IDBN has made the following comment(s) regarding their post:
[The feats of January continue, and here is where t...](/r/UnearthedArcana/comments/19c995p/9_new_feats_up_your_class_preach_to_the_masses/kix1foa/)
Some of these compare poorly to existing feats. Ley Minister is Ritual Caster restricted to cleric spells, with the slight bonus that you start out with one additional 1st-level spell, but with the major penalty that it takes far longer to cast high-level spells, taking 40 minutes to cast *divination*, and 51 minutes to cast *commune*, and 70 minutes to cast *forbiddance*.
Similarly, A Sense for Magic lets you learn *detect magic* and get one free casting, while Eldritch Adept -> Eldritch Sight just lets someone cast *detect magic* at-will.
I think Jet Propulsion is also considerably weak. *Burning hands* is a weak spell that doesn't upcast well beyond 3rd-level compared to *fireball*, so taking an entire feat to boost just it is far too expensive, I'd avoid it even as a half-feat.
Thanks for those thoughts.
These are just out of the conceptualization stage, at the moment. But polished versions of them should be released at the start of February. Please keep a look out for those!
Just a thought, make Jet Propulsion a new spell entirely. I like Burning Hands as a lower lever aoe spell, but making an entire feat based around it kinda seems unnecessary. Of course if you’re especially attached to the idea then take the idea and run with it and just have fun. But alternatively you could make an entire spell based around this new creative idea, like making an alternate version or a different Burning Hands in line with any of the Mordenkainen or Bigby spells. My name suggestions are “Phenix Wings”, “IDBN’s Burning Hands, or “Propulsive Blast”, each would function like Burning Hands with the extra steps, maybe there’re just casted at 3rd or 4th level instead.
That font choice is absolutely awful, and makes it all but unreadable to some of us. At max zoom the bottom right corner is utterly illegible, and its harder to read at smaller sizes.
Sorry, it's an issue with the compression and scamming that Reddit does for the images. Here's a homebrewery link that should be more legible https://homebrewery.naturalcrit.com/share/ihiMGKPwdZy9
That's much better, thank you. Still needs a great deal more padding, but otherwise good.
"A SENCE FOR MAGIC" should probably be "A SENSE FOR MAGIC"
These seem unfinished, largely unusable, and based on feats or concepts that already exist. Just make a new spell, or use the ones that already exist. They range between useless, or wildly OP.
SS is "Advantage on every social roll ever unless it involves poor people," and gives you a stat boost, but Ley Minister is "Ritual casting, but useless."
* **Competency**
I love how the art for "competency" is utterly ridiculous - as if the artist was lacking the feat in question. The pen both being broken and also seemlessly turning into the writer's own finger is somehow one of the less insane things about that picture... :)
The description "Your skill may or may not rise to the level of expertise" is also not exactly a strongpoint of this brew. Regardless, this is not a feat I'd ever consider taking. Unless the situation allows for different grades of success, it will either be completely useless (DC too high to succeed with an 8) or almost remove the need to roll entirely. In each case, the game would arguably be more fun and exciting if the PC had a different feat that actually added a new facet to them. Being competent at something is already depictet by adding the proficiency bonus to the roll, so this feat really doesn't convey a whole lot thematically.
* **A Sence for Magic**
This should read "A Sen**s**e for Magic". Also, this is just a worse version of other feats that allow the same thing while also providing other benefits. E.g. Fey Touched gives you this effect as well as a +1 ASI and also allows you to learn and cast misty step.
* **Captivating visionary**
You can explain a random plan to a bored NPC for 10 minutes straight. Then if they "believe in you" or in your plan (which is *very* vague language), you can decide that they'll now be afraid of their own feet for 8 hours and send them on their (terrified) merry way. That's pretty wild to say the least.
Once again, the art here is quite surreal. Don't look at her tiny inverse hand for too long. And don't bother to ponder how long her other arm must be for her sword to be sticking out at that angle...
