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| #1blynnSep 23, 2010 22:47:59 | Feats of Fun article at Wastex Games web-site. www.wastexgames.com/blog/?p=729&utm_sour... |
| #2mplindustriesSep 23, 2010 23:51:51 | I will crosspost my response to these feats here, since I already posted in the Optimization Board's version of this thread: "On the whole, these feats are a trainwreck. Very few are of an acceptable power level. Many are awful and nearly useless, or at least not worth a feat slot. The overpowered ones are so ridiculously overpowered, I can barely believe it's not a joke that they're being put forth as balanced in any way. Here's a detailed breakdown of every feat. This is a long list of feats Mistletoe's Friend sucks and is useless. Threaten Reach is incoherent. I have no idea how it triggers. Unbound Mind isroughly equivalent to a feat that let you recharge an encounter power once a day, so yeah, it's too powerful. Stalwart Mind lets them stack those save bonuses way too high, especially with the new Will boosting feats in HotFL. Warrior's Goring Charge is fine. That's a severely underpowered racial power, so any boost is good. Slicing Shardswarm--no. That's auto-kills on minions with a racial power. No, a racial power should not deal damage without an attack roll, expecially not area damage. Also, all your racial feats could use a prerequisite line listing what race it's actually for. Improved Blurred Step is way too powerful because it duplicates the effects of a feat that is specific to the Harrier build, except it lets any build take it, such as the superior Speed of Thought build. Reaching Mind Spike makes Mind Spike potentially useful at all. I think it should probably be a Burst 2 at base, nevermind at the cost of a feat. Mind Spike is easily the weakest punishment feature among real defenders (by "real defenders" I mean that I do not count Ensnaring or Assaulting Swordmages). Bloodied Resistance is something that I am pretty sure is already a feat, except that it gives you a second use of the power after being bloodied, rather than making you choose which time you use it. Blink Thought is fine. There's very little benefit gained from making it a teleport beyond avoiding terrain obstacles. It happens before combat starts, so it's nobody's turn, and that means OA's don't work anyway. More Demanding is well beyond the scope of a Heroic power. There are Epic Powers that do that. I would keep such power in the Epic tier if I were you. Broad Mind is probably safe. Inevitable Power is not overpowered. It might actually be underpowered. Are there really that many single target Seeker powers that don't count as an RBA? I don't know, Seekers are so bad, I have tried to block them from my memory. Ensnaring Spirits seems counterproductive. I don't know why anyone would ever want to use it as a Seeker, but hey, whatever. I don't think it's overpowered, though you should probably make sure you can only pull if you use the Close Burst 2 version, rather than letting them push from two squares away. Personal Alacrity is definitely missing some words, but from what it seems to be, it's fine. I wouldn't find that ability very useful, and it's almost certainly not worth the price of a feat. Fearful Presence is unclear in how it actually works. The Right Demeanor and Observant seem kind of lame, so definitely not overpowered. Basilisks Teeth is pushing the overpowered level. It makes the Shaman's spirit into basically a Warden with Sudden Roots. It's also silly to include something fluffy like what the spirit looks like in a feat. Boar's Tusks is terrible. Inflicting a disease is super weak in combat for a PC. Blinding Sickness is especially useless. It's initial effect takes away a healing surge, which 99% of monsters can't use anyway. Then, it has no further effect until the monster has a chance to rest and make a check to see if it worsens. Terrible and stupid. And it's even dumber that it inflicts a level 9 disease, since it will be impossible to save against in the lower tier, and trivially easy to save against by mid paragon. Do not want. Viper's Fangs is unclear. When does it inflict ongoing damage? Every attack? One specific one? It's probably too powerful anyway. It, at worst, adds +5 damage to the spirit's attacks. That's too much for one feat, especially for a leader. Wolf's Fangs is also overpowered. It would be impossible to get away from the spirit. Shaman are supposed to be secondary defenders, not primary defenders. Focused Elemental Spirits is awful. I count only three Summons it could apply to: Summon