Unironically, D&D 5e does feats right. You get a precious few and they're build defining, but you never feel forced to take one just to get to a baseline level of effectiveness. PF2 made too many things into feats, and it most results in false choices.I disagree on this.
I feel like Skill feats and Class feats are generally in a good spot with PF2, I like where they are. Although some skills are a bit lacking, generally skills and their feats are good (I'm specifically thinking they probably should have combined Survival skill into something else).
And let's be honest, most of the popular classes in PF1e and 5e alike had what were effectively class feats, despite not officially calling it that. What else do you call a menu of options you pick as you level up, that's unique to your class?
(And yes, Survival should be Nature - Religion and Occultism shows there's no issue with the Knowledge skills having other utility accessible through skill feats, and Nature and Survival skill feats keep eating each other's space)
Then sense motive needs to be split out from perception and either become its own thing or be rolled into the social skills.
There's skills that clearly had preferential treatment in regards to skill feats (Medicine feels like it doesn't have a single bad skill feat, while Nature has like 1 good skill feat and it doesn't even have a legendary-tier skill feat).TBH that can kind of be a double edged sword. Medicine has much stronger skill feats than Nature, but in turn I feel like I get most of what I expect out of nature from just skill increases, while medicine with just skill increases feels kind of bad.
Yeah, but you still have to take skill feats, which if at 3rd or 4th level you take your first increase into Nature and you aren't a primal witch, what feat do you take? I don't remember a single time in my years of playing 3.X, PF1e, and PF2e where the PCs would want to identify a spell, so Assured Identification is pretty much niche. Bonded Animal is a worse pet or familiar. Magical Shorthand as I said doesn't work for you unless you are a primal witch, and while Spirit Speaker is probably the best one it requires the GM to purposefully leave dead animals everywhere for you to use the feat in the first place, which in non-natural areas is going to be harder to justify. I used to max Medicine ASAP because it allowed me to auto-pick skill feats, which my players often did too so we ended up with multiple medics.
I'll probably back up and reply to some stuff from earlier in another post, but the feat thing is easy to comment on:
A lot of feats do feel like they're so required or important that they should just be class features, and sometimes classes have competing "packages" of de-facto feat chains that feel like they may as well be delineated subclasses. I find both really awkward.
Skill feats are both poorly balanced and also kind of frustrating, because part of what determines what skills you want to increase is how good the proficiency-gated feats are. Any skill with bad expert/master/legendary feats just doesn't feel great to increase. I feel like this is a large part of why intimidate continues to feel like such a great skill to take—it has a consistently good set of skill feats.
A lot of feats do feel like they're so required or important that they should just be class features, and sometimes classes have competing "packages" of de-facto feat chains that feel like they may as well be delineated subclasses. I find both really awkward.
PF2e actually cut this back a lot compared to, uh, every contemporary D&D (including 5e). I know some people are convinced that you need to take an attack reaction as a martial or flounder but I've seen martials not take them and be happy. There are some subclass specific feats that are extremely important to the subclass but making them feats do give them a bit more power than you can get from a class feature and they do have interesting tradeoffs (barbarian is a notable case where their defining subclass feat is at 6th... and so is Reactive Strike).
Overall class feats are really close to the ideal of 'pick whatever you want, it won't hurt you but it will feel good to use'. Some improvements can be made (caster feats be notorious for this) but I think if you make class feats any less important you end up dropping the fantasy.
Yep, I don't personally find any class feats to be "required". There are a lot of options to help you build towards doing whatever thing you want that character to "specialize" in.
Like a ranger doesn't necessarily need Twin Take, or Hunted Shot, or an Animal Companion, or Warden Spells, but they're all options. I was recently musing on a Ranger crossbow (arbalest) build and so my first level feat would be Crossbow Ace and I would pick up Warden spells later for Gravity Weapon. Hunted Shot doesn't apply because arbalest isn't a reload 0 weapon.
My point being is, while the ranger has a lot of options on how you could build, none of them feel like required things that should be class features instead. And the way I would build my crossbow ranger isn't going to be the same as I would build a two weapon ranger, an archer ranger, or other options.