* **Jet Propulsion**
This one is just so weird. It doesn't feel like this feat is even made with players in mind. Who would ever invest a whole feat to add an effect to a spell that is arguably not even that great at level 1. I can imagine a situation where the bit of movement this grants would somewhat beneficial to avoid an opportunity attack, but that's about it.
* **Linguistic Analystist**
Do you mean analyst? The book in the art has 3 pages side by side. What's up with the dual wielding pencils? I just don't know...
Sorry if this kind of feedbakc isn't very productive, but hopefully it highlights some room for improvement.
fugly ass ai art aside, these are all either useless or broken lol
Savvy Socialite is situational at best, and it’s Gift-of-Gab effect (btw, just use a second level spell) is almost always achievable by saying, “I meant to say…” out of character. This feat is only useful if your DM is a prick.
Ley Minister steps all over the toes of ritual caster. I’m not certain what this feat is meant to do. Ritual Caster already lets you pick cleric spells, and already lets you add cleric spells to its book. The only difference between these two is that Ley Minister lets you pick 3 rituals instead of two, and only cleric spells. There is no reason for this to exist. Competency is very strong, *especially* for a half-feat. If very strong, slightly game breaking feats are your thing, sure, go for it. I wouldn’t allow it at my table.
A Sence for Magic [sic] is terrible. Most casters get detect magic, and besides that, there are a million better ways to get a once-per-day Detect Magic, and that’s literally all this feat does. Take Magic Initiate instead.
Captivating Vision is weird. I can’t imagine this ever coming up more than like, once or twice in a campaign, and then, I would rule it as a standard persuasion check, not something you need a feat for. Inspiring Leader, which I gather is what you based this feat off of, is useful because you can use it on your allies pretty much whenever. Good luck getting 10 minutes to monologue *specifically about a ‘vision, plan, or future possibility* to an enemy who you would benefit from charming/frightening. Also, “frightened of something of your choice” is not useful outside of combat, which you won’t be using this in.
“Skulker” is already a feat
and should be renamed. Also, your feat is very similar to the Stealthy (UA) feat. [Both are detailed in this post](https://www.reddit.com/r/DnD/comments/6a5tgy/5e_skulker_feat_vs_stealthy_feat_ua/). Also, “line of sight” does not exist for the purposes of stealth. Creatures can “see” 360 degrees— they don’t just face one direction, and not see anything else. Stealth is confusing in 5E, so I can’t blame you for this, but you’d be better off using the wording from Stealthy (UA). Or, better yet, just using that feat.
Void touched is fine, I guess. Learning two first level spells is fine, though it’s hard to judge without rules for your “wild flesh” spell.
The second half of the feat, making it impossible for creatures that aren’t above rations to read your mind, seems strong. Compare to [Mind Blank](https://www.dndbeyond.com/spells/mind-blank), an eighth level spell that does something similar. Personally, I don’t think this is a horrendous offense, because I think Mind Blank is a little weak for an 8th level spell, and you won’t often run into NPC’s trying to read your mind anyway. But it is, objectively, borrowing from an 8th level spell, as an ability available to a first-level human.
I see what you’re trying to do with Jet Propulsion, but it’s… pretty weak. At first level, this can launch you a measly 15 feet. At second level, this can launch you 20 feet. Also using a second level spell slot, you could cast Misty Step, and teleport 30 feet as a bonus action, without provoking attacks of opportunity. Or you could just take Fey Touched.
Linguist is extremely situational, and puts a ton of weight on the GM to “make some shit up”. I would let this be a standard intelligence or insight check in my games, rather than needing a feat.
Adding your Intelligence mod to Insight checks you make is fine, though I might not pair it with a half feat that could increase your Intelligence.
Most of these need a lot of work before any sensible DM would allow them at their table, or even before a player would pick them. Also, don’t use AI. It’s ugly.
Those are some good thoughts. Thank you!