Fire Beetle at 5th, Summon Lightning Drake at 15th, and Summon Storm Behemoth at 29th. All are poor choices at their levels anyway, as they are far too likely to hurt your allies. One With the Earth is WAY too powerful. Tremorsense is way too good for a feat, especially in Heroic. And on top of that, it's for Dwarves, who defintely don't need any help, as they are already the most powerful race in the game. Intimidating Athlete is lame. I think there's already a similar Intimidate boosting feat for Goliaths, and I really don't think it's even close to worth a feat. Child of Onyx is really stupid. Why would you ever take that over skill training in Stealth, which adds 5? Or multiclassing to get trained? Or Skill Focus which adds 3. Unless you already had both, at which point I have to wonder where your priorities are if you can spend 2-3 feats just on a single Skill Check. Combat Sport is silly. +1 AC for -2 to attack? No, useless. Hafted Defense almost does that already without any penalty. Also, how would this interact with the Spiked Shield? Could the Goliath wield a two-handed weapon and a Spiked Shield at the same time? Granite Endurance is very weak for a feat. And Temporary Hit Points that only last one turn are unheard of in the system as far as I'm aware. I wouldn't bother. Longstrider is bizarre, too. Why not just take the +1 speed feat that already exists? Unless you intend to take both? And at that point, I again question your priorities. Trojan Horse is totally unclear about how it works. When can you spend a surge for someone else? Even if it's once a day, it's overpowered, because it's basically a better version of Lay on Hands. Play It Again Sam is likewise unclear. What is "melee basic attack damage?" What about powers that can be used as Melee Basic Attacks? Really, though, auto-damage from feats is not a great idea to begin with. Holy Hand Grenade makes very little sense thematically. It's also definitely WAY overpowered. Healing Strike, for example, with Holy Hand Grenade becomes a ridiculous Heal-All. No. Cadean Victory needs an explanation as to under what circumstances you can steal a surge. I think it's probably too strong regardless of circumstances, though. Achilles Child swings from way too strong to useless. What if the first attack misses you? It deals 1 damage anyway and your feat is used up. Otherwise, it's unbelievably too powerful, and it just gets more and more powerful as enemy damage increases further and further away from 1. Free Ride is unbelievably overpowered. Teleporting is awesome. Free movement is awesome. Free Teleporting is stupidly awesome. Don't allow it. Tailor's Might has to be a joke. First of all, it needs more clarification. It is unclear when you can do it. On any melee attack? What about melee attacks that deal no damage? And what is "one die of melee damage?" If I have a Mordenkrad, do I just drop a single d6, or do I drop 2? Attacking 7 enemies for only minorly reduced damage is absurd. You have to be joking. I hope you're joking. |
| #3ceiling90Sep 24, 2010 0:27:10 | While that list is comprehensive, there are a few auto-kill powers. Apart from the new and improved Magic Missle, there is also the new version of the Tiefling power. It's an auto-hit, with a range of 10. Just to let you know... |
| #4IgfigSep 24, 2010 16:17:21 | Jeremy Southard on the other site wrote: The funny thing about fun is how closely it's tied to balance. A feat that does something flavourful is fun, but if you do it in a way that makes it over- or underpowered it becomes much less fun. Imagine you have a player who's a shaman, and you want to give him a special unique feat that turns his spirit into a ghostly dragon thing. Sure, that'd be fun. But how to implement it? How about once per encounter, he can add an energy keyword to Spirit's Fangs? That's pretty dragony. It's also massively underpowered. Your player might like the idea of a dragon spirit, but he's never going to take the feat because it's so useless. He never gets to experience the fun of having a dragon spirit. Or maybe he does take the feat... and finds himself lagging behind the rest of the party in combat. He gets the experience of having a dragon spirit, but that experience isn't a fun one. How about all his spirit's melee attacks gain an energy keyword and can be used as a close blast 3? That's dragony, and way overpowered. He'll definitely take the feat, and then he'll proceed to wipe out every encounter on his own. And that's no fun: where's the challenge? Even if he does find that fun, the other players won't: the shaman's always