Quote Originally Posted by Tyndmyr View Post
I feel like I must say that while epic feats for both of those exist in 3.5, they were the sucky epic feats. More importantly, you can get those in 3.5 without being epic at all, though slightly more knowledge/conditional what not is required.

Let's break 'em down in more detail.

Alert. Fantastic. Mostly for the "can't be surprised". The init bonus is awesome, but init pumping is a thing in 3.5...not being surprised is particularly nice, and not usually available early on in 3.5. The proficiency is mostly irrelevant.

Arcane Archer. It's good they realized this wasn't really a PrC worthy thing. Given that it's value is similar to being able to use a single spell storing arrow at once...it's not unreasonable.

Archery Master. Good, has options...none of which are particularly unique, Im afraid. The flurry of shots option is a hard -5 to everything, and thus, will very rarely be a better choice than just shooting. Ignoring cover is kind of nice, but in 3.5, cover wasn't that big of a deal. A little extra AC? Meh. Long range? Meh, in 3.5, range increments didn't come up much for most weapons, and a -2 wasn't a big deal in any case. Actual archers didn't usually care about range. Proficiency...seriously, not important. Anyone into archery is already proficient with their bow.

Athelete. This is like the boring skill feats that were mostly ignored in 3.5. I suppose the single stat bump makes it technically different, but it is still pretty uninteresting.

Charger...so, it's like Powerful Charge or summat, a very mediocre 3.5 feat. Whatever. Pushing didn't really require a feat back in the day....

Dual wielder. Kind of a mish mash. Penalties appear to not exist. Being proficient with martial light weapons isn't a big deal. So, it's a +1 AC bonus. Pretty sure that existed in 3.5, and I'm also pretty sure I don't care about it.

Fencing Master. Second ability is kind of cool, and is both fluffy and potentially useful. The added attack option, sadly, is also weak. Yeah, I get that statistically, getting advantage is kind of like +5 when the TN is sort of in the middle of the range...but the actual cap hasn't changed. This is not true for flat bonuses or penalties. Thus, the actual benefit may be less than this. A -5 to all attacks kind of sucks.

Great wpn again has one good ability. It basically stole cleave from pathfinder. There's an odd, meh, power attack like ability, but I must say that the static -5s and proficiencies are still unimpressive.

Healer. Handy.

Heavy Armor Mastery. The only relevant bit is the DR. That existed in 3.5 too. Roll With It would be my favorite source, but it was far from the only one.

Loremaster. Ugh, one of these for each stat, each as boring as the last. Got it.

Lucky. Yup, ripped off luck feats, with less overall power. Meh.

Arcane/Divine Initiate. Yeah, these are also pretty much copies from 3.5. Mildly interesting, but not actually new....

Magic Adept. Well, they've formalized some minor shenanigans and optimization. Doesn't bother me, but again, not new.

Mobile. Speed increases are terrible. The ability seems vaguely interesting, but it's really just another variant on Mobility, which sucked.

Mounted Combatant. This is pretty terrible compared to charger anything from 3.5.

Ok, I'm bored with these, but you see the trend. It's just 3.5 feats boiled down, really.
I'd say the Magic Adept/Initiate feats are underpowered (I'd have preferred the feats to be able to grant level 8 or 9 spells at max level... wording like "You may select a spell of a level equal to half your character level, and cast it once per day" instead of make it a mess of multiple feats.

If all these feats were added to 3.5 with their current wording, they'd be terrible. However, they synergize extremely well with the mechanics. Cover is MUCH more potent than a piddly +2 in D&D Next. "Archery Master" turns into a deadly, long-range sniper, instead of having to hope for her enemies to get within 'walk up and hit me' range before being able to apply precision damage. She can also apply it through cover. D&D Next is more about the holistic approach to the dungeon than a 50'x50' combat arena. Advantage/disadvantage pushes the distribution to the ends of the RNG, but still gravitate toward the center of a person's competence, instead of giving them suddenly-godlike competence or abject incompetence.

Mobile is 3.5's Spring Attack, Bounding Assault, and Rapid Blitz all in one - Anyone can move and attack, but AoOs generally dissuade that. You can be a spinning Dual-Wielding Drow Ranger dancing across the battlefield with it, or a nuisance with a polearm. The +10 feet movement is a 25-50% increase in land speed. To throw in Mobility, it would probably want to make all other Opportunity Attacks be made at disadvantage.


I really wish D&D Next allowed characters to start with a feat at first level.