are often central to the character concept.
I think the current situation is actually pretty much ok. Many ancestries are very close to optimal for some particular character concept, most have feats to enhance the ancestries flavour. Oh, there are some feats that I'd probably never take but
1) Better to have a few too many options
2) I'm not the entire player base :-). The fact they don't appeal to me doesn't mean they don't appeal to others. I've seen players take what I thought were underpowered feats and have a whale of a good time with them and even get considerable mechanical benefit from them
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Ancestry feats are a good idea. A thing I very much don't miss from PF1 is "having to sort through a bunch of alternative racial traits to find ones that allow me to play a dwarf PC who isn't greedy and hateful." Moreover, it's good that "who your people are" is something that matters throughout your entire career rather than just once at chargen.
However, PF2 has a problem generally in that it simply makes more sense to print rules content that is accessible to a wide variety of PCs than to a small subset of PCs. This is why we see "archetypes" more often than we do "new subclasses", since a new sorcerer bloodline can only ever be chosen by sorcerers who are created after its publication, but an archetype can be taken by everybody ever.
So we still have a huge number of ancestries with a very small number of ancestry feats (many don't even have *a* level 17 ancestry feat) and this is going to become an even bigger problem with Starfinder 2e which is going to have more ancestries and fewer classes relative to Pathfinder 2e.
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Kind of wilding over the idea that two skills and a scaling lore is somehow bad.
My biggest problem with ancestry feats is that a lot of non-core ancestries simply don't have enough of them, and your options can feel really limited if you aren't adding in a versatile heritage or adopted to round out your list.
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Kind of wilding over the idea that two skills and a scaling lore is somehow bad.
My biggest problem with ancestry feats is that a lot of non-core ancestries simply don't have enough of them, and your options can feel really limited if you aren't adding in a versatile heritage or adopted to round out your list.
Yeah, this. I think Shoony are awesome and so do several of my players, but they have a very small number of ancestry feats and aren't getting additional support in future books.
Paizo tends to only add things in future books to "core" content (core ancestries/classes/etc), and anything from another source doesn't get the same treatment. In this case it's an ancestry from an AP so... good luck.
I'd honestly rather they spend some time adding content to existing ones vs creating new ones constantly.
Kind of wilding over the idea that two skills and a scaling lore is somehow bad.
My biggest problem with ancestry feats is that a lot of non-core ancestries simply don't have enough of them, and your options can feel really limited if you aren't adding in a versatile heritage or adopted to round out your list.
Yeah, this. I think Shoony are awesome and so do several of my players, but they have a very small number of ancestry feats and aren't getting additional support in future books.
Paizo tends to only add things in future books to "core" content (core ancestries/classes/etc), and anything from another source doesn't get the same treatment. In this case it's an ancestry from an AP so... good luck.
I'd honestly rather they spend some time adding content to existing ones vs creating new ones constantly.
I understand why Core components get 'more' attention than some of the say 'extras' but as mentioned, it wouldn't be hard to imagine dropping a Shoony NPC in some adventure or AP and drop in a new ancestry feat that the NPC has and make it available. Or maybe it might make sense to have a Lost Omens: Conclave of the Misfits book, whose theme would be material to help fill out some of the non-core material that was introduced in adventures or other less core sources.
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The plethora of non-core ancestries that don't have enough feats* is one of my biggest issues with the system. Shoonies are a popular example, but a lot of the ancestries from setting books have similar issues too. Compare PC2 Kholo to the original print of Gnolls. I'm very worried about this when it comes to SF2, which to keep the staggering variety of aliens from the original, is probably going to put its foot to the pedal and make so many ancestries in a very short amount of time.
I suspect it's a page count thing, but given Paizo have shown they're perfectly capable of doing back and adding much more, I hope we see some kind of expansion for the non-core ancestries, or just a scaling back of the amount of ancestries per book, in favour of a bit more stuff for each of them.
This then ties into the core of the post, where a lot of ancestry feats are sort of the same thing over and over, because all of the "obligatory" ancestry feats (Innate spells, skills, the weapon feat) come first, and anything unique or interesting may well not come at all.
So I don't think marrying general and ancestry feats is needed, what I would like to see is less ancestries, more ancestry feats.
*And while it is true you can take a versatile heritage, that comes with implications for your character that you might not want to take on board, same with ancestry paragon or the small amount of ancestry-neutral feats.
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Compare PC2 Kholo to the original print of Gnolls.
I don't see why that's a problem for the Kholo since all of those pre-remaster ancestry feats (except the ones that have the same names as PC2 feats) are still valid options.
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If I play an ancestry with a good collection of feats I often find myself wanting more than I can have. I'm more interested in playing with the additional ancestry feat variant than free archetype at this point.
I don't like the separate buckets of feats. Curerntly we have 4 different buckets skill, general, ancestry and class.