I will slightly agree that once you decide on the thing that you want to specialize in, there are generally a "group" of feats that make sense to take to support that thing. I actually find that to be a feature, and not a problem though. It helps me to decide what my character should actually take as they level up. And it's also not so many feats in that group that you can't expand on idea. And there are also enough things outside your main "group" that you would want to look at them, like Warden spells on any kind of ranger build.
For example, there's my favourite Class and Sub-class, the Alchemist Bomber. Every Class Feat level, 1st to 20th, with the exception of 4th, there's a Bomb related Feat. On a few levels, there's more than one.
But you don't have to take them. You're definitely going to want to take some of them, but not all of them.
Which is good, because as Claxon mentions, there are things outside the "group" that are great. On my 12th level Bomber, it's specifically Revivifying Mutagen and Efficient Alchemy. (He has 8 Class Feats thanks to Cultural Adaptibility.) None of his 14th, 16th or 18th level Feats are going to be Bomb related, and I'm dithering about L20 (Mega Bomb is very on theme, but Alchemical Revivification is just really, really cool, even though it would probably never come up.)
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The big thing is, you can make an alchemist who isn't really interested in bombs. And if you do, you probably don't really want most (you might still grab some) of the bomb related feats.
If those were class features instead of feats you'd be "wasting" potential class power on something you didn't intend to use much. That is inherently why having more limited class features and then treating class feats essentially as "class features that you choose" is great design. There are some classes/concepts/"feat groups" that fall short in execution, but the overall concept and how it plays out is something I like.
Oh, I fully agree. I have a L11 Mutagenist. He's Dex +2... suffice it to say, Bomb Feats aren't on his radar, and I am quite glad that other than the base VV acid bomb, there's nothing in there screaming "thou shalt throw Bombs as an Alchemist."
Instead, he's picked up things like a couple of Martial Artist feats, (although to be honest sometimes I wonder if I'd be better off just grabbing more Alchemist Feats), Mutant Physique, Alchemist Familiar, Revivifying Mutagen, Combine Elixirs... that sorta thing.
A lot of feats do feel like they're so required or important that they should just be class features, and sometimes classes have competing "packages" of de-facto feat chains that feel like they may as well be delineated subclasses. I find both really awkward.
PF2e actually cut this back a lot compared to, uh, every contemporary D&D (including 5e). I know some people are convinced that you need to take an attack reaction as a martial or flounder but I've seen martials not take them and be happy. There are some subclass specific feats that are extremely important to the subclass but making them feats do give them a bit more power than you can get from a class feature and they do have interesting tradeoffs (barbarian is a notable case where their defining subclass feat is at 6th... and so is Reactive Strike).
Overall class feats are really close to the ideal of 'pick whatever you want, it won't hurt you but it will feel good to use'. Some improvements can be made (caster feats be notorious for this) but I think if you make class feats any less important you end up dropping the fantasy.
Yep, I don't personally find any class feats to be "required". There are a lot of options to help you build towards doing whatever thing you want that character to "specialize" in.
Like a ranger doesn't necessarily need Twin Take, or Hunted Shot, or an Animal Companion, or Warden Spells, but they're all options. I was recently musing on a Ranger crossbow (arbalest) build and so my first level feat would be Crossbow Ace and I would pick up Warden spells later for Gravity Weapon. Hunted Shot doesn't apply because arbalest isn't a reload 0 weapon.
My point being is, while the ranger has a lot of options on how you could build, none of them feel like required things that should be class features instead. And the way I would build my crossbow ranger isn't going to be the same as I would build a two weapon ranger, an archer ranger, or other options....
While I mostly agree I do think it's worth at least acknowledging that while none of those are individually required, they all pretty clearly point to a specific path and are somewhat significant within that path.
You're making yourself worse by being a bow user without hunted shot, and dual wielding literally doesn't exist without twin takedown.
So there's definitely some guardrails of varying degrees of hardness depending on the build you're making. Saying that twin takedown doesn't do anything for an archer so it doesn't count is kind of missing the criticism a bit.
While I mostly agree I do think it's worth at least acknowledging that while none of those are individually required, they all pretty clearly point to a specific path and are somewhat significant within that path.