hogging the spotlight. Those examples are a little extreme, but hopefully they illustrate what I'm talking about. Cool ideas are all well and good, but they're only really fun when the mechanics support them in a balanced way. Your "Feats of Fun" don't really do that. Also-- While your feats certainly are unbalanced, the thing that really gets my hackles up is how they're presented. Nearly everything is wildly unbalanced, makes no sense, duplicates existing feats, or is just really poorly phrased... it reads like you had a bunch of random ideas, wrote them down in point form, and then posted them. (With all the mentions of Twitter at the top, I'd wager that that's actually what you did.) And that's not cool. Knowingly posting something that you could have done well but couldn't be bothered to proofread, well, that's kinda disrespectful to your audience. More than that, it's disrespectful to yourself. It's saying you don't really care about what you're doing, that you don't take pride in your work, and that you think so poorly of your readers that you expect them to love it anyway. BLynn, I don't think you're that kind of person. I think you do want to make something cool and fun. And I think that's great. Keep at it. But everything on this forum is PEACH: "Please Examine And Critique Honestly." And if you want an honest opinion, it's only common courtesy to put in an honest effort first. Jeremy, Mplindustries gave his honest opinion on the article. He called it like he saw it, and y'know what? Pretty much everything he said was correct. He lost his temper near the end, quite reasonably; I probably would have too. It was an honest critique, and instead of getting snippy you'd do well to follow his example and make some suggestions of your own. I'll post a copy of this post on the other thread, to save BLynn the work. |
| #5blynnSep 24, 2010 20:14:51 | mplindustries & Igfig your both right, I let my friends tell me they sounded fun & so I just made the text easier to read since they were all originally less than 140 characters long. I was busy with other things and didn't really put a lot of thought in to cleaning them up. I apologize for the frustration I caused you, but also realize I mentioned in the blog that if you saw something wrong you should tear it apart and then put it back together how you think it would work best for everyone or even for just your game world. You did an excellent job tearing them up, so where is the rest? B. Lynn |
| #6IgfigSep 24, 2010 23:24:26 | Okay, that's fair. I'll tell you how I'd fix the things that need fixing. For some things, the fix consists of a feat or other rule that already exists. Also, pretty much everything needs to be rephrased more clearly. Use the feats I recommend as replacements as your guides. Show Mistletoe's Friend: make it at-will with some kind of prerequisite, like Moon Strike or Moray Militia. Threaten Reach: use Polearm Gamble, or the Polearm Master paragon path. Unbound Mind: use Psionic Rush. Stalwart Mind: make it +3, not +6. Warrior's Goring Charge: it's fine. Slicing Shard Swarm: use Razor Shard Swarm. Improved Blurred Step: use Harrying Step. Reaching Mind Spike: I'm not sure. This might be okay as a Paragon feat. Bloodied Resistance: use Defiant Fire. Blink Thought: this is fine. More Demanding: use Devouring Demand. Broad Mind: I'd be careful with this for a few reasons, one of which is that there are more than four such features. I'd make it "Choose a Discipline Focus other than your own. You gain that Discipline Focus' powers in addition to your own." Inevitable Power: Sure, but I'd limit it to at-will and encounter powers and let them count as actual ranged basic attacks. Ensnaring Spirits: I really don't know why a seeker would want to pull its enemies. Maybe make it slide them instead of pushing them? Personal Alacrity: pretty weak for a feat. Not sure how I'd make it stronger, though. Fearful Presence: use Ardent Tsucora Initiation. The Right Demeanor and Observant: sure, why not. I'd mention the affected skills specifically by name, though. Basilisk's Teeth: use Intolerable Command. Boar's Tusk: Diseases are irrelevant against most monsters, and Blinding Sickness just makes them lose a healing surge, which they never use anyway. Use Protector's Shield. Viper's Fangs: There's not really a good way to do this; any amount of ongoing damage that would be balanced for at-will use would be too small to matter. You could add ongoing poison damage to your dailies, I guess. Or inflict poison vulnerability equal to your Int mod with Spirit's Fangs. Or just use