Primarily I think this was done for easy of choice and to help reduce choice paralysis - it being easier for people to choose from smaller buckets. They get overwhelmed if you give them too much choice.
The different feat types aren't equal at all. Nor are the feats themselves. There are a lot of low quality options. Many ancestries only have a couple of good feats so you sort of get funneled into one or two roles with some ancestries.
I'd prefer just 2 buckets. Class feats, and other feats. So if you want to lean into your ancestry more you can, or more into skills. Whatever. I don't like being forced to make race important.
But really I want them to go back and patch up the feats that don't work well. They did do a fair bit in the remaster. As always more work is required.
I think you misread Botbrain's post. It's the opposite problem, actually.Remaster Kholo has all of the Legacy feats (any missing were rolled into the Legacy feats in one way or another). The Legacy Kholo only has 15 feats. While the Remaster Kholo has 23 feats.Compare PC2 Kholo to the original print of Gnolls.I don't see why that's a problem for the Kholo since all of those pre-remaster ancestry feats (except the ones that have the same names as PC2 feats) are still valid options.
As I read their post, BotBrain is asking for more ancestry feats for the non-core ancestries. So why is it a problem that the Kholo got more ancestry feats?
And how is the fact that Kholo now have plenty of ancestry feats similar to the situation with Shoonies who don't have very many ancestry feats? Those seem pretty much like opposite situations to me.
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I like ancestry feats myself. I like ancestries being customizable. I do agree they seem a bit too modular and boring.
For PF3 I would like a little more of a return to realism or verisimilitude. It really makes no sense for a winged pixie or a normally winged ancestry to not be able to fly at level 1. I would prefer the rare tag and start with things the ancestry should start with that a DM can decide if they want in the game versus walling it behind ancestry feats.
The ancestry feats don't feel very ancestor-y to put a slang term on it. They feel like modular addons reskinned for each ancestry.
I'd also prefer more skill up feats as a general or ancestry feat. Some generic additional learning thing that allows you to exchange an ancestry or general feat for one more skill up.
I definitely think ancestries could use some work. My players take the same ancestry feats over and over and over and over again. They would like to be able to exchange them for some generic valuable thing like a skill up or class feat or something of appropriate level.
Then again, what prevents you from adapting ancestry feats for other ones?
For instance, The Ifrit's Inner Fire feat grants you Ignition as a cantrip. You don't have the equivalent for the other geniekins, but hoiw hard can it be?
Ardande (Wood) - Timber or Puff of Poison
Ifrit (Fire) - Ignition or Divine Lance
Oread (Earth) - Scatter Scree or Caustic Blast
Sylph (Air) - Gale Blast or Slashing Gust
Talos (Metal) - Needle Darts or Electric Arc
Undine (Water) - Spout or Frostbite
Suli (any) - any
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I don't like the separate buckets of feats. Curerntly we have 4 different buckets skill, general, ancestry and class.
Primarily I think this was done for easy of choice and to help reduce choice paralysis - it being easier for people to choose from smaller buckets. They get overwhelmed if you give them too much choice.
The different feat types aren't equal at all. Nor are the feats themselves. There are a lot of low quality options. Many ancestries only have a couple of good feats so you sort of get funneled into one or two roles with some ancestries.
I'd prefer just 2 buckets. Class feats, and other feats. So if you want to lean into your ancestry more you can, or more into skills. Whatever. I don't like being forced to make race important.
But really I want them to go back and patch up the feats that don't work well. They did do a fair bit in the remaster. As always more work is required.
I like the buckets, and for most of the reasons you mentioned, including that it allows feats to be unequal in power. The whole idea behind skill feats was pioneered by Seifter with the PF1 Vigilante, giving you combat and social talents at alternating levels to ensure your character could be interesting out of combat without sacrificing combat power. If anything, I wish they'd had a cleaner break between general and skill feats.
Skill feats remain the worst, though, despite some steady improvements all the way from the play test to the remaster. Its not just that they are weaker than other feats, but that so many have questionable utility at all, even out of combat.
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Ancestry Feats are a bit weird in that they represent your past/origin and innate properties but also somehow appear successively throughout your adventuring career. I wouldn't mind ancestries being more frontloaded, distinct from one another, and accounting for a slightly larger percentage of a character's capabilities/mechanical flavor.
Some could be to simply "tap into your inner powers" and "awaken them".
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I think you misread Botbrain's post. It's the opposite problem, actually.Remaster Kholo has all of the Legacy feats (any missing were rolled into the Legacy feats in one way or another). The Legacy Kholo only has 15 feats. While the Remaster Kholo has 23 feats.Compare PC2 Kholo to the original print of Gnolls.I don't see why that's a problem for the Kholo since all of those pre-remaster ancestry feats (except the ones that have the same names as PC2 feats) are still valid options.As I read their post, BotBrain is asking for more ancestry feats for the non-core ancestries. So why is it a problem that the Kholo got more ancestry feats?
