New Feats

Dungeons & Dragons The Royal Library
1

Yes, that was the point: that you should be able to cast the spell already, so that there is no mechanics issue, since paladins get some spells at different levels than clerics or not at all; if you are a cleric you have the full spell list available to you but if you are a paladin you have only part of the spell list available to you…

And here’s another one:

[b]Targeted Shot
Some people, after a long time of dedication in the fine art of archery, have become very competent sharp-shooters.

Prerequisites: Base attack bonus +6, Point Blank Shot, Precise Shot, Weapon Focus (any bow), Dexterity 15+.

Benefit: Whenever you take a full attack action using a bow with which you have chosen the Weapon Focus feat, you may forgo any number of attacks granted by a high base attack bonus, starting with the one with the lowest base attack bonus. For every attack you forgo, you gain a +2 bonus on the rest of the attacks you make for that round. You cannot make any attacks other than your normal number of attacks granted by a high base attack bonus minus the number of attacks you forgo.

Precision-based damage (like that caused by a successful critical hit or sneak attack) can be inflicted over greater distance; for each attack you thus forgo, the distance within which such damage can be dealt increases by 10 feet.

Normal: A creature with a high base attack bonus cannot forgo any number of attacks to gain a bonus on its subsequent attack rolls. Precision-based damage cannot be dealt with a ranged attack from more than 30 feet away from its target.[/b]

2

Targeted Shot is different for me. I would have the bonus be used to negate the cover/concealment miss percentage. Then this would be something similar to the Blind Fighting feat for ranged combat. Maybe each shot negates 10%. This gets the ability closer to the prestige class ability of Sharpshooter in 3.0 that gave true strike a certain amount of times per day.

Check out Improved Precise Shot for 3.5. It negates all but full cover or total concealment.

I use a feat called Sniper (which requires Point Blanks Shot, Precise Shot, and BAB +4) allowing Improved Critical and Sneak Attack Damage at any range, though the shooter must take a -4 penalty to hit in order to target a vital area.

Rasp, your feat is cool. I like the aiming idea based on sacrificing multiple attacks. However, I firmly believe a good archer can nail a precise shot (i.e., sneak attack or crit) at much further than 30-60 feet. Perhaps allowing it within the weapon’s normal effective range (i.e., 110’ for a composite longbow, or 1 range increment).

3

I know what you mean Osprey; and I definitely agree.

My comment regarding precision-based damage was based on the fact that these are the most common examples given, with the very apparent example of armour with any of the various fortification enchantments. I do not mind what such a feat would do regarding criticl hits. On the other hand, sneak attacks can be particularly devastating and also miss on flavour if they can be dealt on any distance; I mean, it is particularly bad, saying that you can target any one who has not yet spotted you (at ranges of nearly a hundred feet away, that is not so difficult, actually) in such a manner that you can nail him down in a second or two!

One comment here: should Rapid Shot still work along with the feat, as it is considered an additional “normal” attack? It would make a devastating combo, since you would be able to make two attacks at your standard BAB + 4!

A little correction made to the Soothing Touch feat: you may take the feat if you have access to the Suffering domain instead of the Healing domain. This is based on the fact that the domain is available to clerics of Nesirie (if I am not mistaken) and the feat is accessible only to those who can turn undead anyway, or variant paladins of Cuiraécen.

4

One comment here: should Rapid Shot still work along with the feat, as it is considered an additional “normal” attack? It would make a devastating combo, since you would be able to make two attacks at your standard BAB + 4!

There’s no way I’d let Rapid Shot combine with sharpshooting - they’re so diametrically opposed. It’s not a “normal” attack, it’s a fast and sloppy shot. This is the kind of mechanic that one hopes a DM’s common sense would dictate. Then again, there seems to be a lack of common sense when it comes to DM’s expecting the books to have all the answers…

On the other hand, sneak attacks can be particularly devastating and also miss on flavour if they can be dealt on any distance; I mean, it is particularly bad, saying that you can target any one who has not yet spotted you (at ranges of nearly a hundred feet away, that is not so difficult, actually) in such a manner that you can nail him down in a second or two!

This is exactly the nature of Sniping, and I think sneak attacks rely on long range accuracy. but you have to hit a small target. So the fairer way to rule it is to give an attack penalty, that way long range penalties are built in based on the weapon and its accuracy over distance.