You're making yourself worse by being a bow user without hunted shot, and dual wielding literally doesn't exist without twin takedown.
So there's definitely some guardrails of varying degrees of hardness depending on the build you're making. Saying that twin takedown doesn't do anything for an archer so it doesn't count is kind of missing the criticism a bit.
Did you miss the second half of my post where I basically agree with what you said?
I will slightly agree that once you decide on the thing that you want to specialize in, there are generally a "group" of feats that make sense to take to support that thing. I actually find that to be a feature, and not a problem though. It helps me to decide what my character should actually take as they level up. And it's also not so many feats in that group that you can't expand on idea. And there are also enough things outside your main "group" that you would want to look at them, like Warden spells on any kind of ranger build.
I will disagree very slightly with what you said. Dual wielding does exist without Twin Takedown for example. You can still wield two weapons, and can even wield one weapon without agile (for bigger damage dice) and one with agile for better second attacks with MAP. It also potentially allows you to use different damage types. Is it worth it to do that without Twin Takedown or another feats that supports wielding two weapons? Well, I can't answer that for everyone but I think most people would agree that it is not. But there are at least some benefits to doing so even without any feat support.
Oh, I fully agree. I have a L11 Mutagenist. He's Dex +2... suffice it to say, Bomb Feats aren't on his radar, and I am quite glad that other than the base VV acid bomb, there's nothing in there screaming "thou shalt throw Bombs as an Alchemist."
Instead, he's picked up things like a couple of Martial Artist feats, (although to be honest sometimes I wonder if I'd be better off just grabbing more Alchemist Feats), Mutant Physique, Alchemist Familiar, Revivifying Mutagen, Combine Elixirs... that sorta thing.
Oh yeah, I was just offering that previous post as a rebuttal to what Witch of Miracles expressed in terms of thinking more things should be class features instead of feats.
To me, class features are "you can't be a *insert class* without *insert feature*. So a barbarian isn't a barbarian without rage and some kind of instinct. And a ranger isn't a ranger without Hunt Prey and some sort of edge. Those are essential to the class identity. If you dreamed up something without those, key pieces, you're thinking of a new class.
Class feats are roughly "these are things that these kind of characters typically excel at and you have easy access to support". And often you'll find a thing you want your character to excel at and there are several feats to support that thing (which is a feature, not a bug). But you could also take a dedication that's pretty outside what your class would normally do. Like a fighter taking a spell casting dedication.
You could have a system with no fixed classes no chassis benefits and all the games feats. Just pick whatever you want.
You could have a system with no fixed classes no chassis benefits and all the games feats. Just pick whatever you want.You could but that won't be a class game and PF in general is very much a class game.
I... guess you could make a PF2e hack for it? The question is how to progress proficiencies without making grabbing proficiencies with feats the best choice like ASI in 5e. Currently the only non-skill proficiency increases come from multiclass archetypes and they are very limited, which makes sense in the current game system but not in a classless one.
Right if doing feats in a classless game the feats would need to be build for it. Proficiency and on level spell casting are all chassis benefits so there would need a different method of getting those.
I think a class-less PF2e would still have you choose between martial and caster to determine (at least) your progression.
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There are tons of classless games. Why would PF2 want to move into the classless game niche which already has a ton of games competing for players? Just tossing ideas at the wall eh.
PF2's popularity stems from the D&D tree. You don't move an established class and level-based game to a classless game when you have player base that is expecting a game with classes and levels they are familiar with.
There are tons of classless games. Why would PF2 want to move into the classless game niche which already has a ton of games competing for players? Just tossing ideas at the wall eh.
PF2's popularity stems from the D&D tree. You don't move an established class and level-based game to a classless game when you have player base that is expecting a game with classes and levels they are familiar with.
It would be like the ‘new coke’ bit, leaving behind your core audience to chase a competitor’s audience.
Yeah, I think most people are on the same page the Pathfinder is a class based gaming system, and while there are classless gaming systems that are very cool, Pathfinder isn't that and I don't think it should try to become one.
At that point it would become a completely different game than how we are familiar with it.
If someone is suggesting that should be how Pathfinder is designed, I feel that the expression is really just "I don't like class based games because I find them to restrictive" which is fine to say, but it doesn't mean that Pathfinder should cater to what any one individual likes.