Stalker Spirit Adept; that's pretty snaky. Wolf's Fangs: No. Especially not on a secondary striker like the Stalker Shaman. Maybe use Precise Fangs. Focused Elemental Spirits: Yeah, this is fairly worthless right now. Perhaps if it added the keyword, and to all your summons? One With the Earth: Make it tremorsense 1, and an epic feat. Even that might be overpowered; I'd consider "If you end your turn without having moved during it, you gain tremorsense 1 until the end of your next turn." Intimidating Athlete: use the Natural Intimidator feat. Child of Onyx: use Skill Focus: Stealth. Combat Sport: reflavour Hafted Defense. Allowing a shield with a two-handed weapon is asking for trouble. Granite Endurance: use Unyielding Stone. Long Strider: use Fleet-Footed. Trojan Horse: I don't know what you're trying to do here. A better Lay on Hands, but the target takes ongoing damage? That's... no, I don't understand at all. Play it Again, Sam: also confusing. If you hit with a melee basic attack, you can spend an action point to double the damage? That sounds more like a paragon path ability, and not even a good one. Holy Hand Grenade: Way too exploitable. Just make the grenade as an item or power. Cadean Victory: just grant the Arcane Defiling power from Dark Sun. Achilles' Child: use Wild Savant. Free Ride: A couple of ways to make this work. One would be to make it 1/encounter. Another, which I think more flavorful, is "If a creature grabbed by you teleports out of your reach, you may teleport adjacent to that creature as an immediate reaction. The creature remains grabbed." Tailor's Might: What? No. There is no way to make this work. |
| #7mplindustriesSep 25, 2010 11:15:16 | Okay, that's fair. I'll tell you how I'd fix the things that need fixing. For some things, the fix consists of a feat or other rule that already exists. |
| #8misterarcaneSep 26, 2010 16:46:45 | Play it again Sam does seem kinda useful for someone with an expanded crit range and a lot of MBAs being swung(Lazy lord in the party, for example) so using this on a critted MBA would be worth an action-point. But I agree it feels more like a PP feature. |
| #9IgfigDec 22, 2010 17:22:06 | Commentary on Week 14: Invokers: First and foremost, the whole basic dynamic feels like it needs to be tightened up in some way. Your feats each modify one specific Invoker at-will, so you should consider rephrasing them as domain feats (i.e. Power of [something]). Not only would it fit better with convention, but it'd also give your (extremely specific) feats a much broader appeal. On the other hand, I really like the "spend a minor action for some benefit" mechanic, which won't play well with the domain format. You seem to be using the mechanic in an attempt to balance out some feats that would otherwise be overpowered; unfortunately it doesn't work very well, since invokers rarely use their minor actions anyway. In my opinion, the best use of the mechanic would be to use it in the whole cycle of feats, keeping the benefits small (around the level of a domain feat) but allowing each feat to apply to a wider range of powers. As for the specific feats-- Coupled Retaliation: I'm not entirely sure what this does--how does the trigger work exactly?--but in any case it's way too good. With one feat, you're a better defender than most defenders. My fix... well, I'd be tempted to replace it with Power of Vengeance, but that's not quite the same thing. Maybe let the +Con damage be moved to any one creature within 5(?) squares that has attacked one of your allies since the end of your last turn? Chain Bolts: I'm not entirely clear on this one either. Does it really let you double the number of attacks you're making? That's way too good. Perhaps if you hit with both of Divine Bolt's attacks, you can deal Wis mod damage to another target. Or maybe on a crit, you can forego the extra damage to repeat the attack against another target? Dizzying Shards: Way too good on an area attack. Make it only apply if you only target one creature with the power. Hallowed Ground: I really like this feat. The only thing I'd change is to make it clearer that this only applies to the first such square. Otherwise people would use various slide-increasing shenanigans and cover the entire battlefield with walls. Vanguard's Knowledge: I'm not sure how communicating their strategy gives your enemies a penalty to attack rolls. Might give your allies a bonus to defenses, though. In any case, I'd dial back the bonus/penalty to +-1, and probably also restrict it in some way; only one ally, or only on opportunity attacks. |