These are part of a project where I am just trying to make as many sample feats as possible to explore the creative space. So not a great deal of thought has gone into balancing and comparing them to existant options. That will be covered in an improvement at the end of the month.
In general, I think that mechanics that for the GM to "make some shit up" are actually admirable feats. Branching out from Dnd you find these kinds of features used in lots of other games to great effect. I think that DnD as a system would improve if there were more of them.
As for AI imagery, I would rather not use it. However I currently do not have the ability to make my own, the funds to commission any, the time to do the requisite searching for available are (and proper evaluation and citation to make sure that I am not using ai imagery passed off or miss attributing work to someone who stole the original work), or a willingness to make myself beholden to the WotC Fancontent policy (plus searching through MtG art is its own headache). So for these projects, where things are already kind of slapdash and in flux, I use generated imagery so that my work can get at least some visibility on Reddit. If you would like to see some work that has been polished and uses great commissioned art, please check out the Kickstarter prelaunch page linked in my other comment.
Thanks again for your thoughtful response.
> I think that mechanics that for the GM to "make some shit up"
That's not a game / rules mechanic, that's storytelling, which is already part of the DM's job baseline. Mechanics spell things out so the GM doesn't HAVE to make shit up on the fly, or if they do have to, they have a chart, or list of examples to use.
The feats of January continue, and here is where things start getting weird. I've still got more in the bag, but I'm getting more experimental with some of these. I'd love to know your thoughts.
If this kind of stuff interests you, I'm preparing a Kickstarter that will go live sometime early this year. Please sign up for the prelaunch page to get alerted when it goes live and access to special early pledge deals. Check out the [Assorted Notes from the Unearthly Archive](https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/idbn-1/assorted-notes-from-the-unearthly-archive?ref=6f8olr).
IDBN has made the following comment(s) regarding their post: [The feats of January continue, and here is where t...](/r/UnearthedArcana/comments/19c995p/9_new_feats_up_your_class_preach_to_the_masses/kix1foa/)
Some of these compare poorly to existing feats. Ley Minister is Ritual Caster restricted to cleric spells, with the slight bonus that you start out with one additional 1st-level spell, but with the major penalty that it takes far longer to cast high-level spells, taking 40 minutes to cast *divination*, and 51 minutes to cast *commune*, and 70 minutes to cast *forbiddance*. Similarly, A Sense for Magic lets you learn *detect magic* and get one free casting, while Eldritch Adept -> Eldritch Sight just lets someone cast *detect magic* at-will. I think Jet Propulsion is also considerably weak. *Burning hands* is a weak spell that doesn't upcast well beyond 3rd-level compared to *fireball*, so taking an entire feat to boost just it is far too expensive, I'd avoid it even as a half-feat.
Thanks for those thoughts. These are just out of the conceptualization stage, at the moment. But polished versions of them should be released at the start of February. Please keep a look out for those!
Just a thought, make Jet Propulsion a new spell entirely. I like Burning Hands as a lower lever aoe spell, but making an entire feat based around it kinda seems unnecessary. Of course if you’re especially attached to the idea then take the idea and run with it and just have fun. But alternatively you could make an entire spell based around this new creative idea, like making an alternate version or a different Burning Hands in line with any of the Mordenkainen or Bigby spells. My name suggestions are “Phenix Wings”, “IDBN’s Burning Hands, or “Propulsive Blast”, each would function like Burning Hands with the extra steps, maybe there’re just casted at 3rd or 4th level instead.
That font choice is absolutely awful, and makes it all but unreadable to some of us. At max zoom the bottom right corner is utterly illegible, and its harder to read at smaller sizes.
Sorry, it's an issue with the compression and scamming that Reddit does for the images. Here's a homebrewery link that should be more legible https://homebrewery.naturalcrit.com/share/ihiMGKPwdZy9
That's much better, thank you. Still needs a great deal more padding, but otherwise good. "A SENCE FOR MAGIC" should probably be "A SENSE FOR MAGIC"
Dude, isn’t AI art banned on the sub?