Would you have me believe a person can only SEE a vital area within 30’? Please…

Criticals, favored enemies, weapon specialization, and sneak attacks all seemed to be grouped into the same “precision-based damage” category.

Why not allow precision-based damage at long range with the feat? Assume the shooter (beyond 30’) needs to use a Full-Round Action to aim, and then may attempt to hit with any precision dmage bonuses at -4 to his normal ranged attack.

This would benefit rangers immensely, letting them take real advantage of the long-range battle which archers should excel at, especially with favored enemies. It’s the one real benefit of wide open terrain. Figheter archers could gain their specialization bonuses at range, and rogues their sneak attacks.

However, all of these would be only a single shot per round, with max. 5’ of movement - easily justified for long range precision shooting.

Point blank shots (those within 30’) still have the advantage of full rate of fire and full attack bonuses, so they remain potent in comparison.

“But just where DID that shot come from?” The camouflaged ranger won’t tell 'em, that’s for sure. B)

5

Regarding Rapid Shot: I asked, because my initial proposal, as anyone can see, is that “You cannot make any attacks other than those granted by a high base attack bonus minus any number of attacks you forgo.” That version specifically rules out the usage of Rapid Shot; that’s why I am asking, because I feel I should not allow for Rapid Shot to work along with Targeted Shot.

On seeing vital areas of one’s body: I agree with your 30’ comment, but shooting at vital spots from 100’ away is the other end of the scale! I generally prefer low-powered solutions than over-powered: an under-powered solution will, most of the time, do little harm, while an over-powered solution will always harm a situation.

On the other hand, there could be a tiny little spec of realism otherwise: minus one attack, the range increases by 10 feet, minus two attacks, by an additional 20 feet for a total of 30 feet, and if you forgo 3 attacks, the range increases by an additional 30 feet for a total of 90 feet. I would like to point here that I find penalising their choice of weapon seriously underhanded, so these ranges apply on all bows, whatever their range increment.

How do you like this version? I think it is fine, and it addresses the issue of being a good shot: only those with 4 “normal” attacks per round (the really good archers) can make a shot with a +6 bonus and with an effective range of 90 feet; mind you that Point-Blank Shot deals precision-based damage, so the archer would deal an additional point of damage within 90 feet! :slight_smile:

6

I was thinking of this for quite a time and came to a conclusion:

Cooperative Creation [Item Creation]
Your experience in the creation of magical items allows you to help another creator of magical items complete his work - in several ways.
Prerequisites: Any item creation feat, caster level 12, Spellcraft 15 ranks
Benefit: You may help any one person with whom you share an item creation feat create an item that requires that feat to create. You must offer some help in its creation (possibly by casting some of spells required in the item’s creation) and expend any number of XP as high as half the required number, rounded down. While both of you are needed while the item is created, you must spend a day for every 1.500 gp of its market price rather than 1.000 gp.

7

Interesting, I like the idea. 3 points though:

First, what if you have 5 people with that feat working together on an item… or 10 ect, heheh, maybe adding in a limit to the number of people who can work on the item would be a good idea, as too many chefs ruin the cake. :slight_smile:

Second, It seems like you set it up to just have a max of 2 casters working on the item, as the rate of ceation is 1,500 gp per day. If your intention was to make it without limit than it should be more open ended or to have a higher limit than 2 creators then changing it to: For every caster helping to create the item increases the rate of creation by +500 gp per day. So, having 3 casters working on an item would get it done at a rate of 2,000 gp per day instead of 1,000 gp per day.

If you plan on letting be open ended then it probably should only increase by +250 gp per day or less. Or you cna go by a decreasing scale, so that it goes by +500 for the first 2 additional casters, +250 for the next 2 casters, +125 for the next 2 casters, ect. heheh, would better represent the decreasing usefulness.

Finally, you should probably put in that all casters helping need to be able to create the item also. This would restrict casters from helping to create items that they normally couldnt create.

8

I like the concept. But I wouldn’t add it to the BRCS for the simple reason that the (fools :angry: ) at WotC haven’t seen fit to add something like this to the core rules. Hence this becomes something that greatly changes the core rules while not being something BR specific. That is there is no BR theme that it is capturing only making a change to the core rules (which I like by the way).

We are not trying to create a Book of Feats or a Book of Spells here, there are plenty of those already out there and anyone can use and adapt them to their own campaign without any mention of that in the core 3.5 BR ruleset (i.e., the BRCS).