Wasn't suggesting pathfinder change.
Just saying a game system could be that. This one doesnt have to.
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Wasn't suggesting pathfinder change.
Just saying a game system could be that. This one doesnt have to.
You could absolutely have a game like that, there's quite a few systems I enjoy that are classless.
I just don't think I would ever imagine Pathfinder or D&D as a classless game. Or at least it would be such a departure from tradition that I don't know what it would look like or how it would be received.
Total aside:
Ever since skills, to-hit, and saves were somewhat standardized under the proficiency system, I've wondered what it'd look like if you broke the walls down between this stuff and just made an "oops all skills" variant of PF2E. Higher proficiency tiers would certainly need to cost more "increases" than lower tiers; perhaps you'd need to make it so non-KAS or class skills cost more to increase, or discount the increases based on the modifier you have in the relevant ability score in some way. And weapon proficiency, armor proficiency, saves, class DCs, and the like would need to cost far more increases than bumping a skill would—probably an amount that'd vary per class, honestly. But it'd be really funny. Want to trade some skills for a better save? Want to trade that save for some more trained skills? Sure.
I don't think it's a good idea without a whole lot of tuning, and even then it opens a lot of ways for someone to fall flat on their face. It also invites Grog, who can't use a skill for his life but has legendary proficiency in martial weapons and has silly AC in heavy armor but can't pass a will save on his life—you really have to make it so it's much harder to build tall and outside of the "intended" path. But if you could do it, I think some people would be happy to take 2 lower AC or a worse reflex save for some more skills. The game kind of lets you do this exact thing anyways by investing into INT on classes it's not good on. This would be more granular.
Again, I don't think this is a great idea for the game as designed. I'm not suggesting it. I do just think it's really amusing, and homebrewing it out would be a fun design exercise. How many skill increases do I think +2 AC is worth, anyways? What levers can I create to keep the trades from breaking the game? These are fun questions to try to force yourself to answer—for me, anyways.
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PF1 had some mechanics like that. The trouble is that it often becomes an exercise in trading away a thing you'll never use in exchange for a direct boost to something you want to focus on, which means what looks like an equitable trade is really just free power.
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As someone who likes classless systems and wonders sometimes how Pathfinder could be made classless, I do agree with Squiggit that one of the benefits of class-based systems is that they're able to deliver a package of power that works well without being prone to min-maxing. Importantly, classes in Pathfinder 2e tend to have this One Special Thing that no other class has in addition to a range of other class features that help round them out -- there's no "well my character has the Fighter's legendary attacks and the Barbarian's Rage damage, but makes up for it by having no flavorful class features" or similar setups that do one thing too well and nothing else, which helps avoid a lot of the pitfalls of PF1e. You could avoid this problem in your classless system by creating a much flatter customization framework where options are purely about adding options (and thus horizontal power), rather than vertical power increases, but that makes it more difficult to add those iconic, character-defining mechanics that make you super-special at a specific thing. Not impossible, mind, just more difficult.
As someone who likes classless systems and wonders sometimes how Pathfinder could be made classless, I do agree with Squiggit that one of the benefits of class-based systems is that they're able to deliver a package of power that works well without being prone to min-maxing. Importantly, classes in Pathfinder 2e tend to have this One Special Thing that no other class has in addition to a range of other class features that help round them out -- there's no "well my character has the Fighter's legendary attacks and the Barbarian's Rage damage, but makes up for it by having no flavorful class features" or similar setups that do one thing too well and nothing else, which helps avoid a lot of the pitfalls of PF1e. You could avoid this problem in your classless system by creating a much flatter customization framework where options are purely about adding options (and thus horizontal power), rather than vertical power increases, but that makes it more difficult to add those iconic, character-defining mechanics that make you super-special at a specific thing. Not impossible, mind, just more difficult.
You can get adress that problem by having selection tiers and prereqs.
Only options relatively the same in power are in a specific tier.Each option could have prereqs of some kind that might make some mutually exclusive.
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Well, I'm glad PF2e got away from PF1e, I loved PF1 to death and played it for 10 years straight, but the revamp made it much more interesting.