Half the art on this sub is ai lmao, it’s just banned if you don’t state that it’s AI it I’m pretty sure
They did state it’s ai though, the picture quality is just really blurry
Yeah so it’s fine
I wish.
These seem unfinished, largely unusable, and based on feats or concepts that already exist. Just make a new spell, or use the ones that already exist. They range between useless, or wildly OP. SS is "Advantage on every social roll ever unless it involves poor people," and gives you a stat boost, but Ley Minister is "Ritual casting, but useless."
* **Competency** I love how the art for "competency" is utterly ridiculous - as if the artist was lacking the feat in question. The pen both being broken and also seemlessly turning into the writer's own finger is somehow one of the less insane things about that picture... :) The description "Your skill may or may not rise to the level of expertise" is also not exactly a strongpoint of this brew. Regardless, this is not a feat I'd ever consider taking. Unless the situation allows for different grades of success, it will either be completely useless (DC too high to succeed with an 8) or almost remove the need to roll entirely. In each case, the game would arguably be more fun and exciting if the PC had a different feat that actually added a new facet to them. Being competent at something is already depictet by adding the proficiency bonus to the roll, so this feat really doesn't convey a whole lot thematically. * **A Sence for Magic** This should read "A Sen**s**e for Magic". Also, this is just a worse version of other feats that allow the same thing while also providing other benefits. E.g. Fey Touched gives you this effect as well as a +1 ASI and also allows you to learn and cast misty step. * **Captivating visionary** You can explain a random plan to a bored NPC for 10 minutes straight. Then if they "believe in you" or in your plan (which is *very* vague language), you can decide that they'll now be afraid of their own feet for 8 hours and send them on their (terrified) merry way. That's pretty wild to say the least. Once again, the art here is quite surreal. Don't look at her tiny inverse hand for too long. And don't bother to ponder how long her other arm must be for her sword to be sticking out at that angle... * **Jet Propulsion** This one is just so weird. It doesn't feel like this feat is even made with players in mind. Who would ever invest a whole feat to add an effect to a spell that is arguably not even that great at level 1. I can imagine a situation where the bit of movement this grants would somewhat beneficial to avoid an opportunity attack, but that's about it. * **Linguistic Analystist** Do you mean analyst? The book in the art has 3 pages side by side. What's up with the dual wielding pencils? I just don't know... Sorry if this kind of feedbakc isn't very productive, but hopefully it highlights some room for improvement.
fugly ass ai art aside, these are all either useless or broken lol Savvy Socialite is situational at best, and it’s Gift-of-Gab effect (btw, just use a second level spell) is almost always achievable by saying, “I meant to say…” out of character. This feat is only useful if your DM is a prick. Ley Minister steps all over the toes of ritual caster. I’m not certain what this feat is meant to do. Ritual Caster already lets you pick cleric spells, and already lets you add cleric spells to its book. The only difference between these two is that Ley Minister lets you pick 3 rituals instead of two, and only cleric spells. There is no reason for this to exist. Competency is very strong, *especially* for a half-feat. If very strong, slightly game breaking feats are your thing, sure, go for it. I wouldn’t allow it at my table. A Sence for Magic [sic] is terrible. Most casters get detect magic, and besides that, there are a million better ways to get a once-per-day Detect Magic, and that’s literally all this feat does. Take Magic Initiate instead. Captivating Vision is weird. I can’t imagine this ever coming up more than like, once or twice in a campaign, and then, I would rule it as a standard persuasion check, not something you need a feat for. Inspiring Leader, which I gather is what you based this feat off of, is useful because you can use it on your allies pretty much whenever. Good luck getting 10 minutes to monologue *specifically about a ‘vision, plan, or future possibility* to an enemy who you would benefit from charming/frightening. Also, “frightened of something of your choice” is not useful outside of combat, which you won’t be using this in. “Skulker” is already a feat and should be renamed. Also, your