9

Answering to your comments:[ul][li]I will change the feat as soon as possible to accomodate the concept more accurately. There is a limit of two people working on the item, as you will see, but an additional feat might be able to change that (something I am not very easy about, might I add).[/li][li]On the contrary, I think that the idea has a basis in BR; think of the scholarly Khinasi mages who, due to their limitations, learn to co-operate in order to create A FEW magic items, since even these few are debilitating to most BR mages.[/li][/ul]Thinking of the latter, should I make this Khinasi-specific? Like, adding a prerequisite of “Khinasi human”?

10

Originally posted by RaspK_FOG@Jul 10 2004, 11:58 PM
Answering to your comments:[ul][li]On the contrary, I think that the idea has a basis in BR; think of the scholarly Khinasi mages who, due to their limitations, learn to co-operate in order to create A FEW magic items, since even these few are debilitating to most BR mages.[/li]> [/ul]Thinking of the latter, should I make this Khinasi-specific? Like, adding a prerequisite of “Khinasi human”?

“Cooperative” magic wasn’t just a BR theme - it was also implemented in the Player’s Option books and the Spell Compendiums, so trying to capture cooperative magic via a feat is not really capturing a BR - specific theme.

Where is the example in the BR literature of this scholarly Khinasi mage concept?

It should be noted that in 2nd ed (in almost all the settings) creating many magic items required cooperative creation - a dwarf and elf working together was a very common theme. But this was mostly due to the game-mechanics involved (in 2nd ed dwarves couldn’t be mages of any sort).

So again, I don’t see a specific BR reason for this concept, only a way to work around a poor (IMO) core rule.

11

I tend to agree with Irdeggman on this. I think that it doesn’t really fill a birthright role, so while it is a neat feat, it doesn’t neccessarily belong in the BRCS. Calling on Cooperative khinasi mages is trying to make the setting fit the feat, rather than the feat fit the setting.

That said, have you considered ways of making it possible for more than 2 people to cooperate on the item? Perhaps the primary builder has to put up half the xp and effort, but aides could divide up the other share of xp. Then time taken would be equal to the number of gp per day being worked simlutaneously (being based on the XP contribution of the aides. Of course, there would have to be a limit on how many people could help perhaps a minimum xp contribution to be considered helpful. Just a thought.

12

Another possibility is to add to the level of the magic item being created. For example it could be treated as an item of 2 levels higher. And then the cost could be split evenly amongst those contributing to the creation. For example creating an equivalent +7 sword (adding the pluses for abilities) would make it be treated as a +9 item for market value. Using this number to determine the exp and gp cost of the item. What this does is to keep it from being used on a regular basis, since the costs would escalate and making a lot of low level items would just not be cost effective, while a higher level item might be especially if a sufficient number of contributors could be found.

Also I would put in a stipulation that all of those involved in the process would have to be able to meet the prerequisites to make the item on their own. THis would keep a high level spellcaster from recruiting a bunch of low levels ones to leach exp off of.

Note I haven’t run the numbers to check out my theory on cost effectiveness for higher leveled items, but off the cuff it seems about right to me.

13

I’ll leave the game mechanics for a moment. What I meant earlier on, when I spoke of how this feat fits the BR setting, is that BR has a very good reason for such a feat to exist within itself. I am not trying to make the setting fit the feat, and I am not trying to rationalise my ideas, I was just refering to a simple truth of creative work: inspiration.

While I design most of my feats for my own liking, since I hardly use most of the feats I design (I am serious!), I feel that most of them have a place in 3e mechanics, and that’s why I post some of them here. Soothing Touch was a feat I posted for various reasons (I am not going to mention them here), and so was Targeted Shot, yet Cooperative Creation was the result of only one idea: I have people discuss how difficult should item creation be for a person.

Notice how the feat works: the helper must be a caster of at least 12th level (!); the feat does not allow for lesser creators to help others. While I am interested in making other such feats for various reasons, including a concept of creating superior items and allowing these craftsmen to add to the XP pool, or such stuff, I am not doing anything like that here. The reason is as simple as that: that some people, knowledgeable in the creation of magical items, can help another in the creation of such an item. While feats such as those you described could also be created around the general theme provided here, I do not intend to do that. We may discuss that elsewhere (or later on if you are that interested :wink: ).

