Disadvantage Feat suggestions

[BlueAce417]

Hello Baldur's Gate,

If anyone here has played GURPS you will understand what the following suggestion entails. I feel like the choice of picking a disadvantage as a feat should have some slight benefit. In GURPS, you can select a disadvantage to gain points. And you can use those points on positive attributes, skills or advantages. I propose that if you select a disadvantage feat you should gain an additional choice of feats.

Example:

Ruja the Orc Barbarian takes a disadvantage feat at level 3, she is then prompted to choose 2 feats. Instead of selecting Weapon Focus (Battleaxe), she selected Sickly and was able to choose Weapon Focus (Battleaxe) AND Toughness.

Essentially I am suggesting that we could incorporate mechanical weaknesses into RP and still have some bonus to work with. This way its viable to take up a weakness on your non-commoner PCs.

I also would like to suggest additional disadvantage feats:

Feeble Skilled - Minus 10 to any skill
Weak Will - Minus 5 to will saves
Weak Fortitude - Minus 5 to fortitude saves
Weak Reflex - Minus 5 to reflex saves
Mumble Mouth - Additional 10% Arcane Spell Failure (Only for arcane spellcasters; does not include Warlock)
Deftly Freight - Minus 8 to saves vs fear
Unwitting Ally - Minus 8 to saves vs charm, confusion, or dominate.
Night Terrors - After resting, there is always a 5-10% chance to be stricken with a ghastly debuff that takes a toll on your waking hours. Debuffing you with -2 to all saves, skills, AC, attack, and 5% arcane spell failure.
Brash - Minus 5 to Bluff, Diplomacy and and Appraise. +2 to Intimidate.

That's all for now and I don't expect the disadvantage feats to be added. I just hope to see a more viable reason to pick a disadvantage mechanically rather than for roleplay's sake. I hope this will entice people to flush their characters out and build their characters with intended flaws, as most story book characters.

If anybody is interested in GURPS, you can find free versions of the handbook online in PDF format. It is really easy to play and would recommend this game to anybody who also enjoys D&D. The current version is V4.

Thank you,

BlueAce417

[aaron22]

i could see this being exploitable. look at the fear debuff. would give you a bonus later(epics) but you already play a class that is fearless or can cast gr.hero.

[BlueAce417]

i could see this being exploitable. look at the fear debuff. would give you a bonus later(epics) but you already play a class that is fearless or can cast gr.hero.

Well they are suggestions, the disadvantage feats are less important I'd say. I just want to see a viable reason to use a feat slot for a weakness.

[aaron22]

could just grant the option to have a free malice feat at creation. can only use the malice line and no choice is an option.

[BlueAce417]

But again, the option to take a negative feat would only be used massively if there was a mechanical reason. People can forgo them all together just like they can in GURPS, but if you take one, you should get some amount of benefit. Otherwise people are just going to make builds instead of characters.

If they are granted a malice feat that enables players to select negative qualities, there should be a positive spin on it. Like "Single Minded" may add some will, but subtracts from the social skills. But thats pretty much the background section all over again.

[chad878262]

But again, the option to take a negative feat would only be used massively if there was a mechanical reason. People can forgo them all together just like they can in GURPS, but if you take one, you should get some amount of benefit. Otherwise people are just going to make builds instead of characters.

If they are granted a malice feat that enables players to select negative qualities, there should be a positive spin on it. Like "Single Minded" may add some will, but subtracts from the social skills. But thats pretty much the background section all over again.

Yet I would argue that if you add a benefit players will often take them solely to min/max. Aaron's example is an easy one with the malus to fear saves... If you have a Paladin you can take the "negative feat" and even if it just gives you +2 diplomacy you've essentially gained 2 free diplomacy points. Another example would be taking the malus to confusion, charm and dominate, then utilizing prot f. evil and gaining whatever minor bonus that gives. Penalty to Reflex of -5 may not be great, but if you have Improved Evasion and 40+ Reflex Saves it might be worth it, depending on what the benefit is, but would it really make IC sense?

Hard to say without seeing what the negative/positive would be, but IMO the malus feats are fine as they are. They're there due to an RP request, just like the commoner class and are not meant to be taken as some kind of 'give up something to get something' feats. They are there specifically to give a challenge to the player selecting them. I don't really see a need to add any benefits.

[BlueAce417]

But again, the option to take a negative feat would only be used massively if there was a mechanical reason. People can forgo them all together just like they can in GURPS, but if you take one, you should get some amount of benefit. Otherwise people are just going to make builds instead of characters.

If they are granted a malice feat that enables players to select negative qualities, there should be a positive spin on it. Like "Single Minded" may add some will, but subtracts from the social skills. But thats pretty much the background section all over again.

Yet I would argue that if you add a benefit players will often take them solely to min/max. Aaron's example is an easy one with the malus to fear saves... If you have a Paladin you can take the "negative feat" and even if it just gives you +2 diplomacy you've essentially gained 2 free diplomacy points. Another example would be taking the malus to confusion, charm and dominate, then utilizing prot f. evil and gaining whatever minor bonus that gives. Penalty to Reflex of -5 may not be great, but if you have Improved Evasion and 40+ Reflex Saves it might be worth it, depending on what the benefit is, but would it really make IC sense?

Hard to say without seeing what the negative/positive would be, but IMO the malus feats are fine as they are. They're there due to an RP request, just like the commoner class and are not meant to be taken as some kind of 'give up something to get something' feats. They are there specifically to give a challenge to the player selecting them. I don't really see a need to add any benefits.