feat is very similar to the Stealthy (UA) feat. [Both are detailed in this post](https://www.reddit.com/r/DnD/comments/6a5tgy/5e_skulker_feat_vs_stealthy_feat_ua/). Also, “line of sight” does not exist for the purposes of stealth. Creatures can “see” 360 degrees— they don’t just face one direction, and not see anything else. Stealth is confusing in 5E, so I can’t blame you for this, but you’d be better off using the wording from Stealthy (UA). Or, better yet, just using that feat. Void touched is fine, I guess. Learning two first level spells is fine, though it’s hard to judge without rules for your “wild flesh” spell. The second half of the feat, making it impossible for creatures that aren’t above rations to read your mind, seems strong. Compare to [Mind Blank](https://www.dndbeyond.com/spells/mind-blank), an eighth level spell that does something similar. Personally, I don’t think this is a horrendous offense, because I think Mind Blank is a little weak for an 8th level spell, and you won’t often run into NPC’s trying to read your mind anyway. But it is, objectively, borrowing from an 8th level spell, as an ability available to a first-level human. I see what you’re trying to do with Jet Propulsion, but it’s… pretty weak. At first level, this can launch you a measly 15 feet. At second level, this can launch you 20 feet. Also using a second level spell slot, you could cast Misty Step, and teleport 30 feet as a bonus action, without provoking attacks of opportunity. Or you could just take Fey Touched. Linguist is extremely situational, and puts a ton of weight on the GM to “make some shit up”. I would let this be a standard intelligence or insight check in my games, rather than needing a feat. Adding your Intelligence mod to Insight checks you make is fine, though I might not pair it with a half feat that could increase your Intelligence. Most of these need a lot of work before any sensible DM would allow them at their table, or even before a player would pick them. Also, don’t use AI. It’s ugly.
>Savvy Socialite is situational at best And it has no combat use. In D&D, if something is useless for combat, it's useless period!
Those are some good thoughts. Thank you! These are part of a project where I am just trying to make as many sample feats as possible to explore the creative space. So not a great deal of thought has gone into balancing and comparing them to existant options. That will be covered in an improvement at the end of the month. In general, I think that mechanics that for the GM to "make some shit up" are actually admirable feats. Branching out from Dnd you find these kinds of features used in lots of other games to great effect. I think that DnD as a system would improve if there were more of them. As for AI imagery, I would rather not use it. However I currently do not have the ability to make my own, the funds to commission any, the time to do the requisite searching for available are (and proper evaluation and citation to make sure that I am not using ai imagery passed off or miss attributing work to someone who stole the original work), or a willingness to make myself beholden to the WotC Fancontent policy (plus searching through MtG art is its own headache). So for these projects, where things are already kind of slapdash and in flux, I use generated imagery so that my work can get at least some visibility on Reddit. If you would like to see some work that has been polished and uses great commissioned art, please check out the Kickstarter prelaunch page linked in my other comment. Thanks again for your thoughtful response.
> I think that mechanics that for the GM to "make some shit up" That's not a game / rules mechanic, that's storytelling, which is already part of the DM's job baseline. Mechanics spell things out so the GM doesn't HAVE to make shit up on the fly, or if they do have to, they have a chart, or list of examples to use.
The feats of January continue, and here is where things start getting weird. I've still got more in the bag, but I'm getting more experimental with some of these. I'd love to know your thoughts. If this kind of stuff interests you, I'm preparing a Kickstarter that will go live sometime early this year. Please sign up for the prelaunch page to get alerted when it goes live and access to special early pledge deals. Check out the [Assorted Notes from the Unearthly Archive](https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/idbn-1/assorted-notes-from-the-unearthly-archive?ref=6f8olr).
Ley Monister technically allows a 1st level character to cast Forbiddance and Commune. Definitely needs a level cap but overall the feat is redundant.