And how is the fact that Kholo now have plenty of ancestry feats similar to the situation with Shoonies who don't have very many ancestry feats? Those seem pretty much like opposite situations to me.
My point is that when printed as a core ancestry, the number of feats available to the Kholo increased drastically, indicating the disparity between some core and non-core ancestries.
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My point is that when printed as a core ancestry, the number of feats available to the Kholo increased drastically, indicating the disparity between some core and non-core ancestries.
Oh, that makes sense. Thanks for the clarification!
And I definitely hope that we'll get more ancestry feats for some of those feat-starved non-core ancestries.
I don't like the separate buckets of feats. Curerntly we have 4 different buckets skill, general, ancestry and class.
Primarily I think this was done for easy of choice and to help reduce choice paralysis - it being easier for people to choose from smaller buckets. They get overwhelmed if you give them too much choice.
The different feat types aren't equal at all. Nor are the feats themselves. There are a lot of low quality options. Many ancestries only have a couple of good feats so you sort of get funneled into one or two roles with some ancestries.
I'd prefer just 2 buckets. Class feats, and other feats. So if you want to lean into your ancestry more you can, or more into skills. Whatever. I don't like being forced to make race important.
But really I want them to go back and patch up the feats that don't work well. They did do a fair bit in the remaster. As always more work is required.
I like the buckets, and for most of the reasons you mentioned, including that it allows feats to be unequal in power. The whole idea behind skill feats was pioneered by Seifter with the PF1 Vigilante, giving you combat and social talents at alternating levels to ensure your character could be interesting out of combat without sacrificing combat power. If anything, I wish they'd had a cleaner break between general and skill feats.
Skill feats remain the worst, though, despite some steady improvements all the way from the play test to the remaster. Its not just that they are weaker than other feats, but that so many have questionable utility at all, even out of combat.
I don't think that it realy is giving combat and social talents and forcing you to take some of both. In PF2 anyway, that doesn't work. It is just forcing you to choose from more pools so maybe the top dozen feats don't completely dominate the game. My preference is for the feats to be more balanced. If you genuinely want social feats then make them a category.
The issue of the less popular ancestries not having enough interesting feats or even just decent feats has made it that I've often been floating around in my head the idea of just, what would happen if for a campaign you decided to completely slash the ancestry requirements, for ancestry feats. With the obvious caveat of "what's physically possible" ie if one is about improving your bite attacks, or training your [insert unique body part here] to do something, don't take it if your ancestry doesn't have a bite attack or said unique body part.
The obvious answer is everyone would just take the juicy bits, like human's extra general feat or elves' initiative bonus and speed bonus and then probably some outliers somewhere where the race its attached to actually deeply matters (like maybe the dwarves armour speed reduction thing). At the same time, it might make some of my players feel less incentivized to go those races purely for those and just play whatever funny little dude they want without worry, or maybe even not take the 'boring but generically powerful feat' because they have that 'niche feat that fits their character perfectly that otherwise wasn't available'. Dunno.
With some of the versatile heritages (dragonblood!), I would be willing to trade even a class feat for an ancestry feat on occasion. You could argue that some of the archetypes like Dragon Disciple, Werecreature, Ghoul, etc. do a sort of this, giving you abilities tied to your genetics rather than your skill. Thematically at least.
The issue of the less popular ancestries not having enough interesting feats or even just decent feats has made it that I've often been floating around in my head the idea of just, what would happen if for a campaign you decided to completely slash the ancestry requirements, for ancestry feats. With the obvious caveat of "what's physically possible" ie if one is about improving your bite attacks, or training your [insert unique body part here] to do something, don't take it if your ancestry doesn't have a bite attack or said unique body part.
The obvious answer is everyone would just take the juicy bits, like human's extra general feat or elves' initiative bonus and speed bonus and then probably some outliers somewhere where the race its attached to actually deeply matters (like maybe the dwarves armour speed reduction thing). At the same time, it might make some of my players feel less incentivized to go those races purely for those and just play whatever funny little dude they want without worry, or maybe even not take the 'boring but generically powerful feat' because they have that 'niche feat that fits their character perfectly that otherwise wasn't available'. Dunno.
I know if I played in a campaign with this rule I'd probably completely ignore it simply because I don't want to go through 30 ancestries to find which feats I'd want.
Since SF2 barathu can poach other ancestry feats, you could see how much that gets used for inspiration of what would happen if you made that call.
The issue of the less popular ancestries not having enough interesting feats or even just decent feats has made it that I've often been floating around in my head the idea of just, what would happen if for a campaign you decided to completely slash the ancestry requirements, for ancestry feats.
Well, Paizo has already introduced a few such universal ancestry feats, but so far, they've all been designated as Rare.
Creating a few decent Common ones at the various levels would be a fairly simple way to help address the feat shortages that some ancestries currently face.