1) I saw people speaking about how great customization was in PF1e and how PF2e streamlined it. Well, feats in PF1e gave you the illusion of customization, but it was just that, an illusion. They were also much more boring, since everyone's favorite feats were usually merely a bonus value.
Speaking from an optimization PoV, most casters would take spell focus whatever (for +1 in one school) greater spell focus (for another +1), spell penetration (for +2 to penetration), greater spell penetration (for another +2), improved initiative (for +4 init) then some metamagic feats depending on whether you wanted to blast or be a god wizard (heighten, persistent, empowered, maximize...), point-blank shot/precise shot if you wanted to use rays... and well, that mostly covered all your feats from 1 to 20.
A fighter would take Weapon focus (+1), greater WF (another +1), weapon spe (+2 damage), greater weapon spe (another +2), improved critical, and either the vital strike line, the power attack line, the shatter defense combo, the two-weapon fighting line or some defense feats. Your build was basically set in stone as soon as you chose what style you would use.
So yeah, PF1e had many more options but it was mostly useless bloat, and every player wanting to build an efficient character had a very small pool of feats from where to choose, especially since most were mandatory.
2) As for balance, I played Kingmaker with an unchained Crane Monk. Stacking all bonuses and spells I could find, my AC was so high that the DM was faced with a dilemma - either throw opponents that COULD hit me and thus would destroy the rest of the group with more reasonable AC, or use opponents that the rest of the group can defeat - and thus make me unkillable. It didn't help that a monk also have high saves and high touch, so there was little he could do to stop it.
Luckily, PF2E doesn't fall into this trap anymore.
PF1E was "everyone tries to be THE hero". PF2E is "we're all moving parts of a hero group"
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Well, I'm glad PF2e got away from PF1e, I loved PF1 to death and played it for 10 years straight, but the revamp made it much more interesting.
1) I saw people speaking about how great customization was in PF1e and how PF2e streamlined it. Well, feats in PF1e gave you the illusion of customization, but it was just that, an illusion. They were also much more boring, since everyone's favorite feats were usually merely a bonus value.
Speaking from an optimization PoV, most casters would take spell focus whatever (for +1 in one school) greater spell focus (for another +1), spell penetration (for +2 to penetration), greater spell penetration (for another +2), improved initiative (for +4 init) then some metamagic feats depending on whether you wanted to blast or be a god wizard (heighten, persistent, empowered, maximize...), point-blank shot/precise shot if you wanted to use rays... and well, that mostly covered all your feats from 1 to 20.
A fighter would take Weapon focus (+1), greater WF (another +1), weapon spe (+2 damage), greater weapon spe (another +2), improved critical, and either the vital strike line, the power attack line, the shatter defense combo, the two-weapon fighting line or some defense feats. Your build was basically set in stone as soon as you chose what style you would use.
So yeah, PF1e had many more options but it was mostly useless bloat, and every player wanting to build an efficient character had a very small pool of feats from where to choose, especially since most were mandatory.
2) As for balance, I played Kingmaker with an unchained Crane Monk. Stacking all bonuses and spells I could find, my AC was so high that the DM was faced with a dilemma - either throw opponents that COULD hit me and thus would destroy the rest of the group with more reasonable AC, or use opponents that the rest of the group can defeat - and thus make me unkillable. It didn't help that a monk also have high saves and high touch, so there was little he could do to stop it.
Luckily, PF2E...
PF1 had more customization not because of the feats, but because the class features were more interesting and varied.
PF2 siloed class features into feats. PF1 had class features as an innate part of the class and used a different system to modify class features which was extremely customizable.
Comparing feats between PF1 and PF2 doesn't compare because both games took two different paths for customization, completely separate paths that have nothing to do with each other. Feats in PF1 more closely compare to general feats in PF2. Class feats in PF2 more closely compare to class features in PF1. PF1 had a lot of power and customization tied to class features.
PF1 had some mechanics like that. The trouble is that it often becomes an exercise in trading away a thing you'll never use in exchange for a direct boost to something you want to focus on, which means what looks like an equitable trade is really just free power.