As for my idea of including the Khinasi or whatnot, it was just inspiration: the most magic-wise knoledgeable people in Cerilia are the Khinasi, and that’s why the would be the best potential creators of such an accomplishment; the Sidhelien would not have done something like that in my opinion.

14

RaspK_Fog,

Do you realize what you wrote? I mean you hav verbalized exactly why this feat doesn’t belong in the BRCS. It was created, not to capture a BR feel but because it sounded good and then it was tried to be inserted into the BR setting.

I’ll leave the game mechanics for a moment. What I meant earlier on, when I spoke of how this feat fits the BR setting, is that BR has a very good reason for such a feat to exist within itself. I am not trying to make the setting fit the feat, and I am not trying to rationalise my ideas, I was just refering to a simple truth of creative work: inspiration.

See above

[b]While I design most of my feats for my own liking, since I hardly use most of the feats I design (I am serious!), I feel that most of them have a place in 3e mechanics, and that’s why I post some of them here. Soothing Touch was a feat I posted for various reasons (I am not going to mention them here), and so was Targeted Shot, yet Cooperative Creation was the result of only one idea: I have people discuss how difficult should item creation be for a person.

Notice how the feat works: the helper must be a caster of at least 12th level (!); the feat does not allow for lesser creators to help others. While I am interested in making other such feats for various reasons, including a concept of creating superior items and allowing these craftsmen to add to the XP pool, or such stuff, I am not doing anything like that here. The reason is as simple as that: that some people, knowledgeable in the creation of magical items, can help another in the creation of such an item. While feats such as those you described could also be created around the general theme provided here, I do not intend to do that. We may discuss that elsewhere (or later on if you are that interested ).

As for my idea of including the Khinasi or whatnot, it was just inspiration: the most magic-wise knoledgeable people in Cerilia are the Khinasi, and that’s why the would be the best potential creators of such an accomplishment; the Sidhelien would not have done something like that in my opinion. [/b]

Unfortunately what has happened with this feat is that it is actually making item creation easier for any setting. And we as a general rule have been investigating ways to make item creation less prolific in BR, to capture the low magic item feel of the setting.

Now other feats you have proposed also fall into this category. Targeted Shot for example. But the Soothing Touch feat does have a BR theme to it. That is the healing aspect of the goddess of mourning. So it does make sense, at least enought to bother discussing whether or not it should be added to the BRCS. The others, well to be blunt belong on the Royal Library as additions to the ongoing selection of feats that people create.

What I might suggest sense you have such a well of creative juices going is to instead of spending your tiem writing feats (and I assume presitge classes, since that is another category that people fall into), is to write an adventure.

That way you can incorporate a lot of things into one. You can insert your creativity into something that more people would simply clamor for - there has always been a shortage of BR adventures.

15

Seems you are right… :unsure: My bad, I suppose.

I will think of what you said and talk about it with other members as well; if you read this, Gary, Osprey, anyone, I would like to discuss that with you. I hope you will find the time, 'cause I would prefer that this is done from several points of view (in order to prevent mistakes one can so easilly make).

Sorry for taking up both time and space. Irdeggman, do you think you can divide things up, or should I do it?

16

At 05:09 AM 7/15/2004 +0200, RaspK_FOG wrote:

>Seems you are right… :unsure: My bad, I suppose.I will think of what you

>said and talk about it with other members as well; if you read this, Gary,

>Osprey, anyone, I would like to discuss that with you. I hope you will

>find the time, `cause I would prefer that this is done from several points

of view (in order to prevent mistakes one can so easilly make).Sorry for

taking up both time and space. Irdeggman, do you think you can divide

things up, or should I do it?

Im going to be a wee lil bit busy for the next couple of days… and

probably through the weekend, so I dont know if Id be able to contribute

much in the immediate future.

One suggestion, however, that might make the Cooperative Creation feat a

bit more BR-specific and also tie it into some other recent topics of

conversation… namely magicians. What if it was the feat that allowed

magicians to create permanent magic items? That is, if one of the campaign

specific additions to the BRCS is that in order to take one of the feats

that allows one to create permanent magic items there is an additional

prereq “must be able to cast true or divine magics” (which is one of the

things I think should be in there anyway) but spellcasters who take this

feat could combine their efforts with a spellcaster scion to create

permanent magic items that would normally be beyond their capacity.

Gary