I see your point, but again they were just suggestions. I'll spitball a few more below:

Unfortunate Bartering - Minus 20 to Appraisal.
Burn Scars - 20% Vulnerability to Fire.
Blind - Subject to Blind status at all times.
Deaf - Subject to the Deaf status at all times.
Anemic - When struck by a slashing weapon, subject has to roll fortitude against DC 10 + Attacker's BAB. If the roll fails, the subject is dealt bleeding damage for 10 rounds or until healed. Damage is 5% of the damage dealt in the initial blow.
Rejected by Magic - Minus 15 to Use Magic Device and Minus 5 to saves vs spells. In addition, subject has 100% Arcane Spell Failure.
Frail Frame - Minus 2 Constitution

Not expecting these to be added, still just want to see some mechanical reason to take a disadvantage feat over anything else.

[Valefort]

The existing ones aren't enough ? I can make a couple more if necessary but have a look at those first !

[mrm3ntalist]

The existing ones aren't enough ? I can make a couple more if necessary but have a look at those first !

No, they are enough

[DeepFriedMoose]

I =love= this idea -- I'm picturing a fraidy-cat Orc that is just... otherwise invulnerable (e.g. no reason to BE afraid, but just... IS!) I love it, really I do.

But I also see the min/max problem. I could take half the feats suggested in the first post as my monk, and they would mean nothing, but I'd have a whole +3-4 extra feats.

Devs: Would there be a way to add a script that checks for conflicting feats? e.g. "Deathy Fright" has the -fear tag, while "Aura of Courage", "Fearless", "Immune to Fear", etc. have the +Fear tag?

In short, I think this idea is VERY much worth pursuing, but caution has to be used to avoid abuse. I would love to see something like this implemented. Thanks for the great idea, BlueAce! Let's see if we can work on some more ideas.

Here's my spitballs:

Fragile: -20% damage immunity slashing/piercing/bludgeoning
Clumsy: Auto-fail on d20 roll of 1 OR 2 (OR, -2 Dex)
Distracted: You are easily disrtac-SQUIRREL! -- -2 WIS
Obnoxious: -10 to Bluff, Intimidate, and Diplomacy
Obvious: -10 Hide/Move Silently

[BlueAce417]

The existing ones aren't enough ? I can make a couple more if necessary but have a look at those first !

Ehh these are ideas, I just want a mechanical reason to pick a flaw. I gave an example up above.

Feel like a broken record now.

[Valefort]

Oh my bad I didn't read carefully.

I must say that at first thought this 1 malus => 2 feats doesn't seem feasible without going through a bunch of hoops development wise...

[mrm3ntalist]

There should not be any mechanical advantage to pick a flaw. They werent implemented with that in mind. If you dont want your character to have a flaw, dont pick it. There wont be any powerbuilding by choosing flaws.

[BlueAce417]

What if it's implemented like the Arcane restricted schools feat? Everyone is granted a "Malice" feat where they get to pick one flaw and that flaw has a specified bonus? Or has a list of possible bonuses they could select from? Can't be that hard to code if the restricted schools feature is already implemented the same exact way.

[NegInfinity]

Hello Baldur's Gate,

If anyone here has played GURPS you will understand what the following suggestion entails. I feel like the choice of picking a disadvantage as a feat should have some slight benefit. In GURPS, you can select a disadvantage to gain points. And you can use those points on positive attributes, skills or advantages. I propose that if you select a disadvantage feat you should gain an additional choice of feats.

Example:

Ruja the Orc Barbarian takes a disadvantage feat at level 3, she is then prompted to choose 2 feats. Instead of selecting Weapon Focus (Battleaxe), she selected Sickly and was able to choose Weapon Focus (Battleaxe) AND Toughness.

Essentially I am suggesting that we could incorporate mechanical weaknesses into RP and still have some bonus to work with. This way its viable to take up a weakness on your non-commoner PCs.

I also would like to suggest additional disadvantage feats:

Feeble Skilled - Minus 10 to any skill
Weak Will - Minus 5 to will saves
Weak Fortitude - Minus 5 to fortitude saves
Weak Reflex - Minus 5 to reflex saves
Mumble Mouth - Additional 10% Arcane Spell Failure (Only for arcane spellcasters; does not include Warlock)
Deftly Freight - Minus 8 to saves vs fear
Unwitting Ally - Minus 8 to saves vs charm, confusion, or dominate.
Night Terrors - After resting, there is always a 5-10% chance to be stricken with a ghastly debuff that takes a toll on your waking hours. Debuffing you with -2 to all saves, skills, AC, attack, and 5% arcane spell failure.
Brash - Minus 5 to Bluff, Diplomacy and and Appraise. +2 to Intimidate.

That's all for now and I don't expect the disadvantage feats to be added. I just hope to see a more viable reason to pick a disadvantage mechanically rather than for roleplay's sake. I hope this will entice people to flush their characters out and build their characters with intended flaws, as most story book characters.

If anybody is interested in GURPS, you can find free versions of the handbook online in PDF format. It is really easy to play and would recommend this game to anybody who also enjoys D&D. The current version is V4.

Thank you,

BlueAce417

The penalties are way too high.

-8 to saves is equvalent to loss of 12 to 24 levels.

-10 to social skills is equivalent to alienist level penalties. Alienist is an insane scholar that contacted eldrich abomination and those told him/her their terrible secrets no mortal was meant to know. At the point where character gets -10 penalties, they're pretty much a raving lunatic.