PF2E isn't free of this, either. Multiclass archetypes are imbalanced in many cases, and some regular archetypes are clearly out of line as well. Making class feats fungible doesn't make the things you can swap them for equally powerful. You can still gain free power by dumping class feats at levels with bad options. (Many class feats are weirdly worse than taking an archetype dedication or later archetype feats, as well. E.G., am I ever taking cantrip expansion over a casting dedication? Can I get an attack reaction on a martial that doesn't natively have one, greatly increasing my ability to take advantage of both the action economy and my flanking partner spamming trip?) It also creates a frustrating asymmetry between classes that really want their class feats (like kineticist) and classes that need them substantially less (wizard being the classic example, here). The latter ends up with substantially more build flexibility.
Classes that want an early feat (like champions who want their reaction upgrade, kineticists that want their first impulses and weapon infusion, etc.) get an especially raw deal, since L2 is generally the most comfortable level to start an archetype.
The delta is generally lower than a character giving up later features or power in PF1 to hit a specific powerspike timing (which was especially common with some prestige class builds). But it's definitely still there. Everyone here is aware of how much the strongest archetypes can buy you, especially compared to picking actively bad feats.
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I honestly always ignored the 3 feat rule of archetypes since the beggining because I find it really dumb, but mostly because my table pretty much since the beggining has been using Free Archetype and there's a ton of archetypes that don't work otherwise. I still try to not take many archetypes at once since seeing 3 feats with the "Dedication" name at (for example) 6th level kinda triggers my OCD a bit, but with the exception of a few combinations (specially now with the Exemplar Dedication) I don't really think it breaks anything. Not even those few good combinations do.
PF1 had some mechanics like that. The trouble is that it often becomes an exercise in trading away a thing you'll never use in exchange for a direct boost to something you want to focus on, which means what looks like an equitable trade is really just free power.PF2E isn't free of this, either. Multiclass archetypes are imbalanced in many cases, and some regular archetypes are clearly out of line as well. Making class feats fungible doesn't make the things you can swap them for equally powerful. You can still gain free power by dumping class feats at levels with bad options. (Many class feats are weirdly worse than taking an archetype dedication or later archetype feats, as well. E.G., am I ever taking cantrip expansion over a casting dedication? Can I get an attack reaction on a martial that doesn't natively have one, greatly increasing my ability to take advantage of both the action economy and my flanking partner spamming trip?) It also creates a frustrating asymmetry between classes that really want their class feats (like kineticist) and classes that need them substantially less (wizard being the classic example, here). The latter ends up with substantially more build flexibility.
Classes that want an early feat (like champions who want their reaction upgrade, kineticists that want their first impulses and weapon infusion, etc.) get an especially raw deal, since L2 is generally the most comfortable level to start an archetype.
The delta is generally lower than a character giving up later features or power in PF1 to hit a specific powerspike timing (which was especially common with some prestige class builds). But it's definitely still there. Everyone here is aware of how much the strongest archetypes can buy you, especially compared to picking actively bad feats.
You're not wrong, but I'm also not sure I'd really draw an equivalency between some feats being stronger than others and a hypothetical homebrew that lets you sell skill increases for damage.
You're not wrong, but I'm also not sure I'd really draw an equivalency between some feats being stronger than others and a hypothetical homebrew that lets you sell skill increases for damage.
Oh, I figured we weren't discussing that. I marked it out more as a fun design exercise than a serious suggestion, and no one had seemed to directly respond. I kind of thought that post was mostly ignored (and understandably so) and we had moved past it; for some reason, I had actually thought you were responding to talk about classless PF. (Classless systems also have the potential to let you avoid dead choices more often, was my logic.)
...In retrospect, it makes way more sense you were responding to my post.
You can get adress that problem by having selection tiers and prereqs.
Only options relatively the same in power are in a specific tier.
Each option could have prereqs of some kind that might make some mutually exclusive.
Okay, let's go with that: at what levels do the tiers for Super Special Mechanics appear? Because in most cases, the mechanic that makes a class special appears in full at 1st level. In others, like the Fighter's accuracy or the Barbarian's Rage damage, it requires features at higher level to keep that bonus going. How many Super Special Mechanics would a class be allowed to have under this model?